Tissue Loss Question

yes to all, sudden changes affect sps. Mg is the buffer between Ca and dKH. having 11dKH is fine as long as the Ca matches. my tank has 16 dkH with 500 Ca and 1600 Mg. a good salinity target is 1.026 or 35 ppt. sudden temp canges also effects corals.

ive never aged the new saltwater nor do i dose the new saltwater. once mixed, goes in, maybe an hour.
cant beat instant ocean sea salt, imop. and i also use salifert test kits, though some ppl have issues with the dKH from them, i never had any.

 

reef guru, will my corals heal anytime soon? I'm really upset with everything that is happening to my tank. I turned on the lights today to see how things were doing and my Montipora Undata has white marks (tissue loss) and my Orange Cap has a white rim of tissue loss. Also my Purple Lokani turned brown. Basically all my acro's look really bad or are dying except for my ORA Green Birdsnest and ORA Blue Tortuosa. The Green Hammer, Green Frogspawn and Fox corals are completely closed up. My GSP is completely closed and my Xenia looks like it's about to crumble. Do I do a water change with new Red Sea salt, go back to Tropic Marin and perform a water change with that mix, or move the corals to a new tank with new saltwater that is lower in Ca, Mg and Alk. I had the lights off for all of yesterday and most of today hoping it would relieve them of the stress. They're not acclimating to the new conditions, Ca - 494 (possibly over 500), Mg - 1500, Alk. - 10.2 dKH.

 

keeping the lights off is big no no. they will die with no light. sudden changes put you in this perdicament, so try to control the urge to make any sudden changes, i.e. moving them.

as far as your parameters dKh is a little low for the Ca, mine: 500 Ca, 16 dKH, 1550-1600 Mg
the correct balance for 10 dKH is 440 Ca, keep in mind Mg is the buffer between the two.

under the right conditions the corals should bounce back in due time, patience, patience, and more patience. the tissue may grow back over the dead spots, or they may not. worse case scenario you end up fragging the tank out once you get your parameters under control.

 

I believe that keeping the lights off for two days rejuvenates the corals. I've done this three times in the past and the corals really expand when I put the lights back on. It also kills any algae that was growing.

 

if the absence of light kills algae, what is it doing to your corals?

 

I really dont see the purpose of turning the lights off. Most of the corals that you have need strong lighting anyways. Remember that in nature, the only time the corals are not getting sun light is in the night. Even then, the moon helps a little. Just my 2 cents.

 

The response and expansion that you and your corals are experiencing is the corals trying to capture as much PAR and more importantly PUR for the corals zooxanthellae. This is accomplished by opening up as big as they can to collect the light. This is also evident after doing a water change! Water changes will lower the nutrient and dissolved organics in your water, so for corals to capture the same amount of food, from nutrient deprived water as a result of the water change, your corals will have to work harder and open up fully to be able to capture as much nutrients as possible. Being without lighting for that long a period of time , in my opinion, has caused a negative implication as zooxanthellae has stopped photosynthesis in symbiotic corals. This will lead to changes in water parameters as a result on a much larger scale.
I would try to find ways of limiting the algae problem by being proactive rather than reactive after the fact...Find out the main underlying reason your algae(micro) is growing and take efforts to reduce or rid this problem once and for all.
High nutrients, phosphates and nitrates are probably the major culprit, so by monitoring these and testing, you will better be able to handle this annoyance without harming your corals by keeping your lights off for extended periods of time, which is ultimately a more dangerous concern...
Hopefully this will help you-not trying to lecture just help out a fellow reefer!
Good luck