[Roady]

Is there any other way that corals could bleach out other then the Lights being on to long? My lights are on two separate timers for the dawn/dusk effect. i went out of town for three days, and when i got back my zoos and my finger leather were almost white. No one else lives here, so noone could have turned on the lights by accident and when i got back the timers were still working properly. All the water parameters are in desired levels but don't have a test for iodine. Any ideas?

[e_baer]

What other tpyes oof corals do you have? It is possible that if you have lps they had some chemical warfare thus causing some bleeching.

[Roady]

I have green and orange zoos, blue and red mushrooms, I finger leather, green star polyps, frog spawn, some orange and green richordia. The finger leather, orange zoos, and the star polyps were the only ones that lost color, and they were all in different locations around the tank. None of them are really never each other. I did have a problem with mojona anemones around that time, but I didn't kill them off until after the "bleaching" took place.

[e_baer]

hmmmm....It is really hard to say what the problem is without knowing every little detail about the tank. It could be the mojonas, but its odd that they would have only stung those corals in thoses few days you were gone.

Have you had any problems like this before? How old is the tank? How long have the corals been in the tank for?

And is the lighting system you have on there new?

[Roady]

The thing is the tank has been up and running with all of these corals and the same exact lights for over a year. It's just really weird that only certain corals were "Bleached" while others positioned even higher in the tank are completely normal. I thought about it after i posted the last time, I had a yellow fiji leather die on me right before all this happened. It just bafffels me man. I haven't added any new chemicals. I have a dosing pump that doses kalkwasser, stromium and molybdenum, and I and coral vital with every waer change.

[e_baer]

What kidn of water do you use when you do water changes? RO/DI, RO, DI, tap water, well water?

[Roady]

I use RO water

[Roady]

I have done a 10 gal water change every week for as long as I've had the tank, however, I started doing a 10 gal change every other week after this happened to see if that would help. The aquarium is about 100 gal.

[R34dawn]

What brand salt are you using?, or have you switch brand lately? and what is your ca, mg, and dkh levels?

[unclejed]

Originally Posted by Roady

The thing is the tank has been up and running with all of these corals and the same exact lights for over a year. It's just really weird that only certain corals were "Bleached" while others positioned even higher in the tank are completely normal. I thought about it after i posted the last time, I had a yellow Fiji leather die on me right before all this happened. It just baffles me man. I haven't added any new chemicals. I have a dosing pump that doses kalkwasser, stromium and molybdenum, and I and coral vital with every water change.

After reading this my opinion (and not expert) is that your lights are losing their spectrum and the coral is losing the beneficial algae that gives them their color. T5s can last 12-16 mos. but other lighting only 6-8. You didn't say what type lighting you use, that may be helpful.

[e_baer]

Leon, that is a very good point!

[Roady]

Sorry, I'm using VHOs

[unclejed]

What type of vho, T5?

[Roady]

No they are T12s

[Roady]

To be exact there are two Actinic White FR30T12/VHOs and two Super Actinic FR30T12/VHOs, each of which are 95 watts, 380 watts total. They are over a year old.

[e_baer]

I would think that it is very possible it is the bulbs then. After a while bulbs tend to lose their "color" and go bad. I would go and get some new bulbs and see how things progress from there.

[unclejed]

I checked out the t12 here is the skinny;Detailed Description


The performance series by URI. The great quality of the Super Actinic R without the built-in reflector.




* All New Economical Aquarium Lights


* 6-8 Months Useful Life / 1500 HR. Rated


* No Reflector


* True Actinic Phosphor


* Silver Ends

* 110W (VHO)

I would replace them and maybe go T5 ho or T5 vho true blue actinic and a daylight.

[Roady]

I'm not very familiar with the T5 HOs or the T5 VHOs your talking about. Would they work on the same ballasts that I have now, and would the wattage be the same?

[Roady]

I looked up he T5 HOs on marinedepot.com really quickly just to see them, and if they would fit the ballasts I have the wattage would be significantly lower than the T12 VHOs i have now. It says that it delivers more lumens-per-watt than T12s. Does that mean less wattage wouldn't matter?

[dinor2]

I had a similar problem with my yellow polyps a while back and, turns out my problem was simple and easy to fix, iodine was wayyyy too low! I would get an iodine test before new lights, that's something I think we all should be testing as not only the corals use it but the coraline algae (and other algaes so don't over dose!) and inverts. I'm not an expert but, just something I learned on my own.

[Roady]

I have it dosing in with everything else...kalkwasser and molybdenum...and it's supposed to be the recommended amount for the volume of water in the tank. I know i shouldn't even be dosing it without being able to test for it, but I've never had a problem with doing it before. Maybe it's not enough? I will probably get knew lights anyway now that I know how often your supposed to change them. I'm really curious about the ballasts though. I will get an iodine test though. Aren't they really expensive?

[dinor2]

I use the Seachem iodine test kit; not cheap but it's not Salifert expensive either. Course, I"m sure Salifert is worth every penny, just don't have those extra pennies to spend now so, Salifert it is, and it seems to be accurate.

[unclejed]

Hi roady, you really should be adding Iodine at least once a week (most products say one capfull). The latest advances in lighting (T5) makes watts per gallon almost obsolete. The intensity is the key along with the penitrating power. No, T5s will not work in your current fixture as the buls are about 1/2 the diameter of your T12s so if your don't want to invest in a T5 fixture just replace your bulbs.