bleaching headache

[beireefer]

i have constantly had coral bleaching in my tank even with shrooms and zoos, sometimes in a very short period would a coral lose color, tank's been running for two years though, i have no ammonia no nitrite, nitrate's acceptable, no phosphate, ph's 8.0, circulation in my tank seems fine.
I tend to blame it on my salt, crystal sea marinemix, since some people locally have been complaining about it, am i on the right track?

 

[NYreefNoob]

What's Your Calcium, Magniesium, Alkalinity ? What Light's Do You Have As Well ? And What Are You Using To Test The Other Stuff With ?

 

[beireefer]

i couldn't find a calcium test kit, but i do some 20% monthly water changes using RO water, specific gravity is 24, and i have low calcium demand in my tank.
i use Prodac to test phosphate, jungle to test nitrite, mei for ammonia and ph, and tetra for nitrate. Notice also that the tank has only three small fish.
the tank is 110cm x 40cm x 60cm(height) i have a 150 watts 20k kelvin arcadia halide and two 38 watts actinic arcadia fluorescent tubes. the halide goes on at 2:00 pm, actinics start at 3:00 pm, halide shuts down at 10:00 pm and actinics at 11:00 pm.

 

[FREEZE]

can you post some pictures of the bleached coral? I know sometimes for me zoanthids will get white spots on them if the lighting is too strong or you have them too high up (too close to the light)...

 

[crox99]

It sounds like an alkalinity problem.

 

[beireefer]

Well there are two nicely blue colored mushroom rocks (photos displaying only one rock) that turned brownish in a matter of 2 months
there's also a red ricordea yuma that is turning white. Some mushrooms would also just die off sometimes.
Also notice that i couldn't get caulerpa to live in my refugium, including grape caulerpa, fern caulerpa, except for the invasive taxifolia.
All the crystal sea marinemix i used came from the same shippement.

 

[NYreefNoob]

also i would say the mh are on too long, and if you have sps dont assume the demand on calcium is that low as well as coraline eats it up also

 

[jay1335]

Did you ever use that tank as a fresh water tank?

 

[beireefer]

so is it this severe to have the halides for 8 hours? i don't have sps, i sure wish i had, and my corraline algae is slow propagating.
when i first started my tank i used it as a fresh water tank for only a short period, what does that pose?

 

[jay1335]

Did you ever dose copper into the tank?

 

[beireefer]

no i never used copper in it. so usually would alkalinity have a strong impact on the livestock? there's this PRODAC alkalinity test that i would get if it is so. or mabe wait and check if MEI have one for alkalinity.
well anyway i've already switched some 3 months ago to IO and used 4 boxes (4 kg) and one box of reef crystlas, no major changes yet though, should i do more large water changes? i also added a box of PRODAC Active kohle plus (carbon) into the sump in case i had any toxins in the water for some reason.

 

[2slo4me]

i honestly think 8 hours is wayyy to much for the halidaes..... cut that in half and see what happens...

i keep my vhos on for 8 hours mh on for 3-4 hours...

also what are your temps like in your tank??? i would think they would get up there hence the mh are on for that long.

 

[beireefer]

my halide bulb is 150 watts, which provides 2.14 watts/us gallon on my 70 us gallons display, it's located 35cm away from water surface, when turned on alone it weakly lights the tank, but i'll reduce the period to 6 hours and check for any differences.
concerning temp, bleaching occured both winter and summer, and i add a fan during summer time.
another thing i would like to add to the equation is that i used to purchase RO from a place that i didn't know so well, and now i changed to purchasing it from a place that my friend deals with and this friend was successful at keeping sps.

 

[marki24]

I also see that the leather is not doing that good or maybe just when you took the picture, and i think 150 MH is not sufficient for a 70 gallon. but from the looks something has to be wrong witht he water quality, cause mushrooms are very easy to care for. What kind of test kits are you using?

 

[reefman]

ca/alk probably low or unstable

dont think havin no sps means u dont need to care about ca/alk

 

[tosiek]

when was the bulb last changed? =0)

 

[tosiek]

and 8 hours is alot but not too much that it would start bleaching coral (or shouldn't). When did this happen compared to when you set up the tank? this recent or has this always happened in the 2 years its been set up

 

[beireefer]

I also see that the leather is not doing that good or maybe just when you took the picture, and i think 150 MH is not sufficient for a 70 gallon. but from the looks something has to be wrong witht he water quality, cause mushrooms are very easy to care for. What kind of test kits are you using?

Leathers usually do good in my tank. The metal halide combined with 2X 38watts of actinics give a total of 3.25 watts/gallon. yeah it bugs me how zoas turn from a fluorescent green to an ugly brown.

ca/alk probably low or unstable

dont think havin no sps means u dont need to care about ca/alk

ph is stable day and night at 8.0, and i had problems occur ever since i started the tank, so if there really is a problem with ca/alk, it has to be the salt, i will try to find some salt from the batches i used and test for its alkalinity, and ca in case i found an MEI ca test kit.
but 3 months ago i did many 25% water changes using IO which i supposed would correct any bad water parameters, but still no big success.

and 8 hours is alot but not too much that it would start bleaching coral (or shouldn't). When did this happen compared to when you set up the tank? this recent or has this always happened in the 2 years its been set up

a few months after starting the tank i added a green mushroom wich started bleaching in a matter of weeks, i also added a red yuma 4 months ago which is now half as colored, i also had a multicolor mushroom rock that now has half the mushrooms it had once.

 

[beireefer]

alkalinity test bought, it gave me 11 dkh, that's not severe is it? and i've noticed that my ph has always been 8 through the year day and night.

 

[reefs4life]

I have 2-175 watt halides with 4-24 watt actinic PCs on a 75 gallon fish tank. My lighting schedule is as follows...8:00am-actinics on, 10:00am halides on, 8:00pm halides off, 10:00pm actinics off. It used to be 2 hours less on each but I decided to increase it for some reason. I haven't had any problem with bleaching though.