LPS corals peeling from skelton HELP!

[jjj1100]

Hello,

Tank has been set up for almost 2 years.
parm's
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 20 (has been that for 2 years)
The following 4 from salifert kits
Calcium 400
Alk 4.75
Mag 1100 ( I have been dosing to raise to 1250)
Stron 15

2 months ago I changed all the bulbs in the tank and cut back on the lighting to let then corals adjust. Slowly after this I got a brown film algae that began coating my sand bed. I keep all of my acan's on the sand bed as well. All of the sudden I began seeing white skelton's where the acan polyps were. A few of the acan's have been in the tank for 1 year. I lost a few frags in addition. I have added 100 blue leg hermits and they took care of the algae that was coating the sand, but I am still seeing some recession on the acan's.

I haven't added any fish that nip or anythng like that and I have been staring at the tank/fish trying to see if anything even swims near the acan's ....nothing.

Is there something that could be doing this, something esle I should be testing for??

Thanks in advance

[demonsp]

You need to get the nitrtate under control. Can you list all equipment and water change amount and scedule plus amount of LR and LS with all stock including CUC.
Also water source.
Many equipment problems take time to show months or yrs and then are hard to pinpoint and control.

[jjj1100]

Equipement
2 ASM G3 skimmers, 110 gallon refuigium ( I added this 2 months ago to get the nitrates under control...cheato is growing rapidly), Calcium reactor, closed loop sequence pump,

water changes 80g every 2 weeks

LR about 400 lbs
LS...not sure about 2 inches through, 6 inches in the fuge

Live stock
20 anthias
achiles tang
Nger trigger
10 wrasses
...nothing is new as far as live stock though

CUC...100 astrea snails, 40 nasarius, 100 tiny blue leg crabs, 4 sand sifting stars, 4 tiger tail cucs

[demonsp]

Sorry dont have any experiance with a 300 gallon YET.But i didnt see any powerheads and SB looks low.

LR and LS will convert nitrate and ammonia into harmless nitrogen if flow is correct and amount is atleast minimum.If not it will only collect it. Also rock placement helps.If rock is all packed in and flow cant get around it then uneatin food , waste , and other debris will collect in amounts CUC cant control.
Also didnt mention water source as with such a large tank its very important to use RO/DI water as tap has nitrate and will only keep adding to it.
You said you replaced bubls and cut back light time.I wonder if you did enough though its to late at this point.

I would suggest a SW aquarium begginners book for quick refferance.If you learn on thing from it then it was worth the price.

Look here for some help.

http://saltaquarium.about.com/od/startinganaquarium/tp/topmistakes.htm

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2007/1/aafeature/view

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/water4maruse.htm

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/pic/article.cfm?acatid=421&aid=842

[dileggi]

As another alternative, I would also suggest possibly posting the thread here as well:ReefCentral LPS Forum (http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=332)

Sorry to hear of the problems and good luck with a resolution!

[drillsar]

4.75 alkanity Mg or dkh? if dkh thats real low

Calcium should be a little higher around 450ppm

Nitrates are high, do you have any sponge filters, using RO/DI water?

Nitrates should be close to 0 as possible and this could be the big reason, corals will die if over 10 ppm

You need powerheads if you dont have any, your sandbed is low, either go with a bare bottom or add more sand.

Try powerheads first and see what happens with the nitrates, then add more sand, etc

[Avi]

LPS will sometimes shed tissue if the salinity drops too much. You don't list yours above, jjj, so just check that to be sure.

[zotzer]

JJJ,
I upgraded my lights recently, and even though I cut back on the lighting schedule, I lost a candy cane coral in two days. What a bummer....you think you are doing something good for your tank, and stuff dies. I had to cut back to only 4 hours of daylights, and even then, one of my rare birdsnests started to fade.

Went from a 4-lamp T5, to 6-lamps with individual reflectors and even used three lamps from the old system. Who would think it could fry things like it did?

If anything is salvageable, get them to the shade asap, but I didn't have that luck.

Tracy

[jjj1100]

Thanks for the replies. I don't think its the nitrates, they have been in 20 ppm for 1 year. I think it was the slime/algae that coated the sanI d bed after I changed all the bulbs.
The salinity in the tank is 1.25
I use a Kold Steril for water

[currentking]

[QUOTE]<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11801971#post11801971 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by drillsar
[B]4.75 alkanity Mg or dkh? if dkh thats real low

Nitrates should be close to 0 as possible and this could be the big reason, corals will die if over 10 ppm

I disagree. I have ran a very successfull high end LPS tank with nitrates between 20-40 for quite some time and everything grew crazy. Some LPS like dirty water. I have never had an acan peel on me. Some corals are sick to begin with. Sometimes there is nothing you can do.

[NirvanaFan]

Next time you need to change out your bulbs, do one, wait two weeks, do another, wait two weeks, do another....

This way the bulbs won't burn them nearly as bad. They have time to get used to the new lights before you change another out.

[Tonblogna]

I don't know much of anything, but I just PM'ed Bertoni a short time ago and he said in general Nitrates up to 40 would not hurt LPS, as long as they were not of the extremely difficult variety.

[jonbry123]

It does sound like your alkilinaty is to low along with your calcium levels. It isn't likely that the light change is the problem, also I'm not sure of the water brand you mentioned, never heard of it. The brown algae growth you mentioned and I assume based on your comment that this is something new are diatoms. Like any algae they need a food source to grow so is it possible that your water source may be contributing to this which means that your nitrates are much higher than what you stated. Also you didn't mention your phosphate levels. If too high this will kill your corals much faster than to high a nitrate level. The peeling of the animals from their skeletons is indicative of phosphate levels being to high

Scott