Too much light?

[dlux5life]

Hey guys-

Posting a couple pics of my coral that seem to be losing coloration, specifically in areas that would be receiving the most light.

They’re not losing their tissue, so much as their coloration. They’re concern is that it will lead to tissue loss.

Hoping to get some opinions. Alk has been steady, albeit a little low at about 7-7.5 dkh. Ph has been rock solid around 8.3 and coral growth has been pretty solid.

I have 4 quanta helix pros, about 18” above the water. Working on getting the clubs par meter to confirm.

Would love other’s thoughts on this. I know it can be a tough thing to gauge by pictures.

 

[Cpage101]

salinity and magnesium levels?

 

[dlux5life]

1.026 and mag is 1475

 

[dlux5life]

I should mention that I am picking up one of the clubs par meters, likely this weekend.

 

[Reefried]

It’s tough to tell by the pictures. Those corals do not look to me like they are getting too much light.

For years with SPS typically corals turning white meant too much light, and browner meant too little. But in the last ten years or so, or more likely when people moved to mostly LED’s it’s not always the case. I have put corals in high light areas that I thought they would love, and they didn’t like it, but they didn’t turn white, or “bleach” they turned duller, and almost grey-ish. I moved them to lower light areas and they came back quickly. I have some SPS sitting at 175 par and they look amazing.

What are your nutrient levels? I have experienced that low nutrients and high par is not a good mix.

I am curious to what numbers you get with the par meter. I would bet your tank is getting about a 225-250ish numbers at the high light areas and 150-180 in the low light areas.

 

[Swordsman82]

What are your Nitrate and Phosphate levels?

 

[dlux5life]

Par readings directly above the waters surface were ~400.

Directly under the waters surface was roughly 290 at peak time.

At the frag rack in the low boy tank, the par readings were closer to 270 or so.


Phosphate: .01
Nitrate: 0.0

I’m guessing this is a result of me having low alk for about 5 days. ~ 6dkh.

I was getting low results (6dkh) with both Hannah testers I have, and slightly higher readings with my Red Sea test kit (7 dkh).

I’m dosing 4900 ml of kalk a day, and feel I reached my limit as ph was getting too high. I also had lower flow in my sump, meaning I was dealing with a lot of precipitation issues.

I’ve started dosing 160 ml’s of liquid soda ash daily which, after a few larger doses, has held my ALK steady at 8.0 - 8.1 dkh.

Chalk it up to not knowing which test kit to believe, and having to little slow in my sump making it more difficult to raise my alk and ca. increasing the flow in my sump has eliminated the precipitation issues and means the supplements are actually having the desired effect.

 

[Swordsman82]

“Phosphate: .01
Nitrate: 0.0”

That is your problem. I was seeing the same issue. Get your Nitrates and Phosphates and your color will appear.

I got mine from zero to 12 Nitrate and .05 Phos and my white branches Paletta Pink Tip, turned pink

 

[NeverlosT]

I agree with Swordsman. You need nitrate and phosphate. Feed more or dose and things will improve

 

[dlux5life]

I immediately shut off my GFO. I have a small softball of cheato I’m holding on to still.

I have a nitrate additive coming today. I don’t want to get more fish now. I have another tank (130 gallon display) that will increase my fish load that will tie into this. I already feed my fish daily. Sometimes 2x.

Thanks for the help guys!

 

[Swordsman82]

Have you tried dosing Ammonium Bicarbonate + Urea mix? It will increase your Nitrates, and your acros take it up easier than nitrate

 

[Reefried]

why were you running GFO? Was your phosphate high at one point?

 

[dlux5life]

I haven’t had a tank in roughly 10 years. I feel like it was commonplace to have gfo running all the time back when i had my last tank. Even if it was preventative. I did the same thing this go around. And with my tank being less than a year old, I wanted to get ahead of any phosphate issues / GHA.

Lesson learned…things have changed for sure in the last decade.

 

[dlux5life]

I started feeding a little more. Nitrates were 3ppm this morning. Dosed a little more nitrates to bring them up to 7 ppm. Going to try and hold steady there for a bit and see how the corals react.

 

[dlux5life]

Have you tried dosing Ammonium Bicarbonate + Urea mix? It will increase your Nitrates, and your acros take it up easier than nitrate

I haven’t. I’ll read up on that. I just grabbed brightwells nitrate product. I’ll go through this bottle and do some research in the mean time.

 

[Reefried]

I haven’t had a tank in roughly 10 years. I feel like it was commonplace to have gfo running all the time back when i had my last tank. Even if it was preventative. I did the same thing this go around. And with my tank being less than a year old, I wanted to get ahead of any phosphate issues / GHA.

Lesson learned…things have changed for sure in the last decade.

I see, makes sense. Personally I would try to avoid running GFO if possible. People get all exited when their P04 numbers get higher than .08. It’s kind of ridiculous. I’m not saying I would like super high phosphate numbers. But I would let your tank/system find its natural equilibrium, instead of chasing numbers. At the end of the day, the corals will tell you what they like and can handle.

I personally do not like dosing nitrate or phosphate just to achieve some number on a test kit. There are more beneficial ways to raise your numbers, and the same for lowering them.