Help with coral

[craigscott]

Hi to all, i have had a marine tank for about six months now and have been trying to get help, have just now come across your web site, hope someone can help.Have a nano tank with coral introduced about a month ago, can anyone identify it and tell me if it's positioned correctly or what can be done to save it, as it looks rather unhealthy to say the least. Have sent pics as attachments hope they go through.

[Mike]

Hi Craig, welcome to MASA.

To post pictures, use the toolbar at the top of this page, up load them and then copy and paste the [IMG] code onto the answer box.
Any problems let us know and we will try to help.

[Warr7207]

Welcome Craig, this is the place to get your tank and coral healthy and happy

[jacquesb]

Welcome to MASA Craig! I am sure that we can assist - can you perhaps also post the following information for us?
- pH
- water temp
- amount of light (wattage) and type (e.g. fluorescent (T8/T5?)/metal halide/PC)
- what type of water flow you have - size tank, how many litres per hour does you power-heads rate at, and how your power-heads are located in the tank (pointing towards each other? pointing in the same direction? pointing onto the glass of the tank, etc)
- parameter test output:
= SG/salinity
= calcium level
= ammonia
= nitrites
= nitrates
= phosphates

Many thanks - this all can assist us in determining what the possible issues could be with the coral....

[Mekaeel]

Welcome Craig!pics will help alot and as Jacques mentioned,please post your water parameters

[craigscott]

[/IMG]



I hope these images get through, my water parameters are as follows:
ph:8.2
alk. 2
temp 26 degrees
capacity 80 litres
lighting: flourescent

[Smithers]

Hate to be the bearer of bad news. But that candy cane is on the way out. The skeleton is showing through.
The nenny could be stinging it as well.

[craigscott]

Not sure whether this went through with the other pics showing the position in the tank.
Thanks for the help.

[Alfie]

what kit are you using to measure KH. It is very low and equates to dKH of only 2.8 and you should be at least 7dKH.

[Mike]

Originally Posted by Smithers

Hate to be the bearer of bad news. But that candy cane is on the way out. The skeleton is showing through.
The nenny could be stinging it as well.

I would agree, it is likely the anemone has declared war on the trumpet, and is winning by a long way, the trumpet could regrow if it was moved away from the nem'

[jacquesb]

Hi Craig - many thanks for the pics and info.

What type of fluorescent lighting do you have? T8? or T5's? How watts in total?

Also, what did you measure your alkalinity with? If the measurement is in dKh, then 2 is EXTREMELY low - it should be in the range of 9 to 11 dKh.

Do you/did you target feed the trumpet corals? They should have been target fed mysid shrimp, or artemia at least....

Also - do you dose kalkwasser at all? Do you have a calcium testing kit? And Phosphate testing kit? If not, take some water to your LFS and ask them to test these two water parameters as well, and post them too.
One should always dose calcium / kalkwasser when you are keeping corals.

[craigscott]

Hi to all and thanks for the response.

The anenome is on the move he hasn't always been that close and today he has moved to the other side of the tank.

The flourescent lighting I have is a 24watt normal and 24watt ultra-violet light.

I didn't realise that the coral needed target feeding but have started immediately with artemia. I dose with kalkwasser every second time that I top up with ro water.

The alkalinity I am testing with is a Red Sea Marine Aquariums Test Lab the card says that between 1.7 and 2.8 is normal so obviously it's not dKh but what it is i'm not sure, it says mili equaivalents per liter.

[viper357]

An alkalinity of 2 meq/L is the equivalent of about 5.6 dKH, still a bit on the low side but not terribly bad.

That coral doesn't look good but they can make a comeback if you can find the reason why it is declining.

[Kanga]

Originally Posted by craigscott

The flourescent lighting I have is a 24watt normal and 24watt ultra-violet light.

I trust you mean actinic and not UV?

[craigscott]

Yes the light is actinic and all lights are left on about 14 hours per day, coral is still hanging in there but not improving, will be trying some coral grow from today.