teach me about polyp extension
 

As the title says.

So I have a few choice sps frags in my tank, and see little to no polyp extension they are mid to high in the water column, light peak at about 45% on my ai sol but the only frags exhibiting and PE are my birdsnests what can I do to change this? even my purple bonsai is slightly browned out with 0 PE on a regular basis. Any tips/tricks?

Thanks all

Oh and params
Nitrates less then 5ppm
0ppm ammonia
0ppm phos
440ca
Mag 1360
9alk
Salinity 1.0245ish

Parameter looks good, I would check flow, make sure there isn;t any direct flow on the frags. Also take a look at night and see if there is any PE on then, maybe some thing is irritating it during the day time hours. Worst case scenario I would check for pest like aefw since they go after Bonsai and any smooth skin sps first. I would remove the sps and dip it in a clear cup with revive then observe what comes off. If that doesn't yield any results then you can start trying to feed the corals some oyster feast or just general coral food and supplement with zeovit k balance. I would highly recommand you test the level for k before dosing for that matter any other additive you might want to add.

What's your flow and turnover??

Total flow is about 550gph give or take as my return pumps is 750gph minus headloss plus my 2 korilia 425s, no direct flow for anything. I know I should know this by now but what's AEFW?

Does that sound right? Lol or do I need to throw my other 2 korilias in too?

Ps I'm at work so I may be slow to respond

Acro eating flat worms...not a good thing to have when you have Acro.:sad:

What's your fish list?

Double this.

If there are any fish nipping at the polyps, that would be my first guess if there are no marks on the sps from aefw.

K sorry for the delay, coffee break is here finally. So the stock list is
6 line wrasse
2 Occ. Clowns
Bangai cardinal
Scooter blenny (dragonet)
I had a cherub angel but lost him in the tank move, he never nipped at anything though so I doubt it was him unless I just never saw it. But sps is as followsgreen birdsnest
Blue polyp birdsnest
Purple bonsaired convexa
numerous acros
salty nuts (is this an acro?)
Seems to be just the acros showing signs of little PE the salty nuts seems to have days with lots of PE and days with none. The bonsai is the only browned out one

All the corals except a few zoas and a monti frag ar in the holding tank still I plan on moving them in tonight unless I see anything on them with the magnifying glass tonight. In which case should I qt them for a few days? with a revive treatment or fw dip?

Also would a dip in coral rx kill flatworms? Or are they a little more resilient then that

Check for flat worms and look for bite marks on the bonsai.

I don't believe coral rx or revive kills them with 10min. but, it should stun them enough so they will loose grip of the surface that they are attached to.

However prolong dipping will kill them, and kills coral at the same time.

I use coral Rx Industrial to dip all our corals for 15 min when they come in and it works very well for us (it is stronger that the coral rx pro).

Dip in the coral Rx pro as opposed to reg strength imo.

There is a finite dipping point between strenght of dip and length of time and how harsh it is on the corals.
If the tip is too harsh or too long the corals will definately brown out (not an issue when they are brown already) or even die in some cases. If you dip a bunch of pieces and a few die, its usually the ones that had severe damage to begin with and the dip was just too much for them in their current state.

The only downside I have found to coral rx is that I find it doesnt do the best job at killing the evil crabs in sps and it does a great job at killing the good ones lol.

Bite marks are a sure sign something is attacking your sps. These are most easily seen on brown sps as small white circles near the bottom, at the intersection of the branches.
You can normally smell if something is bugging them, or I can anyways. When you take the coral out of the water in smells similar to when you have been fragging sps + the piece will be browned out often + no PE extention.

If you want to be really thorough then prep a dip of coral Rx + Interceptor.
Did once a week for three weeks.
If there is ANYTHING bad on your sps they will be gone for sure!
it will also kill any good acro crabs.

Lol very thorough thanks I'll check them all straight away when I get home

You probably do not have any issues like flatworms, red bugs, etc. I myself don't have polyp extension during the day, but boy are they out in the dark. You have to remember that in the wild, many corals don't show much until darkness falls. So unless you are showing signs of stress or destruction, then I would not worry.

I know how you feel though, many beautiful tanks out there, with major polyp extension in daylight. I wish I could have that, but again in this hobby, the fact my corals are growing is good enough for me.

No, you're right, it doesn't kill them. I ended up buying some flatworm exit to get rid of mine.

Nano, I've got an extra dose if you need some.

If your corals are brown you need more light.

So no flatworms or eggs etc. I may crank up the light a bit this weekend when I have time. My big purple acro and green acro RTN'd on me through the move ugh.. lol this is life I guess but got the ato hooked up and an aquadoser so the tank is finally (kind of) high tech :P

well, there is that.....maybe the tank just needs to settle a bit after the move before you will see better PE?

Kenny, when I bought my first SPS, I thought there was an issue too, but it took a couple days for them to calm down before I saw any PE
Plus, some that I have don't seem to extend much during the day as their polyps are quite short

If you'd like to check for PE, give your fish something frozen right before lights out, then watch for about a 1/2 hour after lights out
My corals close a bit when the lights turn on/off, then come back to normal, and I get crazy PE after lights out, even without a feeding

And if I overfeed during lights on, more crazy PE

doesn't do anything for AEFW, just the little red planaria. In tank, nothing completely gets rid of the acro eating flatworms.

Is this your 35-gallon cube? I would try adding another powerhead since you have them on hand anyway. See what happens. It's hard to get high turnover in small tanks without getting areas of concentrated flow that is too high or too close to the corals. I would suggest you mess around with flow a bit.

Do you use carbon or GFO or any other resins?

Well I'm glad I didn't fing them. Still bummed abiut losing a few things but this is the way things go at times I suppose. At any rate thanks everyone for the help and suggestions, I will post a update in my build thread when I find time during the move
The tank is barebottom now, witb the ato hooked in etc, rearranged the rock similar to how I had them in the last update, and added another powerhead for more circulation re did the plumbing so I can easily disconnect it, added lock line instead of elbows, hmmmm what else.. yeah I think that's all, I just realized there hasnt been a refugium light running over my cheato for 3 nights better pick it up tomorrow, anyonr thing its a problem to leavr the chaeto in the dark for 3 days?

I've left my Chaeto in the dark for 3 months with no problem. I'm not sure why there wa no problem though. :lol:

Lol k cool. 3 months eh? :lol:

Lol holy typos batman, typing on a phone is one thing, but after a few wobblies its another thing all together :P