channah Posted April 10, 2003 Share Posted April 10, 2003 Well, I'm not sure what the heck is going on with my 15 high. I'll list the corals at the bottom, but the only ones that are really opening are my star polyps (still not comepletely). The only changes that I made are adding my DIY canopy and expanded from 32w PC to another 32 W PC, added a Bakpak skimmer and an empty Aquaclear 150 for circulation (a week ago), and even when I first added them, it was cool. My green shrooms always open, but even they aren't looking great. Water parameters have been consistent. So I'm not sure what's going down. 15high, equipment listed above, corals: pagoda cup, green mushrooms, star polyps, button polyps, tree colt coral, orange tree sponge, twp perc clowns, coral banded shrimp, blue-leg hermits, turbo snails, lettuce nudibranch (who doesn't touch the hair algae). Ammonia,Nitrite 0, nitrate <5, Ph 8.3, Ca 400. Link to comment
tinyreef Posted April 10, 2003 Share Posted April 10, 2003 could be the additional light. adjusting the photoperiod is not sufficient or effective in most cases. the peak photosynthesis period can still overwhelm the corals. you doubled the light output even if it was only actinic it still added significant PAR to your system. you may want to put a spacer between your hood/light and tank to raise it up a couple of inches (i.e. lower your light intensity/quantity). over a period of time you can slowly lower it to let your corals acclimate to the higher light (more difficult/traumatic for the corals ime). Link to comment
kennerd Posted April 10, 2003 Share Posted April 10, 2003 I agree with tinyreef. Adjusting photoperiod is not the answer when bumping up your wattage, it's intensity. A couple of 2x4 chunks spanning your tank and propping up your caopy is the best way to simply decrease the intensity. Link to comment
channah Posted April 10, 2003 Author Share Posted April 10, 2003 The lights are already a good 6 inches off the water, and I have the 50/50 bulbs on timers to come on and go off at seperate times. should I still raise it up, and how long until I should let this remain this way? Thanks! Link to comment
kennerd Posted April 10, 2003 Share Posted April 10, 2003 Originally posted by channah The lights are already a good 6 inches off the water, If that is the height they were at initially, then yes, raise them. The idea is this: the higher that you raise them, the lower the intensity of the light being emitted. Without getting mathematically detailed about it, you had 32w over the system @ 6", and double the lighting to 64w, but raise the hood another 3 inches, you are causing the amount of lighting actually hitting your corals to only be aslightly more than the orignal 32, since less light from bot bulbs is actually getting to and penetrating the water. Gradually lowering the lights back toward that 6" height over time will make the intenisty up ingentle steps for your corals to adjust to. Now, a final question: are your bulbs going to be 6" off the water at their lowest point? Also, do you have waterproof endcaps? Link to comment
flaunt Posted April 10, 2003 Share Posted April 10, 2003 hmm strange... i don't recall having problems on my 10g when I added a 36W PC to my existing 75W VHO... 36W on a 15H must have been somewhat dim, eh? You said your lights are a good 6" above the tank. Were they that high before adding your DIY hood and the extra 36W PC? Also, did you add the 36W PC at the same time as the DIY hood? Basically what I'm wondering is whether the original 36W bulb was always 6" above the water or only after you added the DIY hood and extra bulb. Unless your corals are all at the very top right under the lights it doesn't seem likely IMO that the extra light would be causing the problems. If it were the light I would think you'd see coral bleaching. My father recently put 500W MH + 180W VHO Actinic over his 40g (and then he gave it to me )... I told him to keep the massive set of lights atleast a foot above the tank starting out. Initially he did this, then a week later decided to lower them all the way to about 2 inches from the tank! It didn't take more than several days before many corals started showing signs of bleaching, but none of them were withdrawn from the excessive amount of light. You said you also got a bakpak skimmer and an aquaclear filter for additional flow. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the bakpak draws water out and overflows back into the tank much like the aquaclear doesn't it? If so, what did you feel was the need for so much extra water flow? IME I have had corals close up and GSPs get a "weathered" look after exposing them to too much direct current. So, it *could* be the light, but if I were you I wouldn't rule out other causes such as too much direct current on corals that prefer light-medium water flow, or maybe even air bubbles if your bakpak is putting a lot of them into the aquarium (i've heard some people have this problem with them). Link to comment
channah Posted April 10, 2003 Author Share Posted April 10, 2003 well, I wasn't sure about just how far to lower them, or to use a glass cover. One of the lights has the waterproof caps, but the other does not. When I made the canopy, I made it about 6" off the water. Should I lower them and add a glass cover? I really wasn't sure. Link to comment
channah Posted April 10, 2003 Author Share Posted April 10, 2003 I thought about the whole air-bubbles thing too. The aquaclear doesn't move too much water, and the water coming from the bakpak is much of a current at all. Maybe I will try to slow the currents down more, but I really had close to that current before. I ditched my Eclipse set-up with 32w retro for my DIY canopy, so the lights were a little closer before. Link to comment
