O.K. got this green bird'snest frag. Had it about a month now and I could actually see growth with it. Woke up today and it is totally white. The more I liik at it it looks like a coccoon wraped around it. I've kinda been slack on my waer changes lately diong abut 20% every 2 weeks. I was doing weekly wc's. FFirst thing I did was check PH nitrates and calcium. Everything is in acceptable range and normal. None of my other corals or anything appear affected. What could this be?
SPS trouble
- Thread starter lees
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It's called RTN - Rapid Tissue Necrosis. Unfortunately, this just happens. I never found an explanation that completely satisfied me...
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RTN starts from the bottom up... and generally has reduced PE from the SPS. He's experiencing it in an acro from top down with full PE. Also, the birdsnest is one of the hardier types of SPS and doesn't RTN in the same manner as an acro does. They typically just hold on as long as they can and then just die all at once as seen here.
When SPS especially acros die off from the top down its typically due to two things from my experience. Either its a sudden influx of too much light damaging the more sensitive growth tips, or simply a potassium deficiency. I'm thinking in this situation that its the latter. I've actually experienced potassium deficiency and had almost those exact symptoms. I still would have this problem if I didn't do water changes with high frequency...
I advise you to go back to your weekly water changes at the least and to do a water change asap. Hopefully you won't have any more losses...
G'luck!
When SPS especially acros die off from the top down its typically due to two things from my experience. Either its a sudden influx of too much light damaging the more sensitive growth tips, or simply a potassium deficiency. I'm thinking in this situation that its the latter. I've actually experienced potassium deficiency and had almost those exact symptoms. I still would have this problem if I didn't do water changes with high frequency...
I advise you to go back to your weekly water changes at the least and to do a water change asap. Hopefully you won't have any more losses...
G'luck!
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The problem with dosing potassium is that its always in potassium iodide format. That means you're dosing iodide in equal parts to potassium and you can only dose so much iodide before running into other issues. That's why water changes imo are a better way to replenish your potassium in conjunction with some dosing. I do dose fuel and have been pleased with it so far.
<span style="font-family: Verdana">When a coral looses its tissue rapidly, whatever the cause is, it’s RTN. Some explanations include shock, flux, light, bacteria etc. I don’t think there is a contradiction here unless you just want to get into an argument…</span>
Lee, I can replace that frag for you whenever your system is ready.
Lee, I can replace that frag for you whenever your system is ready.
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If you want an argument I can give you one. However, that's not my intent so try not to take it that way.
I simply made a distinction that I think is worth looking at. It may very well be that the entire coral is going to RTN, but at this time its showing signs of something very different.Let me explain...
Tissue necrosis in general happens at times and much of the time its hard to decifer the cause. As reefers you can't get too hung up on it as it happens to everyone from time to time and it is frustrating to not be able to pinpoint the causes. Over time from experience though people have distinguished types of necrosis. I don't think you're wrong in saying that rapid tissue necrosis is simply the rapid loss of tissue on an Acropora sp. The funny thing about RTN though is that it occurs from the BOTTOM up in an acro. You have tissue lose at the base of the acro which will spread upwards towards the tips. This is of course the most serious type of necrosis and as the description indicates it happens post haste and fragging the branches away from the receding base is often the only course of action you can take.
This is very different though from tissue necrosis starting at the tips. When its starting at the tips we don't commonly call that RTN, although it is a rapid tissue necrosis to some degree, instead its been labeled simply as tip recession. Tip recession doesn't typically cause the flesh to rapidly fall off on the entire acro. That's not its MO, and I think its important enough to be able to distinguish that from RTN. It will typically stop at the end of the tips exposing the skeleton there but doesn't rapidly reduce the entire acro into a skeleton. Instead the acro is simply showing signs of distress which can often be remedied and thus allow the acro to recover withhout further issues. I've had tons of acros experience tip recession and not experience RTN. So I researched the hell out of it and this is what I came up with. One of the more common causes of it happens to be K deficiency. When I corrected my K levels my acros grew thier tips back and are now growing with a vengeance. Who knows if this guy is experiencing the same thing or not. I'm putting it out there as a possibility and in doing so explaining that his issue may be distinct from regular old RTN. There are other types of necrosis as well but there's no need to talk about those at this time.
Salam.
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with tips recession, another issue that is common is extremely high phosphates. Huge alk swings could also cause rtn, but it would most likely effect a few. Starting GFO and lowering phosphates too rapidly also causes rtn &/or tip recession. Flow could also cause issues (or lack of flow rather).
Lee was mentioning two corals: his green birdnest that he woke up to a white skeleton, and then a purple acro that started loosing tissue from the top. I think we are both right.
Shalom...
Shalom...
