green star polups deteriorating

[KcMopar]

Hold up!!! FILTERS!!!! You should not have any filter material in a SW tank with corals, filters are OK to move the water but do not load them with filter material at all. The filter catches the food that the corals eat, I wonder if the corals are doing bad because you are removing the food. As long as you are dosing the Cal, strontium, iodine, maybe iron, ect... you should be ok.

 

[exhumed07]

oh i was refering to ur comment about the water changes u do, it's like how i take care of my cichlid tanks, i don't have a filter in my salt tank, i learned that early on. and it's cause they are nitrate traps more so then any other of my concerns, i do have a tiny whisper filter that came with the tank and was going to use it for water flow but have no plug ins left to plug it in.

 

[KcMopar]

OK, good. I figured you had it right. With my cichlids I have to change water every week at a rate of at least 50% each tank. I have that TEST scrubber on my FW 150G and that cuts it down to about every other week where as before it was twice a week. I just bumped up the lights to about double the wattage so I hope it makes a change. I also wonder if my bio-material in the FW tank is causing to many nitrates. I have two filters with a lot of bio material so I might end up remove this material a little at a time to see if the scrubber keeps up with the ammonia and other nutrients.

 

[exhumed07]

well i got home today and all my kenya trees were dead and had to remove them, and my buttons and stars have still not opened up and starting to fear the worst for my corals, it bugs me that all my water tests are coming out beautiful but they are dieing.

 

[KcMopar]

Are they getting enough food? Maybe you need to feed more, you can feed more with a scrubber.

 

[exhumed07]

they are all photosinthisising corals that don't need fed and they are all pretty close to the lighting, i just don't know what the deal is. they started to come back a bit and then just suddenly closed up.

 

[KcMopar]

I only ask because mine did better when I fed the tank more. My toadstools really took off when I increased the feedings as did my buttons polyps too, they are really extended now!!

 

[exhumed07]

well i took a small soft brush to my corals and they just all fell apart so all my corals have finally died

 

[KcMopar]

I am sorry to hear that. I have two that are not doing so good, one is my own frag toad stool and the other is a Xenia frag I bought, I have moved both to my other tank which always has good coral production. I also have a frog spawn that is starting to come around, its still in the 40G. He is not all the way out yet but, he is showing more this past week.

 

[exhumed07]

just realy wish i knew what happened, yesterday i took my water to my lfs, i collected water for 3 days so they could see that the water quality is steady, everything they tested for was in good shape shape as my test kits were saying, they are clueless besides thinking mayby they had a bacterial issue.

 

[KcMopar]

That is just strange but I understand. Two of my tanks have corals and both have nearly the same water parameters but the smaller one with the higher nutrient levels grow better corals, weird, I know. Usually higher nitrates and phosphate limit corals.

 

[exhumed07]

well the turf scrubber is starting to kick into high gear and alot of the algea is dieing in the tank and the screen is getting nice and green. i still have the skimmer going just for the simple fact i know i'm not catching all the dead algea so it's rotting in the tank, normally i only have to empty the cup once a week if that and now i have to empty it every day, so once that slows down to where it was and all the algea in the tank is gone the skimmer will come out.

 

[KcMopar]

Are you getting a bunch of green growth?

 

[exhumed07]

i am getting alot of green growth on the scrubber but mostly around the edge of the screen, i'm starting to thing the bulb i have is to hot and to close to the screen cuase in the middle where the light is pointing there is no algae growing at all. going to adjust it if possible. and for now i give up on corals lol, I'm going to get this tank back on track for at least a few months before i try again. and it don't help that my lighting just went out on the tank and had to buy another light for it today, thank god it went out on black friday lol

 

[KcMopar]

Your light may be to close but, normally its yellowish burned look if its to close. All you can do is try an inch away for a week or two.

 

[exhumed07]

I'll try that, i aint got alot of room in the container i have the scrubber in.