sick colt -- HELP!

daisy

daisy

Member
Long time since I logged on. Hope you can help me!
58-gal oceanic with 20-gal fuge, live sand, tons of LR, only four fishes in the tank, huge clean-up crew, lots of water motion, protein skimmer on fuge, tank up and running over a year, lots of soft corals -- mushrooms, anthelia, colt, zoos, buttons...
The colt was huge and happy for more than eight months, but has been declining over the last month or so. Today I woke up to find it totally deflated, wilted. What can I do for it? Everything else is thriving! The lights were changed about two weeks ago -- the colt had been declining before I changed the bulbs. Chemistry checks out okay.
We've been using Joe's Juice on an aptasia problem, but the colt was declining before we started doing that. What can I do? What might the problem be? I know we're not overfeeding the fishes, and I add seachem reefbuilder and calcium weekly.
Thanks!
Daisy
 
traib

traib

Member
My colt goes through episodes of deflation and then normal inflation. I've noticed this especially when I do large water changes or otherwise change water parameters quickly. It also happens when the colt is spliting off arms that become new colonies. I've got more colt coral than I need or want. Give it some time and it will come back.
 
daisy

daisy

Member
thanks for the reply-- but some follow up questions...
how much time, and when do I fear that maybe it's not normal behavior, but that it's actually ill or something?
 
j21kickster

j21kickster

Active Member
it usually only lasts for a week or less- also do you test your calcium and alkalinity before you dose those chemicals?
 
j21kickster

j21kickster

Active Member
because soft corals use calcium too- some more than others, leather for example use a fair amount of calcium- but the reason why i ask is because you can add too much calcium and have negative effects on corals
 
daisy

daisy

Member

Thanks for the feedback...but it is dead and gone. I guess we waited too long to try and help it. I lifted the lowest parts of it up and they had already started to disintegrate. It was a gloppy mess and I ended up removing the entire thing from that piece of rock. It is very sad.
 
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