I did something VERY wrong - HELP

[kirkwood]

So I had a thriving green birdsnest that was growing very fast over the last 8 months or so.. Then on Saturday I did a 5% water change, added a new media bag of GFO, and dosed with Ions Calcification. Sat by the aquarium almost all day Sunday while I was gettin' my Tebow on and didn't notice anything. Then Monday I came home from work and noticed a big chunk of the bottom part of the birdsnest was basically a bright white skeleton and I could see flesh just peeling off. W/o wanting to overreact and chase what I did not know, I removed the new GFO media bag and decided to sleep on it. 24 hours later when I got home from work the next day it was almost all a skeleton - See the picture (1 is when healthy last week and the other is the damage). The weird thing is that I have 4 good sized frags of it in the same tank and they did not have the same problem, although they did not appear as healthy as usual in terms of polyp extension..

so here goes with the params and what has changed recently:
water volume - ~60 gallons - i do weekly 5% water change
Sal - 1.025
pH - 8.1-8.2 (tested w/ elos)
kH - 6.5 - 7 (tested w/ elos - used to be between 8-9 but i just switched my buffer from a Seachem powder to Ions eight.four liquid
Mag -
calcium - ?
ammonia - 0
nitrate - 0
temp - 81

About a month ago after not really feeding the corals at all over the past 6 months (aside from what they might get from cyclopeeze) i started adding a capful of phyto every other day and some kent microvert. After a week of that I started adding a capful daily. About 3 weeks ago I started adding Ions Calcification because when I had the LFS test my calcium they said it was 250 (i was shocked by that # especially with a birdsnest thriving). So i never tested the calcium myself, but I began dosing with Ions Calcification every day or two for about 2 weeks and then ever 3 days or so, while maintaining normal addition of my buffer, ions eight.four. So I was reading up on the alkalinity/calcium relationship and was wondering if I crashed my system, although I don't think so. My pH reading is normal, and although I'd like to raise my kH back to the 8-9 range, I can't imagine a 6.5kH having such an immediate and devastating effect.

Saving the piece is not what I'm posting about, I fraged it and moved on. I am just trying to learn why this happened, so it doesn't happen again, and I can fix the problem and rebuild the reef.

 

[thanh386]

Disclaimer: this is my opinion and experience

First thing I saw wrong was u said gfo in a media bag? U can phosban and purigen but I don't recommend gfo in a bag. Has to tumble. Than how much gfo did you add? If you strip of phospahte too quickly, coral cant adapt as fast. Get them check if you can.

The alk drop would have likely burned your sps. I am surprised its only half dead. With sps, I never had to chase a number but keep change slow. I have brought my alk anywhere from 6-14 ( originated at 9) without I'll effect to coral if the change is done progressively over a relatively long period of time (1 month). 3 points is alk is not small . Why do you think people get sick currently, crazy weather swings. Same for coral

Don't take this as an insult but are you sure your nitrates are 0? Not saying impossible, but improbable . Your test is likely off. If it isn't please tel me how you got it to 0. I've been desperately trying.

 

[kirkwood]

don't worry about offending me, I'm happy to hear the opinions... i've been running GFO in a media bag for about 2 years or so.. I put maybe 3-4 tablespoons in a media bag and I used to change it out every month or more and recently started changing it every 3 weeks because I read that is how long it works.. I really didn't think there was much risk of me getting my Phos too low... But honestly i don't know what ill effects low phos can cause...

You are correct that my nitrate test kit is quite old.. but I have a small bioload, just clown wrasse, royal gamma, domino damsel, mandarin dragonet, coral beauty, and pj cardinal.. I never really test for ammonia or nitrate unless I see corals not opening up...

 

[cbj25]

stop getting your tebow on and things like this wont happen!

+1 to what Thanh said

 

[thanh386]

The first time i used gfo, i used a baggy and dear god did I pay for that. Maybe I added too much, maybe you have been lucky. It's not low phosphates that harm coral. It's suddenly dropping the level. But if u are only using that amount, it shouldn't harm anything is you have been doing this for a while.

Only thing that leaves us is the alk... And a possible case of STN/ rtn . Regardless I would cut the birdnest at a part that has not been affected and use super glue to seal it.

Edit:

cbj25;723582 wrote: stop getting your tebow on and things like this wont happen!

+1 to what Thanh said

Even as a FL hater , I was impressed. Maybe cause he's no longer with FL lol

 

[kirkwood]

what is STN/rtn?

I wish i could test my calcium. I am headed to Einsteins tomorrow to get an ELOS test kit. I am going to do another 5-10% water change this afternoon after I go grab some RODI from Publix. I think after that I will start adding my buffer again to raise the kH back up. I am wondering if this is something I did by overdosing with the Calcification? I really dont think that i supersatured the tank because i thought I would see some precipitation on my heater, which i did not... i was wondering if maybe i put too much phyto in the system if I was adding it everyday and maybe the system was not able to handle it, since i wasn't feeding the past 6 months???? what really gets me is that the birdsnest thrived when I payed so little attention to the tank params and just did my 5% weekly changes... now when I try to kick my routine up a notch because i want to get ready for some new sps, i have a major setback... go figure... maybe its back to softies for me...

best thing about Tebow is that he entertains the fans and haters alike.. either you wanna see him dominate or you wanna see him fail, but either way you are watching...

 

[thanh386]

Slow tissue necrosis / rapid tissue necrosis . The lamest thing in the sps world. It can happen for a million and one reason or just whe it feels like it.

 

[snowmansnow]

while the GFO COULD have been an issue in this it sounds more like an ALK issue to me.

i can see how this would sneak up on you if you aren't keeping an eye on your alk here in the beginning stages of the tan.

its awesome that you were reading up on alk and ca... so you'll know that when you add ca to your tank it will affect the buffering capacity (alk) of the water at the same time.

if you weren't adjusting your alk while the ca was rising it could have caused the issue.

the way you describe the birds nest it almost sounds like RTN (rapid tissue necrosis) if you managed to save some by fragging then good for you.... IME with RTN it is regional... what i mean is if I can manage to keep the infected coral away from others it seems to slow the spread.. just my exp though.

you did the right thing in moving slow and trying to figure things out. keep in mind that RARELY is there a quick fix for an issue in this hobby.

if i can ever help out feel free to pm me and i'll offer what limited exp i have (i like to keep things simple btw haha).

B

 

[kirkwood]

thanks Snowman. I had fragged the birdsnest many times before, and I have good sized frags of it in the same tank from about 4 months ago.. They do not have the RTN and I'm hoping to keep it that way... another question - when i see the RTN, can I assume that is affecting my nitrates since it is dying organic matter? should i remove it immediately? when the tissue began necrosing i noticed the fish starting to nip at the dying tissue (never the live)... and I saw a cleaner shrimp cleaning up some of the dying clippings that fell to the bottom of the tank like it was a chicken wing at a tailgate...

my plan for today is to do a 5-10% water change... after that I thought I would add my buffer (recommended dosage) to start to raise the kH again... I'm not going to add any calcium again until I get a test kit and talk to Chris at Einstein about the proper balance of Ions Calcification and eight.four on a 60 gallon system... does that logical and safe??