turbinaria receding

[RobbieC]

Hi,

I have a bit of a problem with a new turbinaria i just got friday.... bit of my own stupidity really, it had such good polyp extension in the store i didnt notice it had a small receding patch in the center till i got it home, in the two days since, the patch has grown considerably... otherwise it seems healthy, very responsive to light and to movement around it... my question is how do i help it recover and heal somewhat. pic attached is just after the light came on, before the polyps could hide most of the hole.

thanks

 

the tank's specs are:

via-aqua 11 gallon tank, with PC lighting included (36w)

ph- 8.3

temp 79

salinity 1.24

alkalinity 3.0 (adding b-ionic to raise it)

nitrates>10ppm

other inhabitants:

9 blue leg hermits

3 burgundy leg hermis

1 emerald crab

2 margarita snails

3 nerite snails

2 crown tops

2 tomato clowns

some zooanthids

a finger leather,

a toadstool leather

a caulastrea

[RobbieC]

anyone?

[Tempest]

I'm not really familiar with these corals (I keep mostly softies). I'd make sure that you have sufficient calcium and magnesium in the water (400-450 and 1300-1500 respectively). Also, without knowing what the problem is its hard to give advice. Is the receding area white? Is it a bacterial infection or predation? Is that part of the coral getting sufficient light? If no one here has any ideas try the coral forum over at WWW.Reefcentral.com. I've found them helpful in the past.

[storrsms]

I have one in a 40BR, but have about 318w of light-96w Smartlight, 2x96w Aqualight (with 2 10k), and a 30w NO actinic.

Mine is fully expanded and is growing along the edge closest to the lights-I have it positioned at about a 45 degree angle to the light source as they need to have any debris rinsed/blown off of their surface or can get infections &/or dead spots on them. you

could/should try increasing your light to help with the polyp extension

 

Mark

[Aiptasia]

If it were me, i'd add a little iodide to the water (lugol's solution) as skimmers have a tendency to skim out iodide. Iodide can have a prophylactic effect in a lot of corals that have bacterial infections, much in the same way as some caulerpa algae secretions can be mildly antibiotic.

 

The coral also probably needs to be fed. Many wasting type recessions in the tissues of a coral are related to a lack of proper feeding, so you may need to target feed the coral's healthy polyps with some BBS, marine snow and zooplankton.

 

In other words, good light, good food and clean conditions are your best bets for healing up the coral.