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Originally Posted by Beal09
Are you saying that that is a large number of fish for a 135??
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It IS a lot of fish, not necessarily too many, but remember that you have to cycle a lot of food through a tank for that many fishes, to the point that it may be a source of phosphate that will saturate your sand bed over time. It isn't too many fish for the husbandry of fish, but it might be too many fish if keeping corals is your primary goal:
Fish poop, the keeper scoops: recycling loops into the Sandbed, OOPS!
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Originally Posted by Beal09
I have had 2 Wellso brains, 1 was started on the bottom and slowly moved up to the top ... all of a sudden just started pulling away and was dead ... one I have now is still doing OK ...placed on the bottom, again low flow, but this time lower light (not under a shelf) but on the sand bed. I have a 4 inch ... sand bed ... feeding the brains small silversides about 1-2 times a week varied with defrosted mysid and Phytoplankton mixture fed with a turkey baster at night.
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The phytoplankton really does nothing for the brains, same for coral vital, but they may introduce a large amount of phosphate into the tank from the phytoplankton's digestion by any filter feeders in the system. The Brains really do not need to be fed much (although they will appreciate it!) nor often, a chopped silverside (HEH! Fish is
Brain food...
) every other day just after the lights go off or in the morning about an hour before the lights go on will be enough. These
Trachyphyllia spp. are from semi-lagoonal to lagoonal environments or slow intertidal plains or from protected areas within the tidal flats where there is always some water. Occasionally they are found in muddy substrates or in seagrass beds, or in protected areas at the base of the outer fore reef.
Trachyphyllia geoffroyi skeletons are usually flabello-meandroid with cone-shaped bottoms that help anchor the polyp in soft sediments (usually sugar-sized aragonite), although they will rarely attach to a rocky substrate if conditions are favorable.
Trachyphyllia radiata, on the other hand, attaches to hard substrate (and has never been reported as a substrate dweller), and lacks the cone-shaped base, and has fused walls instead of lobes between the oral valleys. Both will tolerate bright direct lighting for a period, and some I am sure can be acclimatized to direct MH lighting or direct tropical sun given time, but for the most part they do well with moderate indirect lighting, in particular the red specimens, although green ones are much more light tolerant. These creatures should be placed in areas of indirect lighting preferrably in a sand substrate near the bottom of the tank. This mimics their natural habitat selection and allows for easy capture of isopods and copepods during their nocturnal feeding cycle.
If you have fish specimens that move sand (some wrasses or in particular, engineer gobies or any of the
Valenciennea spp. of gobies). keep in mind that these corals must shed these substrate depositions, and if the specimen in question is already weakened, that it takes energy to produce the mucus and to inflate and deflate the polyp to shed such depositions. This is energy that could be used for growth and development and tissue repair. The same is true if there is so much current that sand is continuously blown onto the specimen. They need enough current to clear mucus from the specimen, but not so much that the animal gets dune-blown sand deposits. If the energy requirements become too large, the specimen will die. I dunno why, but for some reason, some spp. of Tangs seem to like to occasionally nip at these corals, although I have no personal experience with this. Close observation of your specimen may be in order with your tangs in the same tank.
Hopefully you don't have a large population of octocorals in your system, as the Terpenes produced by many Octocoral genera have strong effects on these corals. In particular,
Sinularia and
Nephthea spp. are quite toxic to the
Trachyphyllia spp. and will cause a slow wasting away and ultimately may cause death of affected specimens.
On top of that, import and shipping stresses are often just too much for these corals, the septa may tear or cut the coral fleshy tissue and these tissue openings may become a port for bacterial infection. These corals can experience RTN, have bleaching, and may on occasion, suffer systemic infections that lead to death. Once most Open Brains survive the initial 2 months, they will have survived any trauma introduced by shipping.
