Purple Stylo colony bleaching

[bzb]

Got a weird one here. A few days ago, I noticed a bubble on the stylo. Almost like a soap bubble, coming from one of the tips... like a polyp blew up. Went away after a couple days, but it was pretty odd.

Today I wake up to half the colony bleached out (admittedly, I didn't really inspect it yesterday except for a quick feed). Checked everything but went ahead and did a 10% water change despite the params being perfect.

Everything else in the tank is doing just fine. In fact, the montis have never looked better, and the growth rate has exploded over the last month. As you can see in the photo, the fruity pebbles is growing across three rocks, that green one is scrolled up really tight, and the birds nests and digis are out of control.

Even more curious, there are two other purple stylo colonies fragged off this one that are doing quite well.

I'm not super torn up if I lose this colony, but I'm worried this might be the canary since this thing was thought to be impossible to kill. Any ideas?

pH: 7.7
Temp: 78
sg: 1.025
Alk: 8.1
Ca: 410
Mg: 1340
Nitrate: 0
Phos: 0.08

 

[gainesvillereef]

It looks like something has been eating the polyps. I have had this happen on the very same coral. Ended up being a hungry peppermint shrimp. Fed more and the shrimp left it alone. My stylo grew back all the polyps.

 

[bhodges82]

Is the stylo touching the green Monti to the right?

 

[bzb]

It looks like something has been eating the polyps. I have had this happen on the very same coral. Ended up being a hungry peppermint shrimp. Fed more and the shrimp left it alone. My stylo grew back all the polyps.

Hmm... will keep an eye out.

 

[bzb]

Is the stylo touching the green Monti to the right?

That right-most branch is real close to it. But there’s still polyps on that spot.

 

[bzb]

Here’s a pic of the weird bubble from a few days ago. Looks like it was already bleaching underneath and I just didn’t really take much notice.

 

[dball711]

Doesn't look like "bleaching", looks and sounds like "RTN".

 

[ActiveAngel]

I agree with @dball711 . It looks more like STN or RTN rather than bleaching... which will start at the top and work it’s way down.

your parameters looks good. May I ask for you to double-check or re-calibrate your tools for Salinity and Temp. It’s less likely in this occurrence, but still possible (especially salinity).

 

[bzb]

The temp controller is the Inkbird with two 150W heaters on it. I have a separate probe in another chamber of the sump and tested with a meat thermometer, all within 0.5 degree of each other. Water temp increases to almost 80 during the day, doesn’t dip below ~78.

I have a digital refractometer in addition to the oldschool telescope one. Checks out.

Only two things I can think of that’s been different:
- Switched salt to HW MarineMix, ~7-10% WC (5G, 70G volume). I’ve used this new salt a total of 3 times, so only 15G of the 70G is the HW.
- I’ve increased the dosing to keep up with the coral demand.

I thought cleaning the gyre may have been part of the issue, but the sticks that are directly in front of the gyre aren’t bothered. (Side note: the hammers, however, aren’t fans of the increased output). Despite the dying parts, the rest is still very deep purple and fully extended polyps. So weird.

In my case, the white started from the base and is creeping toward the tips. There is indeed one branch that is just ever-so-slightly touching the green monti, but it has full polyp extension right there.

 

[ActiveAngel]

Hmmm...

Well, if it is STN or RTN, be aware that it can jump to other closely-related colonies in the same system. This means any other Stylophoras as well as Pociloporas or Seriatoporas could be at risk.

 

[bzb]

I don’t think I have any of those in the tank, so I guess I’m not too worried (??)... but just got back from a gig and it’s almost totally gone.

The one below is a separate colony and is ok. So weird.

 

[ActiveAngel]

I think you do have at least 1. I could be wrong, but from the photo you posted:


and as for the separate colony being ok: keep in mind that ‘the exact same species’ definitely falls under the category of closely related colonies/species. It could be fine now, and maybe it will stay fine (we still haven’t ID’d the issue): but I’ve seen STN/RTN infections jump from colony to colony until all aforementioned corals were gone in the entire system.

 

[bzb]

That one circled is some sort of bi-color birdsnest, got it from @ptreef. I was actually considering fragging that colony this weekend. Maybe not the best idea with this issue going on?

Crossing fingers it doesn't jump to the other colony. Should I remove the dying one?

 

[bzb]

He not feel so great Mr. Stark

 

[bzb]

Here's the other colony that is encrusting Squidwards house, and a frag from the dying colony

 

[bzb]

So crazy how fast these can crash. I was incorrect on the lower one... looks like it's got some die-off at the lower branches, too.

 

[ActiveAngel]

Yup, birdnest corals are generally Seriatoporas... one of the 3 common closely-related corals to Stylophoras.

I was battling it in one of my tanks years ago. Nothing solved my issue. Finally, I cut frags of all the closely related corals. Any pieces that were within 1 inch of infected tissue, I threw out, even if they looked completely healthy. All remaining pieces, I put into a separate tank/system. Even amongst those remaining frags, a few that were closest to the infected area began to show signs of tissue loss. My frag cutting apparently wasn’t conservative enough. As soon as I noticed, those frags were removed too.

And such corals left in my main display died. None made it.

But that’s just me; and it’s only anecdotal experience.

 

[snarky shark]

I just had a Muy Verde birds best do that to me. It was growing fine then stayed to notice what looked like algae build up but when I ducked it off looked like the pics above. Tried to frag but then they slowly died off to.

Sent from my SM-N975U using Tapatalk

 

[bzb]

Well, on Monday, I snipped that thing as best I could and pulled out the dead chunks. There's still a good bit of the base left, it's a helluva encruster! We'll see how the rest fares.