problems with my brain

[Rye_84]

Lately the tissue from my open brain coral has been receding and it never opens up anymore then what can be seen from the pictures. Which really isn't anything at all. Parameters are as follows. Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrate, Phosphate are 0 Calcium is around 420 Salinity is 1.024 and the Ph is 8.2. The only thing that is bit off and I am currently trying to correct it is the Hardness which is at 6 and I like to keep it around 8. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what I can do to help it? I know they like to be on the sound but I thought it might be getting irritated by it so I set it on some rocks last night. I also did I 15% water change yesterday.

 

[framerguy]

They DO like being on the sand. It's the rocks that irritate them when they expand. They are photosynthetic but also need to be fed meaty foods such as shrimp or bits of fish. What are your temp and salinity? What are you feeding? What lighting do you have?

 

[Rye_84]

Temp is 77 Salinity is 1.024 Feeding is pieces of shrimp and it is kept under a 400w halide.

 

[framerguy]

Temp is 77 Salinity is 1.024 Feeding is pieces of shrimp and it is kept under a 400w halide.

both of those are a tad low but not by much. The optimum temp range for this species is 79-83 with 81 being normal and the SG should be 1.025-1.026. That is a lot of light, how deep is your tank? It could be a little to much depending on how you acclimated him to the lighting, hopefully it was done gradually. The food sounds good.

Also, do you have hermit crabs. Hermits are bad for brains.

 

[Rye_84]

I have had this coral for almost a year and it has grown tremendously. There are a few hermits in the tank. No longer then half an inch or so. The coral was doing so well just until recently. I havn't added anything so I am just not sure what went wrong. I will slowly up the temp and salinity over the next few days and see what happens.
Thanks for the advice

 

[framerguy]

Your welcome. Yeah, after a year and the growth it's not the lighting. They don't like tons of flow, has that changed at all? Medium low so that their "skirt" doesn't get blown up.

 

[Rye_84]

Hmm....I did add more flow to the top of the aquarium. I wonder if it is effecting the bottom too. If I put it in a spot that the brain likes how long do you think it will be before it starts to open up again?

 

[framerguy]

Hmm....I did add more flow to the top of the aquarium. I wonder if it is effecting the bottom too. If I put it in a spot that the brain likes how long do you think it will be before it starts to open up again?

It should be almost immediate if it's a flow issue.

 

[JT101]

I have a bright-green open brain that I bought from an LFS that had it under MH's. It looked fine in the store.

I took it home and put it under my (at that time) measly 64W PC in my AquaPod 24. Almost within days, it started to recede. Nobody had any answers, but many told me that they like low light. This didn't make much sense to me - this particular coral was thriving under MH's and wasting away under 64W PCs and my water parameters were within normal limits...

I got a nanotuners 144W PC upgrade and noticed that the coral STOPPED receding!

This is now a couple of months, and the coral hasn't lost any more tissue. Unfortunately, it hasn't grown any back either. I don't know if brains can do that, or if they stay that way permanently (sort of like a human losing a limb...).

Anyway, I wanted to let you know that lighting seemed to have worked in my case.

John

 

[Rye_84]

Thanks for the input, my issue ended up being too much flow. It is now plumping up each day when the lights come on. Hopefully in time, it will grow back to what it used to be because it was huge.

 

[Anselth]

Glad to hear it!

 

[Cavinca]

i instantly started laughing when i read the post title... i thought to myself... "hey i have the same problems.." glad to hear your brain is doing better.

 

[Rye_84]

i instantly started laughing when i read the post title... i thought to myself... "hey i have the same problems.." glad to hear your brain is doing better.

If only reducing the flow around me had the same effect on my brain as it does in an aquarium. That would be nice!