Green Star Polyp questions

[Jakesaw]

Newbie question about this coral.  I added my first few frags about a week ago. 

 

The coral that is the most surprising to me is the GSP b/c it's known as a beginner coral that's easy to keep. 

 

* Day 1 my frag was non-existent.  looked like rubble rock - It was fully retracted into wherever the polyps go when not extended. 

* The next few days it had some  polyps extension a bit more daily til there was maybe 1 1/2" extension.  That held for a few days 

* Few days later I tried feeding some flake food to my fish and  a flake fell right onto the frag base.   A Hermit crab crawled right over the GSP and needless to day, the GSP fully retracted for  the next day and a half. 

* Yesterday got some mild extension

* Today - No polyps. Just looks like a rock. ( well just a little GS fuzz )

 

Frag has good flow across it when extended

 

ACANS, Frogspawn, Green Trumpet coral look to be doing fine. .

 

The only thing I've done new is Blew some detrius I saw in my rock using a siphonette yesterday?  Also scraped film of algae off front glass and it blew around for a while.

 

Doing weekly water changes

Haven't been testing water for much of anything, but tank looks healthy with good green algae on rocks and back of tank.  

 

What is day to day behavior of this coral.  Is my experience normalish or is it something I should be concerning myself with.  

 

SG 1.026

 

Thanks

 

 

 

[Tautoo]

Your experience is completely normal.  Mine will be happy as can be for two weeks, then recess for 2-3 days at a time, then before I know it its happy again.  

 

One thing I do is blow off the mat with a baster if any detritus / algae builds up on it.

[Jakesaw]

1 hour ago, Tautoo said:

One thing I do is blow off the mat with a baster if any detritus / algae builds up on it.

I did my first Detritus blast last night.  I had been reading about it for a while and noticed some crud in crevaces of rock when feeding.   Blew a bunch of water in there and a whole bunch of muck went in the  water column.  Kindof shocked me.

I'm no longer going to worry about my crabs finding food in the tank. They crawl the rocks for a reason.

[DevilDuck]

Same for me, they look great for a week or two then totally throw a tantrum for another week. Makes me want to rethink my GSP wall.

[Jakesaw]

I am enjoying my few corals, and was thinking of getting a couple more til my GSP threw a fit.  Now I'm thinking of keeping what I've got for a while to learn a bit more about keeping my corals happy. 

 

 

[Clown79]

Normal gsp behaviour but 2 things about gsp- it likes flow and it likes nutrients.

 

I can't stress enough the importance to test alk, nitrate, and phosphate. Especially in a new tank and for new hobbyists.

 

Corals can look good for months and then decline slowly or rapidly and without testing, you won't know exactly what causes the decline.

[Murphs_Reef]

Yep keep it clean and you'll be ok, I have 5 not so small frags there is always one that looks pisses off.

[Jakesaw]

8 hours ago, Clown79 said:

Normal gsp behaviour but 2 things about gsp- it likes flow and it likes nutrients.

 

I can't stress enough the importance to test alk, nitrate, and phosphate. Especially in a new tank and for new hobbyists.

 

 

Thanks,

 

I tested Phosphates & Nitrates for a while but stopped.  Phosphates were always at zero, don't remember last Nitrate reading.  I can start testing for ALK, but with 5 small frags and weekly water changes didn't really see there was a reason to test ALK. 

[Clown79]

8 minutes ago, Jakesaw said:

Thanks,

 

I tested Phosphates & Nitrates for a while but stopped.  Phosphates were always at zero, don't remember last Nitrate reading.  I can start testing for ALK, but with 5 small frags and weekly water changes didn't really see there was a reason to test ALK. 

I can tell you, phosphate being at 0, is not good.

[Murphs_Reef]

30 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

I can tell you, phosphate being at 0, is not good.

No and GSP love a good bit of N and P

[Jakesaw]

1 hour ago, Clown79 said:

I can tell you, phosphate being at 0, is not good.

I'll test again later today.  I've never registered anything but 0 on Phosphates though.  How would I go about raising it?

 

One thing that may or may not be a factor is I'm using really old salt.  Bucket was never opened but a good 15 years sitting dry in closet of IO Salt. I was surprised there was no sealed bag inside.  Just a twist on lid. 

 

Salt bucket was a solid block that I'm shaving off weekly to get salt grains to mix in water.  

[Jakesaw]

API Nitrates = 0

Salifert Phosphates = 0

 

Looks like I need to raise these somehow.  Maybe cut out the weekly water changes?  feed different food / frequency?

 

My feeding has mainly been

* 1 x per day of brine shrimp or Garlic Flake food I just started using. 

