oh no. if it was stung badly, it could slowly melt most of the way down. maybe leave a bit of the foot left that could grow back. it will be dumping lots of protein to the water and waste as it wastes away. do lots of water changes if that is happening, hopefully its jsut shedding its skin. it was all waxy looking in the before photo. that usually happens before they shed from time to time. so it may not be a sting. Keep a close watch on it.
I took it out of the water to try and get the stuff off of it. There is only a small area that still has its brown normal texture to it the rest has shedded all the brown normal texture. This was not like the usual when they expel a little mucus it looked like a anemone was sitting on it an stinging it for more then just a few hours. Now I look at it again it has little piss ant polyps sort of sticking out and just the outer layer of skin is gone from the top and the base is just shriveled up but not soft still has its ruff texture.
Well the toadstool has gotten much worse imo. The whole head has now completely shed any color it had into a ooze and is now completely bleached. I still see some baby white tentacles on the head that look extra rubbery and the stalk is starting to shed a layer. I tried researching this but could not find a case as bad as mine but from what I gather it is dead but the tentacles being there atleast give me some hope.
Only thing I have found that may have contributed to this happening was the flow. I am using a mp40w es on the opposite side at around half power ( because sand was blowing to much any higher even with pump raised )on short pulse mode pulsing around 1/second and a nano near the toadstool but not aimed at it at all. I put the mp20 on my 20long which I may tomorrow put on this tank.
Anyone else have any input on this? I will post pictures in the morning when the lights are on.
Hard to tell from the image, but are there still stony corals in the tank? If so run tons of carbon and dilute with small frequent water changes. Sarcophyton is one of the worse toxin dumpers, allelopathic toxins.
Do you think it was too much or too little flow. I have found it to be VERY difficult to hit them with too much flow. And when there is dead material it will rot and cause live sections near by to become harmed so it is good to blow the dead stuff away from the live.
Leathers like this appreciate a small amount of phyto plankton in the water and at least 1ppm Nitrates or more. You may want to add a little phyto to the water if you want to help save it, but don’t go over board with it.
I am sorry to see this big coral dropping. 
I hope it springs back for you. Good luck!
I think it was to little flow. I am still experimenting with have a mp40 in the tank instead of a mp20 so I was testing to see if the 1 mp40 was enough flow without adding additional powerheads. I since have put the mp20 in the tank on opposite side and just put them both in reef crest mode. Can’t wait to upgrade the mp20 to a mp40 w/es and get a mp10 for the 20gallon tank.
Forgot to mention I sucked most of the slime out but on one of my green sinulara’s it got some that got on it and basically made a lot of it black I pulled it out and swished it in water to get some of it off since I have no dip to use right now. SPS is all out of that tank except some monti caps which I don’t have room to move to another tank.
If you have a Hydor power head laying around you may just want to point it near the toadstool for time being until it recovers then play with the toys. I have 4-5 Vortechs in my basement and I was frequently adjusting them the first year I got them. Few people enjoy a reef tank with out corals, so keep them priority first.
For time being I would try to keep the nutrients low with water changes, but have some phyto plankton additions so the coral can eat something if it’s polyps extend. Just my opinion there. I wouldn’t count it out just yet, but it’s looking rough.
I am trying not to count it out yet. I will wait it out and am in the process of getting new saltwater made up for another change. I have not noticed any polyps today since very early in the morning.
Rooting for ya. Hope it pulls through.
[quote=“Gordonious, post:10, topic:5544”]
Rooting for ya. Hope it pulls through. [/quote]
Thanks man.
BTW all those frags I got from you at the frag swap are still doing great.
Jeff, is this the tank with bio-pellets on it? if so, you think the pellets may strip the water most of its nutrients and that’s why the toadstool is being the way it is? I read that bio-pellets strip nutrient so well that people feed their tank often so that they can keep some nutrient in the tank.
[quote=“reefman66, post:12, topic:5544”]
Jeff, is this the tank with bio-pellets on it? if so, you think the pellets may strip the water most of its nutrients and that’s why the toadstool is being the way it is? I read that bio-pellets strip nutrient so well that people feed their tank often so that they can keep some nutrient in the tank.[/quote]
Yes it is the tank with the biopellets. That is a good point about the pellets sucking up the nutrients but I would not think the biopellets would be the cause of this issue. Correct me if I am wrong but the pellets are not supposed to extract any of the trace elements and the such.