kennerd Posted April 10, 2003 Share Posted April 10, 2003 OK, the new higher distance should dim it somewhat, and altough the intensity is greater, it's true that your not exacatly cooking them with only 64w of PC: just a jump off point! I would buy a moisture proof endcaps from hellolights for 11-12 bucks and then you can just leave the lights as-is. (this is what I did with both of my 32w smartlight retros) and you won't need a shield. Just an occassional wipe down of the bulbs of sal creep in the morning before they go on. My PC bulbs (2x32 on a 12gal, 3x32 on a 10gal) are about 2" above to water with no problems. On a 15 H, I would get 'em closer to the water. You list the top-introduced water circulation, but is there anything moving water at the bottom of the tank? You might consider a small powerhead blowing laterally near the bottom of the tank blowing horizontally, maybe even behind your rockwork. Link to comment
channah Posted April 10, 2003 Author Share Posted April 10, 2003 Okay, I went home for lunch to see how things were going with the tank. My tree (or colt) has seem to split it's self. Could there be any sort of chemical thing happening? I'm just really stumped... Link to comment
kennerd Posted April 10, 2003 Share Posted April 10, 2003 You know, doing a big water cange can't hurt: 4-5 gal. Link to comment
flaunt Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 you might also try discontinuing the use of the bakpak skimmer temporarily, say a week, just to rule out possible causes... Link to comment
channah Posted April 11, 2003 Author Share Posted April 11, 2003 Well, I ditched a bunch of the current (just running the aquaclear and the flow from the skimmer) and shut down one of the 32W lights to see how things make out. I also took out the tree coral that split and seemed to be croaking. When I took it out, it seemed to expel this "slime". I'm still running the skimmer, though. The bubbles seem to really be diminishing (hopefully breaking in) Should I run some carbon? Link to comment
kennerd Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 carbon and water changes never hurt. Link to comment
tinyreef Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 i agree with ken & flaunt's suggestions but the colt may have been the victim rather than the perp. it was probably stress spawning rather than the source of the contaminant. it may look like it's sludging tho but they are very tough corals. keep an eye on the tree sponge. : i'm not sure i agree with the toning down of current tho as it's a 15H. i also don't like the reduction of light. once you go one way (especially for light) you should maintain it. raise the lights' height but don't shut it off completely imo. keep running the carbon but change it more frequently (weekly, at least for now). the lack of 'something' that the carbon may be extracting will hurt less than the presence of 'something' it can take out imo. Link to comment
kennerd Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 Yep, tinyreef: you shouldn't keep your carbon in the system for too long. Also, didn;t notice the tree sponge in your initial post. How does it look? These are NOT recommended in our closed systems. I'll admit, I currently have a really tall sppecimen in my 65 gal, that a vendor sent as a freebie. I was a little ####ed, but wasn;t going to just pitch it in the trash. These things crash and make a miserable mess. They are also filter feeders, so you MUST dose phytoplankton, or a similar food. If it's starting to look mushy and losing color, remove it ASAP, as it will foul your tank in a blink. Link to comment
tinyreef Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 ken, actually i've got an unchanged carbon pack in my display tank going on three years now :x (i'm not opening that cartridge!). that's a different situation tho and i do alternate the disposable cartridges every other month. but i wouldn't start dosing anything plankton or stuff now tho. i'd opt to let it alone, trade it, or setup a separate QT for it instead in the interest of letting channah solve the original mystery first. jmo Link to comment
kennerd Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 Oh, sure, just a post with some general info on it. Could certainly be the cause if it's melting down, though! Link to comment
tinyreef Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 oh yeah, i agree with you, the sponge may definitely be the cause. i wasn't disagreeing, just saying i'd hold off on dosing phyto or something in case channah was thinking of trying to feed/save the sponge. that may end up worsening the case imo. like you mentioned (and if it was me) if the sponge looked even a little off i'd probably toss it too. simplify the system to solve a complex problem. Link to comment
FSUreef Posted April 11, 2003 Share Posted April 11, 2003 From lfs expreience, Do you have small children in the house? If they watch you play with your tanks enough, they're bound to dump something in them. Pennies are one of my favorites (don't ask how long that took to figure out). I agree with everyone else, big water change and run lots of premium carbon through your system for a few days. Link to comment
channah Posted April 11, 2003 Author Share Posted April 11, 2003 So, I should ditch the sponge? It looks good though, no discoloration. But it could be the cause? Link to comment
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