SPS Care and Tank Trouble

F

fishman0712

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I have a few questions concerning the care of SPS Corals, mainly color and growth.

Let me start with some of my system information which is now 1.5-2 years old.
60 gallon drilled cube with one over flow, Reef Octopus Skimmer, Trigger Systems 30 Ruby Sump with a fuge ( I think they all have the fuge! This is brand new I just installed it 2 weeks ago) I run two Korilla Hydor power heads, and an Aqua Illuminations Sol light with AI Director. I also run Chemi Pure Elite and Phosphate Remover in my sump area. I do a weekly water change of 10 gallons using RO/DI and I recently switched over to using Aqua Vitro Salinity Salt.

Water Parameters are as follows using a Red Sea kit:
Salt Level 1.025-1.026
Ammonia 0
Nitrate 0
Nitrates 0
Alk 9.5-10 DKH
Ca 460
Mg 1350-1400
P04 (0-0.5)
PH 8.0-8.15 (with Swing)
Water Temp 76-77 with Swing)

Now to the issue, I am currently having trouble keeping spa alive for a long period of time. I am able to keep them pretty healthy for a few months and then they do one of two things 1. Bleach out and die 2. turn pale and loose all color. Currently I have some Jason Fox Red Dragon Acro that is bleached out and has almost no color to it. I have my AI's set at about 15000k color temp with the Regional Weather feature turned on with the AI Director. Lights stay on in my tank about 10 hours a day. I feed my fish twice a day once in the morning with pellets and at night using frozen food blend so that my corals are able to eat some of the oyster eggs and photo plankton that I mix in it. Can some one please tell me why my corals are losing color or why they are RTNing. I always dip new corals and acclimate them properly. Should I be using any white light on my LEDs? Any advice that you have would be great.

Thanks for all of the help.
 
Do you think maybe that you might need more flow in the tank? Do you have any micro algae growing anywhere? Maybe the water is too "clean"? Just food for thought. I don't claim to have any answers.
 
I think I have good flow i turn over at 20x an hour. My SPS either STN or turn pale and have bad polyp extension.
 
Mine adds up to be about 50 X and I would like it to be more. If they don't get flow, they don't get cleaned, and they don't get nutrients delivered to them.

My limited experience with LEDs tells me that you should have some white LEDs on for a while each day.
 
SPS don't like direct flow from a power head at close proximity.
How are you doing your water changes? Directly into the tank? Since you installed the sump in the middle of January, have you noticed any changes?
 
Just a few things I would check for- (fyi, I am not an expert in SPS care, but I have been through a lot of ups and downs with them so the statements below are just references to my own failures and successes.)

First one was already asked by DFW, is do you have any algae growth in the tank at all? If not I have found that my water was "to clean." If your like me, I didn't even know that was possible, but what you can do is run your Alk at a significantly lower levels. I'm talking about 7-8DKH. This is what many are doing with what is refereed to as a ULNS system. (Ultra Low Nutrient System). In all of these type systems, they are very meticulous in feeding and dosing the corals. Research this when you have the time. If you don't want to deal with a ULNS system then you have to feed more. Others with more experience my chime in here with a little more advice if you truly have zero algae in the tank. Also, if you try to adjust alk down, do it very slowly, then go even slower. SPS HATE alk swings.

Second is also stated above. Flow is absolutely the most critical aspect of keeping SPS after water parameter stability. With the now much more affordable knockoff power-heads on the market I would look at swapping out the Korilla's with something that will increase flow and make it much more random. If you want to spend some $ Vortech makes a great pump, but a little overpriced for my taste, and I have one so no haters please. 2-3 MP-10s should do it. Research water movement in SPS tanks and never strive to be at the low end on "recommended" water movement. As stated above you want to really be moving some water in that tank. If it looks like a toilet bowl being flushed then you can turn it down a little bit, but just a little. :)

Third is lighting. Sorry, I am not familiar with AI lighting but many people on here are so hopefully someone lets you know their settings on a similar tank with similar lights that are having good results. Only advice I have on LED lights is they are brighter to the corals than they are to our eyes. How high off the water is your lighting, and do you have or does a friend have a PAR meter so you can check your light output at the level the corals are at?
Last point is a lot like the first. You listed you parameters and they look good for the most part except for the ALK being to high if you have no PO4 and no Nitrates. How long has your tank been stable at these parameters? In my own experience, SPS can be finicky little buggers. Variations in any one of the things you listed and then a water change bringing them back in line can cause them to go south. Variation in water composition is the #1 killer of SPS in my opinion.

Hope some of this helps, and I am no expert on SPS believe me. Think through every change on an SPS tank before you do it. Go slow and be patient. Wish there was a quick fix for SPS, but there isn't. Sorry for the long post.
 
Adding to the above, I had a "too clean" issue for a long time with TONS of algae. Turned out the algae was better at sucking things up than everything else. I was using cheap test kits, but N03 and PO4 were always undetectable. Feeding my coral heavily (no fish at the time) increased the algae growth but not much else. I finally nuked the algae, the nitrates came up a bit (1-3 PPM) and everything did better.
 
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