Echinopora dying

[Faciosity]

I'm very sad. I got a tiny hollywood stunner chalice about 4 months ago, and it was growing at an incredible rate. Over the last couple days, dead spots have appeared and are getting bigger. It looks like the dead spots are right where the mouths were, like they have been falling off. It was in a place of low flow, and I moved it to higher flow to help heal and prevent infection, but it has continued to recede. Should I frag off the good parts, or ride it out? Checking my water perameters right now, but I doubt anything has drastically changed. It's possible that it was triggered by the recent heat wave. I have been trying to control it with AC, fans, and frozen bottles in the sump, but it reached about 83 a couple days ago, and has been up to 81-82 several times. I try to keep it 78ish, but with the fans on it drops to about 75 at night and quickly rises to 80 in the afternoon. No other corals have shown any other signs.

 

[Faciosity]

ok, I take it back. Now that I've been thinking about it, other corals might have had the same symptoms. My tri-color valida had a spot on the bottom area start to recede not long ago, but I didn't think much of it, because I thought it had been stung by something else, and it stopped receding quickly and is doing well. A month or so back, a birdsnest started receding for unknown reasons, and stopped about half way. My system isn't up to standards by most peoples views because of the lack of a skimmer, ro water, and because I never dose anything. I keep it clean and do water changes every week -2 weeks and have not had any major issues except algae growth and nitrates that vary from 10-20 ppm. I have never checked my calcium or magnesium, and don't know the first thing about doing it. I'm not too into SPS, and havn't ever had these problems with my LPS until now.

 

[mjslaugh]

Are you testing for Ca/Alk/Mag?? If not you should, those are gonna cause the most problems with sps if not addressed soon enough, with that said though those nitrates are kinda high, so I would bump up the water changes at least until that is back in check.

 

[returnofsid]

Calcium, Alkalinity and Magnesium, in balanced and appropriate levels, are very important to all Stony Corals, SPS and LPS. If your levels are too low, it will cause tissue loss. For now, I would recommend putting superglue over the dead areas, to discourage algae growth, and then keep a close eye on the areas to make sure they don't spread. If they continue to spread, then it's time to do some aggressive fragging, to save the living tissue.

I'd also suggest you get test kits for Mg, Alk and Ca, test your levels, and dose accordingly.

In my signature, you'll find 2 links. One is to DIY Randy's Supplement recipes. The other link is to a great chemistry calculator, that will help you determine your dosing needs.

 

[Herefishyfishy]

Detritus doesn't bother them, but any falling stray salt crystals will cause burn spots. Similar with pieces of LPS sweepers or anemone tenticals that might break off in the current. Temp changes with less than perfect water quality can also really affect them and seems to be the most probable cause. Besides fix the temp swings, do a partial water change and run fresh carbon in case it is from chem warfare

 

[Faciosity]

Been watching it, and it seemed like the spots didn't get any bigger, but when I picked it up to glue the spots like Michael suggested, I noticed that there were more than last time. I am still trying to keep the temps down, and stabalize my water quality, but am worried I might lose it so I fragged a small piece on the edge just in case. Hope it makes a better turn around, but if it gets any worse I will just frag as many pieces of the good live tissue as I can get and place them in all different places so hopefully at least one will do well.

 

[Faciosity]

This colony died about half way from the inside out before I finally saved it. It has since then doubled in size and grown completely over the dead spots in the center. Just thought I would share. This is one of my favorite corals that I have, because I started it so small and now it's so big and pretty! I fragged out of desperation when it started dying, so I have 3 extra frags of it that are starting to grow very fast!

Compare it to the picture at the top of the page when it first started dying.

 

[ntswift]

Wow! Sounds like you got your water parameters dialed in! Also like you may have some frags up for grabs!

 

[FreakinReefin]

This colony died about half way from the inside out before I finally saved it. It has since then doubled in size and grown completely over the dead spots in the center. Just thought I would share. This is one of my favorite corals that I have, because I started it so small and now it's so big and pretty! I fragged out of desperation when it started dying, so I have 3 extra frags of it that are starting to grow very fast!

Compare it to the picture at the top of the page when it first started dying.

So what, specifically, did you do to change your tank/water quality etc...to save the coral?

 

[Faciosity]

Didn't change anything! Never found the reason why it started dying. Everything else was fine. I moved it several times over the course of a week until I found a spot that it liked. It stopped dying and started growing again. I've changed a lot since then, including adding a protein skimmer, a fuge, and some more powerheads, but that's not what saved it. Couldn't really say for sure. When one coral starts not doing well, but everything else is, first thing I try is moving it into more/less light/flow to try and find a sweet spot.