Cant sit back and let my corals die

[duke62]

Digis and stylos are fine right nowalong with my 2 chalices and and 2 zoa colonys

 

[lnevo]

I hear ya man. All my birds nests now are going. Even those i fragged up. Another acro I got at the swap and purple milli with green tips. Not fun to watch at all.

 

[MIKE NY]

LMK if you lose the Tort I have another one for ya...

 

[duke62]

Mike sorry to say the tort is gone

 

[strgazr27]

Maybe its time to cut the losses and start over D. The tank has been stressed quite a bit the last 2 months. A fresh start may be in order.

 

[garys reef]

+1

 

[Jaftica]

+1 on the fresh start!

 

[Tonyscoots84]

I wish i could help u duke but i never had
This problem but a friend of mine did not like urs but alot of his sps was on there way out n there was no explanation. I saved a few but it can be anything from parasite, bacteria, infection and other things. Unfortunately as everyone is saying fresh start i would +1. Start off with new sand, new rock and scrub the crap out of the tank. Its alot of work and a huge dissapointment but i think ur out of options buddy. Get rid of all the corals u have or start a 10 gallon seperate from your main tank and let them survive or die in there. It sucks yes i no but us reefers never give up

 

[jerl77]

I agree fresh start buddy sucks but clean house and take what you learned and don't make the same mistakes again
And with the fresh start throw the LED out and get t5s

 

[MikeC]

Fresh start might be a good option, can't say you didn't try.
Good luck man

 

[jackson6745]

Duke could you please list all the fish in your tank?

 

[knugenx]

Sorry to here this...you really put some work into it.
If u need some frags to restart, shoot me a pm.

 

[ohana888]

so sorry to read about this. i agree with you - coral deaths are just too painful to watch...esp when they slowly melt away. all the best, duke!

 

[duke62]

My fish are
copperband
2 clowns
yellow tang
hippo
2 chromis
2 springer dmasels
melanaurus wrasse
coris wrasse
cleaner wrasse
2 anthias
mandarin

 

[jackson6745]

Duke your bio-load is high. I'm not saying you're over-stocked but you are high which will require more than your run of the mill maintenance schedule to remain low nutrient.

I had the same thing happen to me 7 years ago in my 120 gal. I had around 20 fish and over time I began to get STN on almost all my acros. Po4 test results would range from .01-.05 (mostly on the low end). I didn't understand it at all. I was given an explanation of it being "bacterial" as well. An old reefcentral member "bomber" told me phosphate was the cause. I explained that test results were in optimal range but he replied that with my bio-load I wouldn't be able to remove phosphate fast enough before it was "wicked" up by SPS.

After a few months of this I decided to change things up. I lowered bio-load and fed less, upgraded skimmers, began running more GFO and changing more frequently, more carbon, more water changes, more frequent changing of filter bag along with a daily detritus blow. Immediately I noticed acros growing over the recession and color improved. The tank did well until I broke it down. From then on I have always kept a smaller bio-load and fresh gfo in my reactor.

HTH:usa1:

 

[duke62]

I have a po4 reactor which is changed every 3 weeks along with a SRO 3000 skimmer which is rated 3x my setup size. My setup is 100 gallons of total water volume and the skimmer is rated for 300 gallons. I do 2 water changes per week and most of these fish have been with me for a year besides the 2 anthias which are around 5 months in my system. But im also getting ALOT of asterina stars which may be adding to the bioload even though i dont know how much waste they produce. Along with thousands of mini bristle stars. I could get rid of a couple fish im not attached to and see if that works

 

[jackson6745]

I don't think the snail and stars add much bio-load and it sounds like your doing the right thing with maintenance + skimmer. What's your drink buddy?

 

[duke62]

Ok would a low range mag cause STN. I just checked which i havent in months because it was always around 1500 every time i checked so i stopped checking. It is 1150 which isnt to low but out of the range its supposed to be in. I know mag helps SPS absorb alk and calcium so would it cause corals to die off slowly?

 

[lnevo]

Came home today and my orange milli i just picked up from metrokat is completely bare at the base... Guess I wont be adding any more SPS for quite a while

 

[duke62]

Ok tried everything. Im on my 250 gallon of water changes in 3 weeks and corals are still going. New STN on 2 colonies of acro and my miami hurricane chalice. Everything is going. Still not any deaths but this fragging and gluing is getting old and it like trying to fill up a net with water i cant get it to stop even with fragging and cutting and dipping and gluing. Time is pretty much ran out and going to just going to let everything go. Going to keep my fish healthy let everything die and when my last coral is gone ill wait a few months and maybe give it another go. Going to stop with all this wasting money on water changes as well and just do 10 gallons a week.