SPS problems.. browning and loss of polyps

[125mph]

LPS and zoas doing great... SPS almost never works out for some reason.

Got a purple stylo that seem to be doing good but now I notice polyps in the bottom half are half as much as the top part. Top part of the stylo still appears good but in past when I saw this happen, they upper portion starts to lose polyps as well Also have a few acros and they are all browning out. Running lots of flow. I thought my lights might be low when I finally checked with par meter (was about 150 a the acros) ... I raised a few percent a week in hopes to get the color to come back and now its at around 250-300 at the acros and stylo but acros still brown (and some parts of branch may be dying). Doesnt seem like increasing the lights did anything so far.

Like I mentioned, running lots of flow.. running 3 MP40s (two on one side and one on other side) of a 64"x29"x22" tank (180g). I have torches and they are blowing around heavily.

I do have one green birdsnest that is doing very well, great colors and polyps. It's placed very low relative to the stylo and acros.

I started keeping log of parameters. Here they are..

Hows this look, is it stable enough? (Tests are using hanna)

Also have lots of fish, feeding the fish a lot to keep nutrients where they are. If I don't feed, nirtates and phosphates gets very low.. Also feed the tank redsea AB+ every day, and benereef or reefroads 2x a week.

 

[bobnicaragua]

Yeah that’s stable enough. Can you post some pics?

 

[125mph]

Yeah that’s stable enough. Can you post some pics?

This green birdsnest is the best looking one.


This is the stylo, bottom half isnt looking good.


These are some acros that are all brown. THat one with the multiple branches looks like some tips are dying. It used to look pink and tons of polyps.





This one is called a cali tort. It does have some blue and green tints thats hard to see from the pic. Its doing "okay".

 

[Dburr1014]

LPS and zoas doing great... SPS almost never works out for some reason.

Got a purple stylo that seem to be doing good but now I notice polyps in the bottom half are half as much as the top part. Top part of the stylo still appears good but in past when I saw this happen, they upper portion starts to lose polyps as well Also have a few acros and they are all browning out. Running lots of flow. I thought my lights might be low when I finally checked with par meter (was about 150 a the acros) ... I raised a few percent a week in hopes to get the color to come back and now its at around 250-300 at the acros and stylo but acros still brown (and some parts of branch may be dying). Doesnt seem like increasing the lights did anything so far.

Like I mentioned, running lots of flow.. running 3 MP40s (two on one side and one on other side) of a 64"x29"x22" tank (180g). I have torches and they are blowing around heavily.

I do have one green birdsnest that is doing very well, great colors and polyps. It's placed very low relative to the stylo and acros.

I started keeping log of parameters. Here they are..

Hows this look, is it stable enough? (Tests are using hanna)

Also have lots of fish, feeding the fish a lot to keep nutrients where they are. If I don't feed, nirtates and phosphates gets very low.. Also feed the tank redsea AB+ every day, and benereef or reefroads 2x a week.

You have some nems that look close to the stylo.

Do you run GAC?

Numbers look great.
How old is the tank? And how was it started?

Do you happen to have a video of the flow?
3 mp40 in a 64" long tank seems low to me.
I have 1 wav, 1 mp40 and 2 gyre in a 60".

 

[125mph]

I do run GAC but only a very small amount in the BRS reactor.. Is GAC bad?

The nem's dont touch the stylo. Even when that haddoni gets as big as he does at the middle of the day, he cant touch stylo.

Here's a video of the flow. I run Reef Crest at 63%. I would crank it up more but it seems so much flow already. Let me know what you think about the flow?

 

[125mph]

Hows the flow look? SHould I get a 4th MP40? If thats why the sps arent surviving, I can get it.. but if thats not it, then dont wana waste money.

 

[Dburr1014]

Flow actually looks good, though your sand doesn't blow around like mine does. LOL

 

[stewy14]

turn the flow off for a bit, around an hour
but keep return pump and filtration on

 

[125mph]

turn the flow off for a bit, around an hour
but keep return pump and filtration on

For what purpose? I do run feed mode at night when I feed the AB+ , which basically does this.

