Polyps falling off birdsnest

[gnatp2]

Ok, so I've been bad. I have left my tank neglected for the past month as work has been killing me. Haven't checked parameters and haven't done a water change in 3 months. So I had this problem coming to me. Now I gotta figure out what to do.

4 days ago I noticed that my green birdsnest that I've had for about a year was missing a few polyps. I suspected that it was just my flame angel that I've been trying to get out for some time. A few more polyps were gone the next day and even more yesterday. Today I come home and it isn't looking so hot. I'd say about 10% of the polyps on this guy are missing. Since many of the polyps missing are deeper inside where the flame angel can't get to, I'm pretty sure it is my parameters. I tried fixing them over the past few days. ( 4 days ago my PH was down to 7.6, calcium was up at 500, alk was down to 5.5, and nitrates up to 5. I know, I'm lucky the entire tank hasn't melted). Over the past 2 days, I've added kalk and the alk part of ESV 2-part to get the alk up to 8 and the ph to 8.0. I've tried to do this gradually over 2 days and thought that I'd be back in shape when I came back from work today. The birdsnest looks worse than it ever has and my other ORA green birdsnest is starting to show similar polyp deterioration signs.

I don't really know what else to do except sit and wait and keep my parameters in check. Anyone else have any suggestions?

Nate

 

[Bob 1000]

Give all your sps to nurse bob and come see them on the weekends...lol

 

[ming]

When in doubt, huge water changes usually resets things back to normal levels.
I have never had any coral which did not like water changes

 

[reefman]

if your birdsnest(espcially if its a good size colony) is receding from base or inside, beside par being off, it may be water flow is not strong enough. birdsnest needs random flow strong enough to get into the whole colony.
like ming said, wc is a fail safe way to deal with water off par.
the odds r against u when dealing with reversing damage done on sps(especially acros). it is 1 of the reasons y they r the hardest to keep in long term.

 

[tripstank]

If the tissue is receding from the base at a exponential rate, you need to frag it, dip it, then glue a ring around the good tissue.

Birdsnest is one of the easiest to keep and is a rapid grower. What lights do you have it under? How high is it in the tank? How much flow is on it?

 

[jhale]

don't worry about the no3 that's the least of your problems.

how did the ca and alk get so unbalanced, what's the mg at?

I agree water changes will help bring the levels back in balance.
I would do a few large ones till everything is normal then monitor the tank.

 

[gnatp2]

don't worry about the no3 that's the least of your problems.

how did the ca and alk get so unbalanced, what's the mg at?

I agree water changes will help bring the levels back in balance.
I would do a few large ones till everything is normal then monitor the tank.

The ca/alk imbalance happened over the past month or so. I switched from a ca reactor to 2 part. My dosing pump was slightly off and I've dosed a bottle of ESV ca and only 85% of the alk. I've since slowly added more the alk part and the alk was at 9.0 this morning.

I'm going to move back to the calcium reactor even though I've never had luck keeping the bubble and drip rate stable for more than a few days. I also purchased a kalk reactor to keep up with the PH issue. (I still have PH probs. When I woke up this morning, my ph had dropped down to 7.7)

I've started to fill water, but since I've been so busy, I dont' think I'll be able to do a 30g water change until thurs night. Hopefully the little guy will survive till then. Strange thing is that all other sps in my tank are doing fine except my 2 green birdsnests and 1 montipora digitata which is starting to have tissue recession randomly in the middle of the colony. Tissue is missing on the underside of branches. Polyp extension on the healthy parts of both the birdsnests and digitata look great.

Nate

 

[gnatp2]

If the tissue is receding from the base at a exponential rate, you need to frag it, dip it, then glue a ring around the good tissue.

Birdsnest is one of the easiest to keep and is a rapid grower. What lights do you have it under? How high is it in the tank? How much flow is on it?

This is a different issue than recession from the base. I've had that happen in the past to a couple acro's and this is a different type of problem.

I agree that birdsnests are one of the easiest to keep. I've had this guy for over a year now. It grew from a small 1" frag into about the size of an orange and has always looked like one of the healthiest specimines in my tank. I do feel luckly though that I haven't had other corals die on me though since my parameters were so out of whack.

Nate