First corals, one problem

[Oldfishwife]

my new 10 gal cycled quickly using live sand, live rock and Dr. Tim’s. 25% water change, calcium 400, kH 9, ammonia and nitrite 0. I’m not adding fish yet, but picked up a couple of corals yesterday. I think I may have damaged the flesh on the orange euphoria.  Should I just hope it heals or get some Lugols and do a dip. It’s opening nicely except for the damaged head. Pics of corals including the damaged spot. Any advice would be appreciated. 

[sadie]

I'm not really sure, sorry, but just wanted to say those are nice looking coral!  Hope it heals.

[banasophia]

Hmm... hopefully you dipped to remove pests prior to adding to your tank. Beautiful corals, very nice choices!! I would just leave it be to heal on it’s own personally. 

[Oldfishwife]

14 minutes ago, banasophia said:

Hmm... hopefully you dipped to remove pests prior to adding to your tank. Beautiful corals, very nice choices!! I would just leave it be to heal on it’s own personally. 

Thanks! I did a freshwater dip in RO water. I moved it a couple of times and even though I tried to keep my fingers off, I think I probably scraped it. It’s just the one head so I’m hoping it will heal and not affect the others. 

[banasophia]

2 minutes ago, Oldfishwife said:

Thanks! I did a freshwater dip in RO water. I moved it a couple of times and even though I tried to keep my fingers off, I think I probably scraped it. It’s just the one head so I’m hoping it will heal and not affect the others. 

For future additions, I would recommend getting a coral dip that will more effectively kill/remove pests. I think that coral will heal just fine and look really pretty!!

[Oldfishwife]

Thank you. I was just looking at Coral Rx. I’ll be ordering that later today. Thanks. 

[Oldfishwife]

Well, my stupid mistake that would be shameful even for the very greenest newbie could have really made a huge mess of my tank. 

 

I did a 25% wc a couple of days ago. I did NOT check the salinity after, nor was I especially careful to match the water level. 😳 add to that the fact that because I didn’t notice the display water level dropping, I didn’t do a top off. I decided to measure salinity- 1.029 pushing 1.030!!!!!i pulled out some water, added RO, measured again, 1.028. Repeat. Now at 1.026 and things are starting to open more and look happier. I used a sharpie and marked the water level. 

 

Stupid, stupid mistake!!! Yes, I’ve been out of the hobby for 18 years, but what is more basic than testing salinity? Ugh!!! Forgive me you beautiful corals!

[Sancho]

If the flesh is damaged an iodine dip can help it heal. But it really doesn’t look that bad. As banasophia pointed out you should be dipping to get rid of pest. There are quite a few good products out there. 

[banasophia]

Just always be sure you're getting accurate results for your salinity before taking corrective action. Are you using a calibrated refractometer?

[Oldfishwife]

1 hour ago, banasophia said:

Just always be sure you're getting accurate results for your salinity before taking corrective action. Are you using a calibrated refractometer?

Absolutely! 

[Oldfishwife]

Looking a bit happier now, plus flash helps. 😍

[mcarroll]

Holy cow folks the fear of parasites is palpable in the air here and NOBODY EVEN MENTIONED THEM.  A dip for a wound is all that was brought up. 🕵️‍♂️ 😄  

 

@Oldfishwife You need to get your water tested for nitrates and phosphates to see where levels are.

 

An injured animal needs building blocks for new cells if it's going to repair....that means an increased demand for nitrates, phosphates and carbon to build amino acids and proteins and cell walls, et al.

 

If your nitrates and phosphates are registering zero (or near-zero) then that's an indication your corals won't be getting enough.

 

In a new tank you want some excess in the water....at least 0.03 ppm phosphate and at least 5 ppm nitrates.  Phosphates are the most crucial, but since you know there's repair work on top of ordinary daily demand, the extra nitrates will be very much used.

[banasophia]

43 minutes ago, mcarroll said:

Holy cow folks the fear of parasites is palpable in the air here and NOBODY EVEN MENTIONED THEM.  A dip for a wound is all that was brought up. 🕵️‍♂️ 😄  

 

 

Holy cow is right @mcarroll... did you even read what we said before you criticized our replies?! 

 

 

11 hours ago, banasophia said:

Hmm... hopefully you dipped to remove pests prior to adding to your tank. Beautiful corals, very nice choices!! I would just leave it be to heal on it’s own personally. 

 

10 hours ago, Sancho said:

If the flesh is damaged an iodine dip can help it heal. But it really doesn’t look that bad. As banasophia pointed out you should be dipping to get rid of pest. There are quite a few good products out there. 

 

[mcarroll]

On 9/6/2019 at 11:14 AM, banasophia said:

pests

 

On 9/6/2019 at 11:31 AM, Oldfishwife said:

I think I probably scraped it

 

On 9/6/2019 at 11:36 AM, banasophia said:

pests

 

23 hours ago, Sancho said:

pest

 

In the context of the first post I guess it seems like a lot.

 

Dips don't heal anything, btw, they kill things.  The idea is more like rubbing alcohol on a wound.

 

Not unlike that example where they now tell you not to use rubbing alcohol on a wound because it's damaging to the tissue in the wound, the same would apply here.  

 

The idea now is to clean the wound as non-invasively as possible, hopefully with nothing more than soap and water, to promote faster better healing.  

 

The immune system does all the real work.

