sps browning out

[NW Fish Dude]

This is getting frustrating. Except for a red monti cap and a green slimer, I'm struggling with my sps a bit. Recently I purchased a blue Cali tort, and a white montipora digitata. They looked great at the LFS, but after about a week the digitata rapidly got brown, starting from the tips and now involves most of the coral. And now in the last few days the Cali tort's tips have started to brown and there is much less polyp extension. The fish, LPS, and others are all fine. Lighting is with two Ecotech radions about 10" off the surface. I do 5% WC weekly. I use RODI, run a good skimmer, and have a fuge.

parameters seem good:
SG - 1.025
Ca - 420
alk - 9.4 dkh
mg - 1340
ph 8.1 -8.25
phosphate - 0 or virtually 0
Nitrate - 0

Both pieces sitting in fairly high flow from MP-40s, on rock in the mid/upper levels of my 100 g DT.

Problem too much light? (I do have a green monti cap that is bleaching a bit, sitting high up on the rocks) Or is this a sign of not enough light?
Nutrient issue?
Chemistry issue?
Infection?

I just don't know.

 

[colin779]

Could be to much light? What were they under at the lfs?

 

[NW Fish Dude]

Could be to much light? What were they under at the lfs?

The digitata was under radion LEDs. I believe the tort was under t-5's. got them both at BRA.

 

[trido]

I've never heard of a white digitata. Ive seen a few, bleached ones. My guess is that it was bleached and browning in this case is a good thing meaning that the zoothanthella are returning. Your Cali tort is either browning from lack of light or too much nutrients in the water. If your tank is mainly softies and LPS it could be from too much turpines in the water from the softies.

 

[NW Fish Dude]

I've never heard of a white digitata. Ive seen a few, bleached ones. My guess is that it was bleached and browning in this case is a good thing meaning that the zoothanthella are returning. Your Cali tort is either browning from lack of light or too much nutrients in the water. If your tank is mainly softies and LPS it could be from too much turpines in the water from the softies.

Hmmmm...tuprines? Well that could possibly be a culprit. I have a couple of large leathers, a toadstool and a finger. One of them was recently moved over to the side of the tank where the sps are, as I needed to find a new spot because it had gotten so big. I recently ditched some kenyan trees and xenia that were in the area.

Does skimming or running carbon (been doing both), help with turbines, or should I just rehome my large leathers?

I'd be surprised if the water is too nutrient rich. I don't feed very heavily, skim, have a pretty good CUC, a vigorous fugue, and my phosphates and nitrates read zero.

 

[trido]

Carbon and WC's are the only things that will remove turpines (think turpentine). A CUC will not truely help with SPS water quality. Mostly just big WC's, perfectly stable parameters, a lot of flow and a lot of light is what hard to keep SPS corals need in order to keep their color. IME the cali tort is not the easiest SPS to keep. I've killed plenty of them.

 

[NW Fish Dude]

I'll keep plugging away. Just traded away my large toadstool leather. Also noted that my magnesium, that I thought was 1350 was only 1100. I'll bump that up to 1300 ish over a few days. Not sure why it's low with the weekly WCs I do. I've got good flow, and otherwise pretty stable parameters.