trouble with my foxtail

[warloc4326]

i haven't had a chance to look at my tank much except in the morning when i flip the light on and do the feeding routine. I just noticed that my foxtail had receded almost completely except for about 3 of the polyps. I had done a water change about a week ago and i'm considering doing another tonight. The levels of the tank are the same as they have been. the coral has been in the tank for about 4 months. i hadn't gotten a chance to dose the tank for about a week with phytoplankton and I'm thinking that this might have been a cause for the recession. Any ideas on how i might revive this critter would be helpful. also, the color in the receded polyps is pale.

Thomas

 

[brandon4291]

I'm not familiar with that name, is it possible you are referring to nemenzophyllia?

http://www.exotictropicals.com/encyclo/ ... ny/fox.htm

There are some specific issues with calcium and alkalinity maintenance if this is the case. This particular coral is more forgiving of lighting when compared to other stony corals.

If your specimen happens not to be nemenzophyllia post a pic if you can or try to obtain other common names and we'll track it down.

brandon429

 

[warloc4326]

it is nemenzophylllia.

 

[Anonymous]

Not feeding with phyto for 1 week certainly wouldn't kill your coral. I don't know if your coral is actually receiving any direct benefit from phyto at all. It may actually be detrimental to it if you're overfeeding.

You may want to read this article:
http://www.reefs.org/library/talklog/r_ ... 02500.html

I suspect you have a Ca/Alk/pH issue as well. Can you tell us what your values are for these? What test kits are you using? How do you dose calcium?

Now that I reread your post, you mention the polyps are pale. This implies some kind of bleaching, but I'm not really sure. What kind of lighting is it under?

 

[brandon4291]

Matt, reading your link made me late to work! It was well worth it, I had't seen that talk from R. Toonen before. He's great no?

This article Warlock along with your Ca++/Alk data should get us started. I fear that some element of your problem will be the "varies from person to person" instance, kinda like xenia that does well in some tanks and does not thrive at all in others.

B