 

[stewy14]

For what purpose? I do run feed mode at night when I feed the AB+ , which basically does this.

the stylo may be stressed out due to too much flow, so turn it off to see if it is stressed, I always do this to see if that is the problem, stylos like medium flow too

 

[stewy14]

double post sorry

 

[stewy14]

oh ye, and the browning is algae

 

[125mph]

Tested out two green slimer .. One placed high in the tank and one placed low/medium in the tank... and this time, the tips are getting white and I can start to see algae on it so obviously its bleaching.. both are doing the same. (white top bleaching). Not looking good... What could this be? I got two cheap sps to "test" out placement but now I believe light is not the issue.

Parameters are all in line still...

The high placement has around 300 par and the low placement has around 180-200par. The LFS told me their frags are around 300 par lighting and the main colony sits at around 450 par.

 

[Kactai]

I would suggest checking for stray voltage, getting an ICP test and checking PAR levels (you can use the Photone App with your phone in a ziplock bag - it's decently accurate). Also read up about DOC effects on a reef tank. major parameters seem fine so it could be a bunch of things. Anyone else want to add your troubleshooting steps when your SPS aren't doing well?

 

[125mph]

Thank you! Also note that I've never been able to keep any SPS other than a single green birdsnest which is placed at the bottom of the tank. All my zoas, torches, hammers, frogspawn and a bounce sroom is doing well. A haddoni and a bta also doing well... Just no to all other SPS. After placing in tank, SPS either brown out and die or bleach out and die,.. If they bleach, happens within a week. If they brown out, happens over a month.

 

[TeamAquaSD]

LPS and zoas doing great... SPS almost never works out for some reason.

Got a purple stylo that seem to be doing good but now I notice polyps in the bottom half are half as much as the top part. Top part of the stylo still appears good but in past when I saw this happen, they upper portion starts to lose polyps as well Also have a few acros and they are all browning out. Running lots of flow. I thought my lights might be low when I finally checked with par meter (was about 150 a the acros) ... I raised a few percent a week in hopes to get the color to come back and now its at around 250-300 at the acros and stylo but acros still brown (and some parts of branch may be dying). Doesnt seem like increasing the lights did anything so far.

Like I mentioned, running lots of flow.. running 3 MP40s (two on one side and one on other side) of a 64"x29"x22" tank (180g). I have torches and they are blowing around heavily.

I do have one green birdsnest that is doing very well, great colors and polyps. It's placed very low relative to the stylo and acros.

I started keeping log of parameters. Here they are..

Hows this look, is it stable enough? (Tests are using hanna)

Also have lots of fish, feeding the fish a lot to keep nutrients where they are. If I don't feed, nirtates and phosphates gets very low.. Also feed the tank redsea AB+ every day, and benereef or reefroads 2x a week.

If the acros are browning out I would start looking at phosphate which is usually the main cause

 

[RelaxingWithTheReef]

The tank looks a little young, but in spite of your water changes and using AB+ this is likely a trace element issue. I suggest the following:

The Jason Fox solution to everything – Water Changes! 4 to 5 20% water changes over a few days, then continue moderate weekly water changes.
No Reef-Roids as standard food (very high phosphate content).

Start by dosing Tropic Marin A- & K+ per label.
Dose Brightwell Aquatics Ferrion. Don’t follow the directions on bottle, only dose 1ug/l (0.001mg/l) once or twice a week. This will probably be only a few drops each time.
Perform the very sensitive Oceamo ICP-MS test (see Reef Moonshiners Webstore), and correct trace elements. Especially the ones that deplete quickly:

Cobalt (B12)
Iron
Manganese
Selenium
Chromium
Copper
Zinc
Nickel

Continue to monitor trace elements with ICP-MS. Note - Standard ICP will only identify elevated levels, but not depleted levels of many trace elements. ICP-MS is a must!

