Need Guidance as my move to LPS is not going well

William Norman · May 9, 2018

I hope someone might be able to find a silver bullet for me.

Tank is little over a year old.

55G, with HOB, SB Reef light. about 50lbs of reef rock.

I do water changes, clean filter pads and replace filter floss in hob every week. I do alternating 5 gallon and 10 gallon water changes. Using combination of natural seawater that has been sitting at my house in dark for 14 days+ and I fill in with RO water and Reef Crystal's when I need to. I heat water to approx 78 prior to adding back.

I use RO with 0-TDS for top off with Kalk.

I have been adding LPS for the past 4 months without much luck. I already have leathers, rose bulb tip, discus and palys that are doing well.

I put all coral in QT for 77 days and then put them into my display tank.

I started with 5 chalices and favites from WWC. Moved into my display tank in Feb

I added another favites and a hammer same process in March.

I have my water parms doubled check by the two LFS that I use.

Water Parms last 5 Months. Test every week prior to Water change, Ammonia, PH and Temp monitored by Seneye.
Temp - 76-78 - avg 77.2
Ammonia, Nitrates and Nitrites have been stable 0
Salinity - stable 1.024 - 1.025
Calcium - 380 - 440, Last 4 weeks 400-420
Mag - 1320 - 1450 Last 4 weeks 1320-1350
point of sale - .25-.5
PH - 8.10 - 8.28, Avg - 8.16
KH - had some high reading 11-13 with my API Kit. I was using Kalk in my top off, slowly lowered to 0 and still KH was high. LFS said it was 9 & 10 so I bought a Salifert Kit and it has been reading in the 9s the last 2 weeks. Added small amount of Kalk back to RO this week.

All the chalices and favites have lost color and look greenish/brown. The first 5 didn't look great coming out of QT. Since then they havent improved.
The hammer has not looked great, not getting good extension. I think it got stung by the favite in QT early on and lost a head, but the other head is not looking good.
The favite added in March lost the yellow in the eyes.

They are all on sand bed with about 100/150 par.

I have moved them around a little to see if that would help. When I put them in display, I stated off in lower par (around 50) and moved them closer to center to get more par after a few weeks.

I now have another favites and torch that are looking real good in QT, but I am nervous to move them.

I have not seen any fish or inverts picking on corals.

Any ideas ? I am thinking that my QT might not be stable enough, but thought they would come back in the display tank.

cmcoker · May 9, 2018

How does the nitrate in QT compare to the DT. These like it a bit dirtier

mav3rick478 · May 9, 2018

PH should be 8.4, 8.1 is tolerable but not for long.

How much flow do you have and how intense are your lights. LPS prefer a bluer hue but don't require blinding bright lights especially if you're doing chalices and favites.

Try taking your Leather out for a few weeks and see if your LPS react, sometimes in rare occasions there is chemical warfare going on but I'm more inclined to think it's your lighting spectrum since your losing color.

William Norman · May 9, 2018

Cmcoker-
My Ammonia, Nitrates and Nitrites have been 0 in my QT. How do you suggest raising my dirt ? Heaver feeding ? or dosing food grade potassium nitrate ?

Mav3rick -
I know PH is ideal at 8.4 . I am going to try and raise it back slowly now that I know my KH is not high. But would that cause them to lose color and not grow ?
I have medium flow higher in the tank but on the sand bed where the frags are is low.
How would you qualify intense ? The par rages from 100/150 that they are getting currently. I have my blues on 8 hours and my white on 5 hours.
Interesting thought about chemical warfare. I thought leathers were peaceful. I wonder if running carbon or chem pure might help. I would hate to remove the leathers, they are much higher in the tank and my largest corals.

cmcoker · May 9, 2018

Do you see any feeding tentacles ever, like after lights out? Might try spot feeding with something like reefroids if you do, maybe a couple times a week to start.

William Norman · May 9, 2018

cmcoker said:
Do you see any feeding tentacles ever, like after lights out? Might try spot feeding with something like reefroids if you do, maybe a couple times a week to start.

I have looked , but I have never seen the sweepers. I have been using reef roids twice a week but my solution is much thinner. I am going to try making it thicker like the video and try some after the light go out on the Chalices and Favias.

mav3rick478 · May 9, 2018

William Norman said:
Mav3rick -
I know PH is ideal at 8.4 . I am going to try and raise it back slowly now that I know my KH is not high. But would that cause them to lose color and not grow ?
I have medium flow higher in the tank but on the sand bed where the frags are is low.
How would you qualify intense ? The par rages from 100/150 that they are getting currently. I have my blues on 8 hours and my white on 5 hours.
Interesting thought about chemical warfare. I thought leathers were peaceful. I wonder if running carbon or chem pure might help. I would hate to remove the leathers, they are much higher in the tank and my largest corals.

I'm not familiar with how your lights work but my Reef Breeders Superlux has 2 channels that I can adjust time and intensity. 1 channel is mostly blues which I have on for 10 hours with power setting at 65, second channel is the white with other colors mixed which are on for 8 hours but only set at 15. This gives my task a more blue hue that my corals seem to like. How is yours set up?

Do you have pics of your tank?

I've been using Reef Roids like that for a few weeks now after seeing that video and my corals seem better. I have a Goniopora frag that had been dead for months coming back to life probably because of the favite next to it that I use Reef Roids on.

Dburr1014 · May 11, 2018

William Norman said:
KH - had some high reading 11-13 with my API Kit. I was using Kalk in my top off, slowly lowered to 0 and still KH was high. LFS said it was 9 & 10 so I bought a Salifert Kit and it has been reading in the 9s the last 2 weeks. Added small amount of Kalk back to RO this week.

All the chalices and favites have lost color and look greenish/brown. The first 5 didn't look great coming out of QT. Since then they havent improved.

This alk swing will cause corals to brown out and it may take weeks for them to get back to color. Keep this stable as possible.

Also, where are you getting the sea water from? Coastal or deep water? Where do you live? I'm just thinking about pollution and stuff that may be in the water that you don't know or can't check for.

William Norman · May 11, 2018

I am not sure if I did have an alk swing due to the testing from the LFS saying it was 9. But you are saying that would cause them to brown... So maybe. How many weeks would it be till they get color back ?

I get my sea water from an ocean research institute that gets it from deep water. It is the same water they use. Its pretty cool they do research on the effects of various things on the oceans and teach school children on how to save our oceans. I am lucky in that they are right around the corner from me. Plus I let it sit for 14 days in the dark to make sure everything in the water is dead. They have fantastic prices on corals and fish, they use the profits to help support their research.

Dburr1014 · May 12, 2018

I had sps that went brown for about 3 weeks. I was surprised cuz I heard it Coyle take longer. The alk swing also made my lps close up and recede. All has recovered.