Torch Coral issue

cohojoe412 · Jun 5, 2024

Looking to see if anyone has any ideas on what’s going on with my torch and any action I can take. Tank has been up for 6 months with no issues other than ones created by me. Has been very stable with parameters staying within 10% week over week. All torches, acan etc seemed happy. Over the last couple days this one torch head looked like its mouth was wide open and now seems to have exposed skeleton.

Recent changes:
Added a UV in the sump 8 days ago
Changed salt from AF reef pro hybrid to AF reef pro, have done 2 20% water changes with the new salt. I have mixed some pro hybrid with the reef pro to ease the change.
I changed out carbon today to see if perhaps something got in the tank

Parameters:
Salinity 1.026
Temp:78
Ph:7.95-8.15
Alkalinity: 8.9, this is up slightly from 8.5
Calcium: 435-450
Magnesium: 1440
Nitrate: 8-10
Phosphate:0.27 (this is high I know but was managing with 20% water change)

Here are some pictures:

Rest of the coral seems fine, detracted and open mouths because I tried feeding but all were closed prior.

Shot from a few days ago during lights on:

fishguy242 · Jun 6, 2024

@MERKEY

MERKEY · Jun 6, 2024

Tanks young and you've had a lot of changes recently.

Some corals can handle the swings better than others. Even same species of coral right next to each other will react differently to environmental changes.

This one may pull through.

You'll get different advice as everyone runs their tanks differently.

Nothing in your numbers looks "off"...I've seen tanks run at .2-3 P04 and are beautiful.

So I'd try to keep things stable from here on. Don't Chace numbers and let your tank settle.

Losing coral sucks and I'm sorry, but it's part of the hobby.

How bad is the flesh on that one?

Gumbies R Us · Jun 6, 2024

I just had a torch with its skeleton showing, but it bounced back pretty quickly after I moved it around and did some water changes.

cohojoe412 · Jun 6, 2024

MERKEY said:
Tanks young and you've had a lot of changes recently.

Some corals can handle the swings better than others. Even same species of coral right next to each other will react differently to environmental changes.

This one may pull through.

You'll get different advice as everyone runs their tanks differently.

Nothing in your numbers looks "off"...I've seen tanks run at .2-3 P04 and are beautiful.

So I'd try to keep things stable from here on. Don't Chace numbers and let your tank settle.

Losing coral sucks and I'm sorry, but it's part of the hobby.

How bad is the flesh on that one?

Yea I’m just going to leave things alone. Flesh looks about the same as last night so hopefully recovers. The head next to it has an open mouth now too so will keep an eye on it.