Plate Coral not extending

[Klaus777]

I have a purple plate coral and today for the first time in the 3 weeks Ive had it it has not extended the polyps even half of what it used to. Is this something the would happen from too much light?

[JEFFR259]

in my experience, too much light wouldn't cause the fungia to stay closed. do you measure alkalinity and calcium? if you alkalinity (or any other important value for that matter) is not ideal, the plate might retract. Can you post your parameters for us?

[Klaus777]

I measured the water today:

cal = 430ppm
alk = 8dKH
mag = 1440ppm (a little higher than usual from 1350 target)
PH = 8.2
Nitrite = 0
Nitrate = 0
Ammonia = 0
Phos = 0
Salinity = 35ppt

[JEFFR259]

Your params seem fine. Alk is kind of at the bottom of the range I and most reefers keep it at (8-12), but that's not low enough IME to keep the plate retracted.

Any signs of improvement today?

What kind of substrate is it sitting on? Flow amount? Anybody been bothering it (like shrimps)? Any other LPS nearby that could be stinging it?

Silly questions, but starting with the simple stuff :)

[Klaus777]

I have dosed alk since to bring it to just over 9dKH, which is where I target.
It looks the same as yesterday but my lights have not come on yet (it will be another hour still for the actinics). It usually extends fairly full after an hour and a half of light (the half is with the halides).
Substrate is special grade reef sand.
The flow around it is good, lots of waving action every 6 seconds or so. So there is no mucus build up or settling matter around it.
It sits with nothing else around it to sting.
I do have 4 very adventurous shrimps but I don't see them picking at it.
I have 2 black and white ocellaris clowns that sleep right beside but during daylight they have no interest in it at all.

[Klaus777]

well, the lights have been on for 3 hours (3 with actinics and 2 with halides). There is still very little extension along with some discoloration (pale white spots and complete loss of the color on the tips).

[ginger7286]

I wish I could help you. I bought a plate coral about 2 months ago. It was gorgeous, purple and green. I acclimated it, it was eating ang looking great and them one day out of the blue I noticed that it was bleaching out. My water params are almost like yours except my pH is about 8.0. Anyway I treid feeding it (like always) but it did not take the food and eventually completely bleached out. Now it is sitting on the bottom of my tank looking like a skeleton. I have not removed it because I have read they will shoot off spawns up to 6 months after they die. So anything you learn may help me. Good luck.

[Klaus777]

Well, I am not really sure what happened but the plate coral has extended and fluffed up just like it did before. It does still have some white spots on it but all in all, it looks pretty good. I'm just kinda shaking my head trying to figure why it happened in the first place.

[victor escobar]

look the under side of the fungia. it should have tissue if it hasn't or it is damaged then the problem could be bugs¡¡

[Klaus777]

Do you have a link for bugsii? I couldn't find one.