 

In the case of a coral that just means to make sure the tank is as healthy as possible (plentiful nutrients, stable chemistry, et al) and that the coral gets excellent flow.  

 

The action taken in both cases might be different if there were signs of some type of infection or some good reason to suspect one such as other infected corals in close proximity.

[Oldfishwife]

There is no increase in tissue loss today, so I am just trying to work on my parameters. Everything is spot on except for nitrate and phosphate. I’m not used to this whole “dirty tank” mindset because we used to try to keep them low.  Anyway, I’m going to try removing carbon, increasing feeding and see what happens.  I see some people use Flourish, which we have for my husband’s planted tank, but I read the label and copper was listed, so I’m not sure that’s a great idea. I will try the natural way first and see what happens. If it doesn’t work I’ll get some additives. 

[banasophia]

3 minutes ago, mcarroll said:

 

 

 

 

In the context of the first post I guess it seems like a lot.

 

Dips don't heal anything, btw, they kill things.  The idea is more like rubbing alcohol on a wound.

 

Not unlike that example where they now tell you not to use rubbing alcohol on a wound because it's damaging to the tissue in the wound, the same would apply here.  

 

The idea now is to clean the wound as non-invasively as possible, hopefully with nothing more than soap and water, to promote faster better healing.  

 

The immune system does all the real work.

 

In the case of a coral that just means to make sure the tank is as healthy as possible (plentiful nutrients, stable chemistry, et al) and that the coral gets excellent flow.  

 

The action taken in both cases might be different if there were signs of some type of infection or some good reason to suspect one such as other infected corals in close proximity.

Seriously... you have a problem... it appears you are still only reading/quoting the word “pest” and not the rest of the sentence that says “dipping to get rid of.” Troll much? 

 

[Sancho]

9 minutes ago, mcarroll said:

 

 

 

 

In the context of the first post I guess it seems like a lot.

 

Dips don't heal anything, btw, they kill things.  The idea is more like rubbing alcohol on a wound.

 

Not unlike that example where they now tell you not to use rubbing alcohol on a wound because it's damaging to the tissue in the wound, the same would apply here.  

 

The idea now is to clean the wound as non-invasively as possible, hopefully with nothing more than soap and water, to promote faster better healing.  

 

The immune system does all the real work.

 

In the case of a coral that just means to make sure the tank is as healthy as possible (plentiful nutrients, stable chemistry, et al) and that the coral gets excellent flow.  

 

The action taken in both cases might be different if there were signs of some type of infection or some good reason to suspect one such as other infected corals in close proximity.

Just offering advice that the OP should have dipped in more than just DI water. I never claimed any pest dip would heal the coral. I did suggest that if the coral was damaged to dip in iodine as it has proven to be beneficial when cutting corals and the flesh may be damaged.  

[banasophia]

54 minutes ago, Oldfishwife said:

There is no increase in tissue loss today, so I am just trying to work on my parameters. Everything is spot on except for nitrate and phosphate. I’m not used to this whole “dirty tank” mindset because we used to try to keep them low.  Anyway, I’m going to try removing carbon, increasing feeding and see what happens.  I see some people use Flourish, which we have for my husband’s planted tank, but I read the label and copper was listed, so I’m not sure that’s a great idea. I will try the natural way first and see what happens. If it doesn’t work I’ll get some additives. 

You do not need to do all that. No need to remove carbon, increase feeding, and intentionally create a “dirty tank,” unless there’s some other problem occurring in your tank that you’ve posted in another thread that I’m not aware of.

 

Corals get cut up into pieces with a bandsaw when they get fragged... they get touched and bumped and held when we get them and add them to our tanks, they may take a little time to adjust to a new system... some corals can take 1-2 weeks to open when we get them, but they heal. Unless I’m really missing something here, your coral looks totally normal in the pics.

 

I recommend avoiding taking the advice of just of one person and throwing everything off in your tank. I would just keep doing what you’ve been doing, making sure to test your parameters. I also recommend getting an ATO as soon as possible... I have a Nuvo 10 as well and adding the ATO really helped keep the tank stable, it gets a lot of evaporation. The Smart Micro ATO is a really good one. 

 

[mcarroll]

You want Flourish phosphorous.  

 

They also make a general fert. which sounds like what you have.

[Oldfishwife]

4 hours ago, banasophia said:

You do not need to do all that. No need to remove carbon, increase feeding, and intentionally create a “dirty tank,” unless there’s some other problem occurring in your tank that you’ve posted in another thread that I’m not aware of.

 

Corals get cut up into pieces with a bandsaw when they get fragged... they get touched and bumped and held when we get them and add them to our tanks, they may take a little time to adjust to a new system... some corals can take 1-2 weeks to open when we get them, but they heal. Unless I’m really missing something here, your coral looks totally normal in the pics.

 

I recommend avoiding taking the advice of just of one person and throwing everything off in your tank. I would just keep doing what you’ve been doing, making sure to test your parameters. I also recommend getting an ATO as soon as possible... I have a Nuvo 10 as well and adding the ATO really helped keep the tank stable, it gets a lot of evaporation. The Smart Micro ATO is a really good one. 

 

Thanks for the ATO suggestion. We are home most of the day every day, so topping off is easy right now. I am going to get an ATO for when we do travel, though. I’m not going to use any additives right now, either. I’m just going to feed to try to bring my nitrate and phosphate up a bit. The damaged coral is open nicely today and took good greedily. 😍 and no more tissue loss. 

[mcarroll]

Good news!!