GSP

[Christian]

I have several pices of GSP and they have not oppened in almost 3 months. I've done a water change and my water is good. What do y'all think the reason for that is?

[stoneroller]

Do you have plenty of current on them? What lighting conditions do you have them under?

If they have been closed for 3 months, they may not be coming out.

[Christian]

Well their unde. My bio-cube 20k light. And ya their is a lot of curent going accross them.

[Christian]

And their are a fue polyps that have oppened up frome time to time.

[+KeeperOfTheZoo]

Hmm, that doesn't sound so good. I have 3 different colonies going in different places. Different levels of lighting and flow and they all open fully. Are yours in a place where something could be crawling on them? I had to move some zoas away from where one of my cleaner shrimp hangs out because he kept climbing on them and making them close.

Since your parameters are good I'd look for a physical irritant. Is the Matt tissue still healthy looking?

[Christian]

Ya the matt looks good and purple. No their is nothing that would be bugging it.

[+KeeperOfTheZoo]

Well, if the mat still looks healthy there's still hope! Maybe change their location in the tank if you can just to see what happens.

[mFrame]

I would suggest changing something around. Move them into more or less current and closer to the light.

I had three large colonies that I moved from my 29g to my 90g. Over 3-4 months they did exactly what you described, quit coming out. Eventually they just melted away. Given the amount of time and not coming out they're showing you they're not happy. Check your water conditions and if those are ok, try making some other change. Look at it this way, they can't really act any worse right now can they?

[Christian]

I have some at the top and bottom of the tank. And neather are oppen. And I moved them around when I redid mu aquascaping.

[+KeeperOfTheZoo]

Are any of your other corals irritated? Could any of the GSPs neighbor corals be bugging them (anything with sweepers?). Maybe they are falling victim to toxins being released by other corals, I think the fancy term is allelopathy. Basically coral chemical warfare. Are you running carbon?

What exactly are your water parameters? Having recently watched a friend struggle with a KH problem I've learned that some corals are a lot more sensitive to certain water parameters being off than others, and it's not always the ones you would think would have problems and be more sensitive.

[Christian]

No none of other corals are cloesed at all. All open. I've been adding calcium into the tank but none of the other corals have been affected by it. Even the anemones have not been affected.

Specific gravity is 1.022

ph- 8.2

Nitrate 0

Nitrite 0

Ammonia 0

Phosphate 0

[+KeeperOfTheZoo]

What's your calcium and kh at? Everything else is good.

Maybe its just their time to go.

[Christian]

I don't know what my calcium is at I don't have a calcium test. And what is kh? Corals should be live for ever right?

[Christian]

I have a test that tests for total hardness of water. Is that the same as calcium?

[Zarathustra2]

Kinda. KH = Hardness of water.

Also, do you ever dose Iodine? GSP, like Xenia, needs iodine to move properly. You should be getting enough in water changes but if its been a while between water changes it might be a culprit.

[Christian]

No I do not put iodine in to the water. Ok what's a good range for kh?

[+KeeperOfTheZoo]

KH is carbonate hardness, a KH test doesn't test for total harness or even true alkalinity in the pH sense of acid/neutral/alkaline. It's worth watching because the carbonates (carbonate and bicarbonate) get used up via biological processes (of the living things in your tank) and when they are gone or too low it can cause pH swings amongst other things. When people talk about 'buffering', they are usually talking about KH. If your KH is where it should be (8-12 dKH), your water is well buffered and it should help keep your pH stable.

You have to have both carbonates(KH) and calcium amongst a whole lot of other minerals for your water to be balanced. I read a great analogy one time that talked about balancing pH, KH and calcium. It basically said think of a glass filled with two different colored marbles, red and blue. KH and calcium both dissolve in water and water can only hold so many dissolved solids. If the cup was full of red marbles (calcium) there would be no room for blue marbles (carbonates, KH). Your tank would be in big trouble. Sure, you'd have really high calcium levels which might seem great since most of us are trying to keep our calcium up for our inverts, but remember, balance is key! So, if you started adding some blue marbles (carbonate, KH) to the cup, what would happen? It would displace some of the red marbles which means your calcium would be lower, but that's ok... you really need it to stay in a range that also allows the KH to stay in a good range.

The opposite can happen to, you can add too much carbonate and drive your KH & pH up and your calcium down.

In your case, if you are dosing calcium without knowing what your calcium level is you might be adding to much. When there is to much calcium your KH will get driven down (remember, if one is too high it displaces the other causing it to drop) which can also drive your pH down. A big drop in either or both of those will start harming your livestock.

It's a good rule to never supplement anything that you haven't first tested for.

If you don't have a lot of hard corals and are doing frequent water changes you probably won't need to supplement for anything. I do 10-15% water changes every other week and I'm just starting to see my calcium dip down between changes to where I might start supplementing (it gets just below 400 sometimes). The thing is, it doesn't always dip below where I want it to be. If I start to supplement I'll have to test often and be very careful to make sure I don't over dose my tank and screw things up!

[Christian]

I only put calcium into my tank because mine was below 400.