The garlic flake - my Clown will eat but doesn't love it.  My Royal Gramma will swim around and not touch it.

 

Filtration has been Rock and HOB sponge filter that I rinse and alternate media when it starts smelling funky like rotting fish ( about weekly )

 

[Clown79]

2 hours ago, Jakesaw said:

API Nitrates = 0

Salifert Phosphates = 0

 

Looks like I need to raise these somehow.  Maybe cut out the weekly water changes?  feed different food / frequency?

 

My feeding has mainly been

* 1 x per day of brine shrimp or Garlic Flake food I just started using. 

The garlic flake - my Clown will eat but doesn't love it.  My Royal Gramma will swim around and not touch it.

 

Filtration has been Rock and HOB sponge filter that I rinse and alternate media when it starts smelling funky like rotting fish ( about weekly )

 

Brine shrimp is more of a treat, mysis is far more nutritional.

 

You want varied foods to feed.

 

Why use a sponge? They never are truly clean and really designed for freshwater biological filtration.

 

Its better to use floss cut to size, changed out twice a week.

 

As for nutrients, feeding a bit more, reducing size of waterchanges,removing filter media that reduces nutrients.

 

 

[Jakesaw]

6 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

 

Why use a sponge? They never are truly clean and really designed for freshwater biological filtration.

 

Lazy & Thrifty

 

I already bought large sponge sheet from Amazon per recommendation of Local Reefer.  and have a big sheet left unused.  Its' been working so inertia has kept it in my tank.  I'll eventually switch to filter floss to see how that works.When I transfer my 10 gal to 20L I'll be running AC 70 which will be better designed to handle the filter floss. 

 

 

[Jakesaw]

10 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

You want varied foods to feed.

That's my intended direction.  Started with Brine shrimp b/c my 2 fish were tiny when I got them.  Mysis shrimp is on my next buy list.  But I still have a good deal of frozen brine left to use. 

 

Flake was my varied food and I'm looking for a pellet that's not too expensive and nutritional. 

 

My Royal Gramma is pretty finniky and had pretty much only eaten brine shrimp and scoffed at Flake and a small pellet I had for my Clown.  Gramma liked smell of pellets but couldn't learn to eat off water surface. 

 

He's been a light eater of Shrimp lately but I see him scraping algae off the walls with his mouth during feed time.  I'll probably grab some Mysis today.  Open to other suggestions to rotate into the mix. 

 

[Clown79]

1 hour ago, Jakesaw said:

That's my intended direction.  Started with Brine shrimp b/c my 2 fish were tiny when I got them.  Mysis shrimp is on my next buy list.  But I still have a good deal of frozen brine left to use. 

 

Flake was my varied food and I'm looking for a pellet that's not too expensive and nutritional. 

 

My Royal Gramma is pretty finniky and had pretty much only eaten brine shrimp and scoffed at Flake and a small pellet I had for my Clown.  Gramma liked smell of pellets but couldn't learn to eat off water surface. 

 

He's been a light eater of Shrimp lately but I see him scraping algae off the walls with his mouth during feed time.  I'll probably grab some Mysis today.  Open to other suggestions to rotate into the mix. 

 

I like spectrum thera a the smallest pellets.

 

I don't feed at the surface. I place pellets/flakes in a container of sw and use pipette to feed or pour it in so that the food doesn't sit at the surface because not all fish will eat that way but rather mid level 

[Jakesaw]

Lost my first aquatic life today.

 

Came home with Mysis shrimp for the fish and the little guy was stuck to side of circulation pump.  Guess his lower appetite was a sign of stress bothering him in small 10g tank.  He was good til I dropped 5 coral frags in tank.  Since that time he's been trying new hiding spots in various parts of the tank and not visibly swimming during the day. 

 

 

 

[jefferythewind]

Phosphates at zero is a big problem. If your tank is new it will be hard to get this level off zero "naturally". Nitrates at zero also not good but less dangerous. The fastest way to get these levels in check is with dosing. 

 

I have green star polyps and early on i had them retract for days at a time. But since i got my water parameters in check they do not retract at all. A hermit crab will not cause them to retract for a whole day. 

 

You've got to get your parameters in check. Also check ammonia. You may need to start dosing to get everything right. Here is a pic. The green start polyps have completely taken over the rock on the right. They love nutrients and good flow. 

[Jakesaw]

2 hours ago, jefferythewind said:

Phosphates at zero is a big problem. If your tank is new it will be hard to get this level off zero "naturally". Nitrates at zero also not good but less dangerous. The fastest way to get these levels in check is with dosing. 

