STN on montis

[panic]

Weird, but all of my montis - digis and caps - are getting a small bare area and spreading to its slow demise from there. It takes a couple weeks. I've had 4 so far in a month and a couple more are starting. Everything else grows and PEs like normal. What gives? My levels are all normal. Nutrients are undetectable on Salifert. Could I be pulling out too many nutrients? Is there such thing as over-skimming?

The only thing I can think of would be too many fish, but I siphon 2x week and do an additional 10% wc every week. I use a 1:2:2 ratio of Oceanic, Tropic Marin, and IO. I'm thinking about dropping the TM.

Is this the new BB tank syndrome? Anyone else had this?

[Geoff]

how long ago did you switch the tank to BB?

how is your Ca and alk?

G~

[Wiskey]

Can you try putting them in less light? I found after I went BB lots of corals I had being blasted with light didn't like it very much any more.


HTH,
Whiskey

[panic]

When you say less light, are you talking higher or less time?

On a 180, I have 3 400se Reeflux 12k in Lumenarc IIIs, and run 5 1/2 hours on the end lights and 7 on the middle. The bulbs are 8" from the water. The Montis that STN are on the bottom.

[panic]

Ca 480
DKh 7.0 / 2.51

I made the switch on April 15

[Wiskey]

Originally Posted by panic

When you say less light, are you talking higher or less time?

On a 180, I have 3 400se Reeflux 12k in Lumenarc IIIs, and run 5 1/2 hours on the end lights and 7 on the middle. The bulbs are 8" from the water. The Montis that STN are on the bottom.

Wow that's allot of light, those Lumenark reflectors rock too. I have a friend with a 7 foot tank that lights it with only 2 250W XM 10K's on lumenark's, and he keeps only SPS, clams, and Zoos.

Do you have any way to measure the output at your caps? Like a PAR meter?

I am hesitant to suggest that you change your whole setup if only the caps are effected, can you partly shade them, and move them out to the far left/right edges of the tank(so they are under the shorter photo-period bulbs).

Whiskey

[panic]

I don't have a PAR meter - I'll get on the hunt b/c that would be nice to know. I'll hunt Sanjay's data to see if he has something metered for my setup.

The strange part is that they are all in different parts of the light. I'll post some pics tomorrow after the lights come on.

[Mike O'Brien]

Have you checked them for nudi's ?

[panic]

How do you check other than looking? They look like little slugs, right?

[Wiskey]

Ya, usually on the underside of the coral first eating the tissue. They will eat a way a bit of flesh then lay eggs in it so you might see the eggs too.

They are very small though.

HTH,
Whiskey

[Wiskey]

Oh, and they are white.

Also, you might want to read the sticky that Spanky just posted, that is something I compleatly missed and I think it might help you too. Not importing enough nutreants caused allot of STN in my tank with certin peices, including monties. First the coral would kina pale, then pe would go away, then the tissue would get paper thin, and then it would kind a come off. I added a bunch of fish a month or so ago, and this made it better, but it did not fix it entirely, I am now feeding more, allot more, to see if I can get rid of this problem all together. It seemed that the more light I gave a cap or digi, the faster this would happen acros did it too, but not all of them, I have great growth on a few.

HTH,
Whiskey

[panic]

I have a lot of fish - 11 chromis, 5 Sunburst Anthias, a Chevron Tang, Red Sea Sailfin, Powder Blue, Yellow Tang, Banded Pipefish, a Blenny, a fire and a cleaner shrimp. I would add more, but I think I would be over in nutrients.

Here are some pics of the stn and a full tank showing lighting:

[panic]

I don't see any nudis

[Mike O'Brien]

No it doesn't look like them either. Look's like the monti's are just totally shutting down.

Who know's anything about Vibro bacteria ?

[Mike O'Brien]

Any thought's on theis ??
http://www.reefs.org/library/talklog...an_040697.html