Somedays I wish I never went to a bigger tank. Things were so much simpler with a nano.
I’m not 100% positive, but the purpose of the pellets is to have ULN (Ultimate Low Nutrient). Maybe Jon (Gordonious) will jump in and give his opinion on it.
I don’t think it strip the trace elements, but it does nutrients. And I think toadstool come from some nutrient type water.
Sure nano are simpler, but you won’t be able to keep all those different type corals you have in the tank now will ya.
Glad to hear the corals are doing well!
[quote=“JustSumGuy, post:13, topic:5544”]
Things were so much simpler with a nano. [/quote]
95% of the time people say the opposite. Thing is every single tank is different and there are a billion variables and it may have been you just struck the perfect balance and need to find that again with your bigger tank. One of the biggest flaws in the hobby is people pick a method of reef keeping, try it for a couple months and then try changing something additional. It’s good to stick to something for a good 5-6 months and really understand what is going on before deciding to switch gears.
If things were simpler before bio pellets, before vortechs, before new lights, and before the bigger tank… was it the bigger tank that made things more complicated or all of the other things as well?
“reefman66” is dead on. It is very possible that one of the factors leading to the decline in health of the Sarcophyton is low nutrients. They love high nutrients.(though this can be difficult to define exactly) They really like phyton plankton to. I would really recommend adding small amounts of phytoplankton to the water. I use Brightwell’s PhytoChrom which is a mixture of the different phytos.
Are you aggressively skimming this tank as well?
EVERYTHING on the planet needs nutrients to survive. True corals get lots of energy from sunlight, indirectly, but a good bit of there bodies are made up of Nitrogen and Phosphorus.(especially softies) If you have a very high nutrient system with tons of algae and you do 90% water changes day after day you will shock the system and kill things off and the corals won’t survive for long. It is very possible to have an aquarium where the nutrients are too low and it harms the corals.
Well this morning the body is slowly disintegrating on some of the edges.
You bring up a good point Gordonious things were much simpler equipment wise. The only thing I did not like before was not having control to make the flow alternating like I do now.
I use a RedSea C-Skim1800 on the main tank. I do not think its over skimming but I could be wrong, I always have some nitrates 10-20ppm. I will test to see what it is later today. My collection cup takes way over a month to fill I think I empty it around once every 2 months.
I used to use live phytoplankton which worked out for me. I will try and get some again soon. I went to a few fish stores this past weekend and ended up at Just Fish and after looking around there I would not buy a single item from their shelves at all. I think DPA carries live phyto though.
To end the story of this post… Toadstool has been pulled out. It was still losing tissue and showed there signs of no return. I also had to remove a green sinulara that turned black and was losing tissue everything else looks fine. I did test my tank after I pulled it and it was as followed
Ammonia- 0
Nitrite- 0
Nitrate- 20-40( i think more along the 30-40 so hard to tell)
Phosphate- .5
KH- 6-7
Calcium- 440
MG- 1170
Very sorry to hear.
Seems as if your Nitrates are way too high. Alk and Mg a bit low. Perhaps more frequent or larger water changes would help.
I would keep running carbon in that tank for the next couple of weeks, changing it out at least once a week.
[quote=“Gordonious, post:18, topic:5544”]
Very sorry to hear.
Seems as if your Nitrates are way too high. Alk and Mg a bit low. Perhaps more frequent or larger water changes would help.
I would keep running carbon in that tank for the next couple of weeks, changing it out at least once a week. [/quote]
Thanks it sucks losing it that way. That was a conversation piece every time someone came to our house and saw the tank.
I have always had a bit of a nitrate problem in that tank. I think the lowest I have seen it when I tested which is rare that I test was around 10-20 after the biopellets were on the system for a bit and my old 6+ y/o foxface died. He used to poop some nasty stuff in the water.
I am going to work on some 5gallon water changes every 3 days I think till the wedding and honeymoon thats in 16 or less days.
Biopellets are designed to add food for bacteria that either themselves or their byproducts should be pulled out by your skimmer. One thing you may try is to reintroduce the bacteria to the tank. (I use BW MicroBacter7 personally, but there are many brands out there)
It is very rare to find a healthy tank in which the skimmate cup does not need emptying once a week.(and those in a low nutrient system even more so) Perhaps your skimmer needs adjusting or replacing.