 

I have green star polyps and early on i had them retract for days at a time. But since i got my water parameters in check they do not retract at all. A hermit crab will not cause them to retract for a whole day. 

 

You've got to get your parameters in check. Also check ammonia. You may need to start dosing to get everything right. Here is a pic. The green start polyps have completely taken over the rock on the right. They love nutrients and good flow. 

Tank is New"ish"  3 mo. old.  

 

Most of my other corals that I'm direct feeding so far seem to be doing fine.  Frogspawn, ACAN, Green candycane ( in process of splitting first head )

 

I'd prefer to bring nutrients up in a more natural maturing vs dosing.  Fits my natural aquarium personality.  Sounds like it may just be a matter of time with this tank?  We'll see, I'm open to ideas to bring them up if I can keep it simple.  

[Clown79]

2 hours ago, Jakesaw said:

Tank is New"ish"  3 mo. old.  

 

Most of my other corals that I'm direct feeding so far seem to be doing fine.  Frogspawn, ACAN, Green candycane ( in process of splitting first head )

 

I'd prefer to bring nutrients up in a more natural maturing vs dosing.  Fits my natural aquarium personality.  Sounds like it may just be a matter of time with this tank?  We'll see, I'm open to ideas to bring them up if I can keep it simple.  

I struggled with nutrients for most of the 6 yrs i had my lagoon. Phosphates in particular but i was able to get those up dosing phyto.

 

Nitrates i had to dose. Nothing i did maintained them.

 

As a new tank and 3 mnths is new, i'd start with feeding some mysis every few days and reducing the size of waterchanges.

 

See how how that effects nutrient levels.

 

Sorry for your fish loss

[Jakesaw]

11 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

I struggled with nutrients for most of the 6 yrs i had my lagoon. Phosphates in particular but i was able to get those up dosing phyto.

 

Nitrates i had to dose. Nothing i did maintained them.

 

As a new tank and 3 mnths is new, i'd start with feeding some mysis every few days and reducing the size of waterchanges.

 

See how how that effects nutrient levels.

 

Sorry for your fish loss

Yeah, definitely cutting down water changes to 1 gal every 2 weeks.  I'm debating timing b/c I'm going to swap to a 20L pretty soon and transferring everything over.  Hoping i don't lose my new corals in the process.  

 

If I bring everything over from 10 gal to 20L - would my tank be considered " a new tank " again?  

[aclman88]

2 hours ago, Clown79 said:

I struggled with nutrients for most of the 6 yrs i had my lagoon. Phosphates in particular but i was able to get those up dosing phyto.

 

Nitrates i had to dose. Nothing i did maintained them.

 

As a new tank and 3 mnths is new, i'd start with feeding some mysis every few days and reducing the size of waterchanges.

 

See how how that effects nutrient levels.

 

Sorry for your fish loss

Do you have any tanks up and running at the moment?  I remember your lagoon!

[Clown79]

8 hours ago, aclman88 said:

Do you have any tanks up and running at the moment?  I remember your lagoon!

No. I shut them down in December. Nothing to do with the tanks themselves but personal reasons.

[jefferythewind]

I just want to add that cutting down water changes, in theory, will accomplish your goals, but I personally found that stopping water changes hurt my corals in other ways, and I don't know why. What I do now is water changes and dose phosphates to keep them at a level. I've increased my fish from 3 to 5 and also feed twice a day a mix of 3 frozen fish foods. I still need to to dose the phosphate although I've never had a problem maintaining a positive reading for nitrates, so I don't need to dose nitrates.  Every tank is a bit different but I just wouldn't be surprised if you have problems getting the phosphates up, it seems to be pretty common lately. 

 

[Clown79]

3 hours ago, jefferythewind said:

I just want to add that cutting down water changes, in theory, will accomplish your goals, but I personally found that stopping water changes hurt my corals in other ways, and I don't know why. What I do now is water changes and dose phosphates to keep them at a level. I've increased my fish from 3 to 5 and also feed twice a day a mix of 3 frozen fish foods. I still need to to dose the phosphate although I've never had a problem maintaining a positive reading for nitrates, so I don't need to dose nitrates.  Every tank is a bit different but I just wouldn't be surprised if you have problems getting the phosphates up, it seems to be pretty common lately. 

 

Its funny how everyones experience is different.

 

My corals did so much better with small waterchanges every 2 weeks than weekly 

 

1 thing that could contribute to problems with corals on 10-14 day waterchanges is fluctuations in parameters if you rely on waterchanges for alk/ca consumption.

 

I dosed daily because my consumption was way too high to rely on waterchanges so my parameters were stable so reducing waterchange frequency had no negative effects.