Montipora dying???

[tundraguy1106]

Hey so over the past few weeks I’ve noticed an issue with all of my montipora. Not coloring up and now starting to turn white. I’ve also had an issue with my candy cane coral and my space invader pectinia receding.
Parameters as of today are

Alk - 8.8 dkh
No3 - 5 ppm
Phos - .04 ppm
Cal - 465
Mag - 1440
Salinity - 1.025
Ph 8.0

I did have a spike in Allalinity a few weeks ago where it went up to 9.5 for a few days. That’s when I noticed the recession on my Pectinia. All of my other SPS frags look fine, encrusting and coloring up. I think it might be a lighting issue since I did have a couple of the montipora up around 300+ PAR. However my flaming Phoenix was also around high 200’s low 300’s and it was starting to encrust. Now it’s getting pale and I noticed algae on it today. The only change I’ve made to my lighting was swapping it one of my T5’s from a coral plus to an actinic bulb. This is an aquaticlife hybrid, running 2 blue plus, 1 coral plus and 1 actinic now. I’m also running 2 AI Hydra 32’s. The T5’s are only running for 3-1/2 hours mid day. I’ll attach my hydra schedule.

many help would be appreciated. I just did a water change and I’m dipping two of my montipora now. Gonna place them low on my frag rack with my new SPS and see what happens. All of my torches, hammer, blastos, chalice, anemone and frog spawns all look fine. Just the montipora. I’ve also attached a picture from the last time I had a PAR meter. I did lower the whites and raised my blues since then.

 

[tundraguy1106]

Current rock structure picture.

 

[tundraguy1106]

Bump

 

[tundraguy1106]

Well from my research I think I might have figured out my problem. I think my high alk mixed with high PAR in my tank is causing the issues. I’ve currently moved most of my montipora s to a frag rack low in my tank and stopped dosing alkalinity. I’m going to check my alkalinity daily till it reaches 7.8-8.0 and then start dosing again to maintain the new level. I’m also switching my salt mix to tropic Marin pro since their alkalinity level is similar to my goal level. I’m currently using reef crystal since it’s cheap and dii is don’t realize how high their alkalinity levels were in the mix.

if anyone else has any input, feel free to share. Thanks

 

[Zoid]

I too have been having a similar issue to yours. Usually Montipora sp are hardy but some imbalance in certain parameters can cause them to die off.

• I would try to bring the Ca down to at least 440
• There could be Montipora Eating Nudibranch present, you might want to inspect the corals.
• Low potassium

I would recommend doing 2x weekly water changes to bring the water parameters to the desired levels.

Hope this helps.