If a trace element deficiency is corrected, you can expect a pretty quick and significant improvement in as fast as a few days, and also a shift in the tanks biology. It may go through some ugliness as the tank re-balances, and unfortunately you may also have to deal with some pests. But give it some time, address the issues, and that should do the trick.

It’s not your current problem, but for SPS I would consider slowly lowering Nitrate to around 5ppm, and phosphate to around 0.050ppm.

 

[branbray07]

Hows the flow look? SHould I get a 4th MP40? If thats why the sps arent surviving, I can get it.. but if thats not it, then dont wana waste money.

IMO you have more than enough flow. Like plentyyyyy

 

[125mph]

The tank looks a little young, but in spite of your water changes and using AB+ this is likely a trace element issue. I suggest the following:

The Jason Fox solution to everything – Water Changes! 4 to 5 20% water changes over a few days, then continue moderate weekly water changes.
No Reef-Roids as standard food (very high phosphate content).

Start by dosing Tropic Marin A- & K+ per label.
Dose Brightwell Aquatics Ferrion. Don’t follow the directions on bottle, only dose 1ug/l (0.001mg/l) once or twice a week. This will probably be only a few drops each time.
Perform the very sensitive Oceamo ICP-MS test (see Reef Moonshiners Webstore), and correct trace elements. Especially the ones that deplete quickly:

Cobalt (B12)
Iron
Manganese
Selenium
Chromium
Copper
Zinc
Nickel

Continue to monitor trace elements with ICP-MS. Note - Standard ICP will only identify elevated levels, but not depleted levels of many trace elements. ICP-MS is a must!

If a trace element deficiency is corrected, you can expect a pretty quick and significant improvement in as fast as a few days, and also a shift in the tanks biology. It may go through some ugliness as the tank re-balances, and unfortunately you may also have to deal with some pests. But give it some time, address the issues, and that should do the trick.

It’s not your current problem, but for SPS I would consider slowly lowering Nitrate to around 5ppm, and phosphate to around 0.050ppm.

Thanks all!

I will start with the water changes right now and got the order of the A- and K+... though I'm not sure its the trace elements, willing to give it a try.

One thing I've not been good at is keeping up with water changes... I'm at 1x or 2x a month, maybe thats the problem... but I see other reefers that do 1x a month or even 1x every 3 months and still have success... I do run a calcium reactor and been told as long as the alk/calc/phos/nitrate are in line, then water change isnt necessary.

Going to try doing multiple water changes and then weekly changes to see if that changes things.

 

[justy]

LPS and zoas doing great... SPS almost never works out for some reason.

Got a purple stylo that seem to be doing good but now I notice polyps in the bottom half are half as much as the top part. Top part of the stylo still appears good but in past when I saw this happen, they upper portion starts to lose polyps as well Also have a few acros and they are all browning out. Running lots of flow. I thought my lights might be low when I finally checked with par meter (was about 150 a the acros) ... I raised a few percent a week in hopes to get the color to come back and now its at around 250-300 at the acros and stylo but acros still brown (and some parts of branch may be dying). Doesnt seem like increasing the lights did anything so far.

Like I mentioned, running lots of flow.. running 3 MP40s (two on one side and one on other side) of a 64"x29"x22" tank (180g). I have torches and they are blowing around heavily.

I do have one green birdsnest that is doing very well, great colors and polyps. It's placed very low relative to the stylo and acros.

I started keeping log of parameters. Here they are..

Hows this look, is it stable enough? (Tests are using hanna)

Also have lots of fish, feeding the fish a lot to keep nutrients where they are. If I don't feed, nirtates and phosphates gets very low.. Also feed the tank redsea AB+ every day, and benereef or reefroads 2x a week.

Hi, Looking at your numbers your alk and particularly your calcium have swung significantly over a short period I would focus my efforts on keeping everything stable, and do regular WC.
keep it simple