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Originally Posted by Beal09
Rest of the tank is fed every other day a combo of Prime Reef and Formula 2, with an occasional mixture of blender mush substituted (own recipe) enriched with garlic. Currently I am simply adding the additives to the RO top off water per the directions on each of the supplements, but will begin using a dosing pump to dose pickling lime within a week or so. |
This should be OK for the corals, they usually are big eaters and will do OK with a little dirty water. The only thing I would be concerned with is accumulating phosphates, and you've posted that you're addressing this. Turn up the skimmer just after feeding the tank for a few hours. Biggest issue here is unnecessary additioins of nutrients to the water column. If you can cut back, do it.
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Originally Posted by Beal09
Test Results are as follows:
CA 440 ppm
Ph 8.2
NH3 0
NO2 0
NO3 0
Temp. 78 degrees
I test about 1 time a week lately to try and track down the problem, but usually do not test unless a problem arises. I am also running a Phosban reactor to eliminate Phosphates, and carbon in my sump. I currently am not doing water changes as within my 2 years i have never done them and without problems thus far....(don't fix what isn't broken is my theory here). I will stop all additives other than the pickling lime once I start dosing...but for my own knowledge what additives other than Coral Vite can be harmful??How?
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If you're loosing specimens, then something is broken.
Test for magnesium. If your magnesium isn't 1300, then these is an issue with the composition of your water column in comparison to NSW. The use of calcium and alkalinity additives outside the use of Ca reactors and Kalk reactors (especially if you use two part additives or single dry additives other than kalk) will gradually skew your conservative elements over time, so that by adjusting the water column salinity, you gradually end up with a Sodium chloride saline brine rather than ASW. Water changes prevent this from occurring, as well as removing terpenes produced by the octocorals. Carbon processing helps, as does good skimming, but there is no substitute for good regular water changes. If you haven't done one for two years, you may have to start with small 10% weekly changes, then after a few months of this, do a large 50% change to reestablish the proportionality of your conservative elements. This alone could account for issues with your
Trachyphyllia, as they are usually a bit more susceptible to these effects than other solitary polypoid corals.
I didn't see how you're supplementing your calcium now (or historically), what's your procedure?
Regular water changes will also eliminate any need to supplement with trace elements, and inappropriate use of trace elements can end up poisoning your corals, especially if the use of them is unmonitored. I might also point out that Strontium use is heavily debated, and rather than reinvint the wheel, I will post the
link to Randy's article on strontium, pointing out that this is the general POV on almost all trace element supplementation in home aquaria.
The trace elements you've listed are seldom growth-limiting factors in the ocean for the creatures we collect, especially with iodine, which primarily ends up in macroalgae when supplemented to closed systems. There are reports form some in a few forums that Iodine supplementation is necessary for Xeniids,
Trachyphyllia spp.,
Lysmata spp. (and crustaceans in general) of shrimps, and corals in general. I have done extensive stax searches and literature scans with research literature tools and cannot locate ANY well-controlled documentation of the need for iodine in excess of the levels found in NSW, and certainly not for the need of iodine above these levels. Keep in mind that iodine is difficult to adequately measure in seawater with hobbyist kits and that it shifts into one of three forms based on water column parameters.
REGULAR WATER CHANGES EVERY 2 TO 4 WEEKS WILL RESUPPLY ALL THE IODINE YOUR SYSTEM WILL NEED UNDER NORMAL TANK CONDITIONS.
None of the creatures we keep require iodine supplementation above what is normally found in ocean water, and they don't use but a fraction of that concentration. It is not a rate-limiting nor growth-limiting factor in our systems unless the tank is allowed to go for long periods without water changes. Just how long will depend on the number of specimens within a system and the starting concentration. The info for iodine holds true for the other trace elements in systems as well, and the majority of folks that keep corals for many years (not just a year or two) do not supplement anything but calcium, alkalinity, some food preps and HUFA-type EFA's/vitamins, and perform water changes. This process is cheaper, less toxic, more effective, requires less monitoring, and has a more positive effect on the corals long-term than trying to manipulate the individual elements involved in maintaining proportionality of the conservative elements and replacing substances consumed from our closed system water supplies.
Sorry for the long post, I hope this sheds a little light on the issues with these corals.
