About to just give up

ChitownRomeo

Active Member
I don't know what happened. I have had the same coral for 4 years. Never changed my tank habits. I do everything the same time on the same days of the week. For the last 2 months, my corals have started receeding little by little. First it started with my duncans closing up and have been closed for 2 months. Come out and peek a little then close back up. Then it was my Hydnophora closing and the skin melting off. Then it was my hammer coral closing up and now receeding into the skeleton. And now it's my Frogspawn colony. 4 heads are dead with 3 receeding. Only thing I can think of what it could be is this salt. Once I got toward the bottom of this bucket is where things went south. Ro/di is reading at 0 tds. Salinity is 1.025 as always. Temp is 78 degrees as always. I mean NOTHING has changed at all. Havent even added anything. It's a 55 gallon reef with a skimmer rated for 100 gallons, Its only 2 clownfish in the aquarium so I have no huge bio load. Also my snails have just dropped off the glass and died slowly. Acans, Gsp, Zoas, Xenia and candy cane corals are doing ok. It seems like everything gets worse after every water change. Help please cause this is making me want to just give up this tank.
 

chipmunkofdoom2

Well-Known Member
What do your other parameters look like (besides salinity and temp)? What is your dosing and maintenance regimen? How often do you do your water changes, and are the parameters of the new water close to that of your tank?

Going off of what you mentioned, it seems as if the issue here is salt mix separation.
 

chipmunkofdoom2

Well-Known Member
Omg you guys might be right. I have never rolled or shook the bucket before..... And this started happening as I reached the bottom of the bucket.

I'm sorry if this is the case. I'm also sorry if this is the first you're hearing about this. I found this out the hard way a few years ago. IMO, this is the dirty little secret about reef keeping that NOBODY talks about, except for a few obscure mentions on aquarium forums. I've never read instructions on a salt mix that tell you to mix the "mix". I've never heard it from someone at the LFS, I've never read it in a "how to mix saltwater" guide and nobody I've ever spoke to in person about the hobby knows to do this.

Do you have test results for your alkalinity and calcium? I would recommend always testing for alk and CA, even if you don't have many hard corals. These two parameters are two of the more important levels to maintain in a saltwater aquarium, and pH stability in particular depends largely on correct alkalinity levels. I would suspect that you'd find that yours are either very high or very low.
 

ChitownRomeo

Active Member
At this point I'm about to give up. I bought a brand new bucket of salt. Shook the hell out of it. Bought all new ro/di membrane, carbon block and di resin, Did a 35% water change, took the skimmer down and cleaned it with vinegar, cleaned the mp10's and everything. Next day they look worse. It seems like the more I clean the more they die, or the more I let it go the more they die. What the heck is it. NOTHING has changed in 5 years!! My torch coral is HUGE and just fine. It's only my duncans, froggies and hammers.

2co0or9.jpg
 

chipmunkofdoom2

Well-Known Member
I'm sorry to hear you're still having trouble. It's a tough place in which to be.

Do you have any test results? What are your parameters looking like? This is probably going to be the key to unlocking the issues.
 

rostervandross

Active Member
Hey man just a passing thought. do you have an extra tank or could go get a 20g or something to fill up with fresh salt water and move a coral or two into it to see if they open up?

Also I had an issue with some corals shriveling a few months ago. I had redbugs and I dipped all my corals in a Bayer insect killer solution but I'm not convinced that was the issue. Just my Kenya tree corals shriveled and died, I just cut them at the base and they're growing back.

Maybe look very very closely at your corals to see if there are any parasites
 

DaveK

Well-Known Member
Let me ask you a couple of questions -

What brand of salt are you using?

What kind of lighting do you have over the tank? Include all the information about the fixture and bulbs.

The photo looks very blue and dim, but this may be because the of the camera and so on.
 

ChitownRomeo

Active Member
Let me ask you a couple of questions -

What brand of salt are you using?

What kind of lighting do you have over the tank? Include all the information about the fixture and bulbs.

The photo looks very blue and dim, but this may be because the of the camera and so on.

Looks dim cause I used a cell phone and the lights were ramping up.

Instant Ocean Reef Crystals like I have for 5 years.

8 x 48" TrueLumen Pro Series LED Strip Light, Marine Fusion 12K White/453nm Actinic
288 Leds per strip= 192 Whites + 96 Blues 30 watts each strip.

2 x 48" TrueLumen Pro Series LED Strip Light, Deepwater Actinic Blue 453nm
288 Leds. 30 watts each strip.
 

DaveK

Well-Known Member
Ok, I don't think there is a lighting issue. I just wanted to be sure that the lighting was enough for the coral you keep. While I wonder about the very low power LEDs used in the TrunLumen fixturers, this is not something that is going to cause a rapid loss of corals, like your experiencing.

I don't see anything obvious that your doing wrong, but I will tell you something did change, we just have not found it yet, otherwise the corals would still be doing good.

The flowing is worth checking out. Even so you may not find an answer.

@rostervandross has a point. You may have an infestation of red bugs or flatworms or something similar. It may be worth trying one of those coral dips and using it on a single coral, and see what happens.

Since water changes seem to make things worse, it might be worth trying a new salt brand. Sometimes manufacturers make up bad batches.

I would also look for anything that might have contaminated the tank. Household cleaners, bug sprays, kids tossing stuff in, anything that might have been on your hands would be examples.

One other thing comes to mind. Check your grounding. Use a volt meter and measure voltage from the tank water to ground. Also check neutral to ground at the wall outlet. All these readings should be 0 or close to it. You may have a pump, heater or other device causing voltage in the tank. You may have to do a lot of checking to identify the source, and you might have more than one source. Over time electrical cords can get brittle and crack, causing a problem.
 

ChitownRomeo

Active Member
Things got worse and ended up taking out over 25 dead corals. Saved a few frogspawn, Torch, Gsp, Acans, xenia and alot of zoas. What's wierd is I cracked open the dead skeleton of my frogspawn and it was dark brown to black all on the inside. Oh well lost alot....
 
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