Coral turning white

[90galguy]

I've had this piece of coral for several months and everything seemed to be going fine. The other day I noticed the stalk started turning white and now its rapidly increasing. I replaced my t5 bulbs recently but thus was occuring prior to that. Any thoughts? Parameters are all good and everything else in the tank seems to be doing fine.

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[liverock27]

Looks like RTN or STN. If it is the only chance to save any of the coral is to frag the parts that have not already turned white.
I would wait before fragging it to see if anyone else has suggestions or thinks it is bleaching from the new lights. In my expereince with bleaching it happens from the top of the coral down, but again that is just my experience.

 

[gmpolan]

Def looks like stn to me, id start fragging personally....typically it occurs from one of your parameters being off. So id start by checking those...

 

[90galguy]

I'll check them this afternoon, but my last check 2 days ago are as follows:

Ammonia 0
Nitrites 0
Nitrates 0
PH 8.2
CA 450
MAG 1300
ALK 9.0
SG 1.026
Temp 77

 

[rdnelson]

Looks exactly like the way my Green Birdsnest looked when my nem moved close to it and started to sting it. I ended up fraging it and moving it. Left just a bit of the white part at the base of the good part and it is doing great. Matter of fact, I fragged a piece for wmboots as part of the pay-it-forwar part 2.

 

[90galguy]

That's it! I just remembered that my RBTA relocated itself a little further down the rock and was rubbing against it before I relocated the coral. The RBTA was on top of the rock and slid down almost on top of the coral until I moved it over to the left more.

I assume since the whitening is happening at the stalk, there isn't any hope of it surviving unless I frag correct?

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[rdnelson]

Not an expert as you well know but yes, I believe you will need to frag it. I don't think the dead part would hurt it but I don't think it will come back to life.

 

[jennm]

I was going to ask if something nearby was stinging it - there's your answer.

Frag or don't - probably won't make a difference since it's injury, not disease. If it's moved away from the anemone (or vice versa) the dead bits will stay dead but the rest of it should be fine.

If it was me, I'd snip off the dead branches but leave the rest. The dead stuff will just grow algae on it in time, and you don't want that.

Jenn

 

[rdnelson]

I had a very good teacher.

JennM;764450 wrote: I was going to ask if something nearby was stinging it - there's your answer.

Frag or don't - probably won't make a difference since it's injury, not disease. If it's moved away from the anemone (or vice versa) the dead bits will stay dead but the rest of it should be fine.

If it was me, I'd snip off the dead branches but leave the rest. The dead stuff will just grow algae on it in time, and you don't want that.

Jenn

 

[jennm]

You are a good student, Grasshopper!

 

[90galguy]

The fragging is complete. Once these things heel I'll have a few to trade off. I think I might be in the market for a frag tray now!

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[90galguy]

One of the frags that I cut this morning seems to be slowly turning white. Is this still damaged tissue from the RBTA stinging or is something else happening here?

 

[frantz]

Birdsnest is fairly sensitive in my (limited) experience. I had some that was stung by other coral and quickly died. I fragged a piece off just because it's pretty and it got turned over by a snail and less than 12 hours later I saw it and the top half was dead already. Other coral is much more resilient to these stresses. If yours dies I'll be happy to give you a frag of mine.

 

[jennm]

Hard to say. Fragging the whole thing like that may have been too much for it as it was already stressed.

Jenn