What is this green stuff and help with paly

[daniejd]

Couple of quick questions.

 

What is this green stuff all over my rocks, I’m guessing algae but couldn’t find any that matches (Its like a pale green spongy, that sorta layers on top of itself).

 

Second question, any idea what’s up with the palys? This is my second batch and they are doing the identical to the first. They spread quickly, then begin to shrink and bleach, never really die, just finally turn white and about the size of a small pea. Tank info below.

 

Tank Evo XII 13.5 gallon

 

Water parameters 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, 5-10 nitrate, Phosphate low (It had been high, but lowered it to control cyano outbreak).

Fed 1-2 times weekly.

Other corals.

Gorgonia growing really well.

Xenia growing well.

Rhodactis split a couple of times, growing ok.

GSP growing slowly.

Kenya Tree just maintaining.

Purple Mushroom just maintaining.

 

Water changes, cut back on, approx. 25% weekly, was doing about 10% daily when I was fighting the cyano.

 

Only crabs and inverts. Everything was better when I had fish, but like an idiot no qt and ich wiped them out so waiting 90 days to restock.

[daniejd]

Oh the waving hand is doing well also

[seabass]

On 8/31/2022 at 10:15 AM, daniejd said:

Phosphate low (It had been high, but lowered it to control cyano outbreak).

I find cyano to be caused more by organics on/in the sand bed or rocks, and/or dissolved in the water, than from high nutrient levels.  Lack of nutrients will cause zoanthids and palythoas to struggle.  Of course there are other reasons that they might be doing poorly (like zoa pox, nudibranchs, sea spiders, or other irritants).

 

On 8/31/2022 at 10:15 AM, daniejd said:

What is this green stuff all over my rocks,

I might even call it golden in color.  Possibly Chrysophytes.

[daniejd]

8 hours ago, seabass said:

I find cyano to be caused more by organics on/in the sand bed or rocks, and/or dissolved in the water, than from high nutrient levels.  Lack of nutrients will cause zoanthids and palythoas to struggle.  Of course there are other reasons that they might be doing poorly (like zoa pox, nudibranchs, sea spiders, or other irritants).

 

I might even call it golden in color.  Possibly Chrysophytes.

Thank you, after researching your Chysophytes suggestion (wasn’t familiar with it at all) that what it looks like to me. Found several photos that appear to be an exact match.

 

The cyano I had battled for over a month (you can still see some in the pictures, but trust me that’s nothing compared to what it was, covering 1/2 the tank…daily!), but while researching it ran across some marine biology paper concerning Florida red tides. It was fairly dense, but the basic premise seemed to be red tides were triggered by elevated phosphate levels relative to nitrate levels (it wasn’t the amount causing the issues but the ratio). I chose to lower phosphates as I have a pretty hard time keeping the nitrate levels even registering (all those softies seem to suck it up, my gorgonia grew from 2” to 6” in 3 months (maybe that’s the issue with the palys, just not as efficient at getting the nutrients)). Anyway, I put some phosguard in a media bag placed in the sump, and 3 days later cyano was in full retreat. Causation or coincidence? Not sure. But the ratio may explain some of the seemingly conflicting cyano cures (lowering phosphates, raising nitrates, lowing nutrients etc., all more or less achieving same results in a different way, that is restoring the ratio). 
 

Again thank you for the help!