Elegance Coral theory

[The_Taz_Devil]

Thanks Darrell, Ive seen the pics now and can safely say mine is nowhere near that sort of deterioration. I will go with your suggestions on target feeding, I do so for my sun coral, brains and goni's so why not for such an aptly named "elegance" coral. I did read you suggested shrimp or fish any ensure their feeding tentacles are out and perhaps place on or near the mouth area so I will try that. I do have some fast swimming tangs who compete like mad for food but I have a cunning little feeding cup which will suit the elegance very well so I can target feed with a mix if required and leave it to feast. Will let you know how it goes. Thanks again.

[John Kelly]

The observation of the effects of different light frequencies on Elegance could provide an answer for some of the deaths, but it doesn't explain how Eric Borneman's 7 year old healthy Elegance became infected within several days of being exposed to sick ones.

.....unless he prematurely treated his coral and the treatment killed it .
or
The situation could be that once an Elegance is affected or damaged by light it develops some type of infection which eventually becomes contagious to healthy Elegance corals .

[achilestang]

very helpful

[elegance coral]

Originally posted by John Kelly
The observation of the effects of different light frequencies on Elegance could provide an answer for some of the deaths, but it doesn't explain how Eric Borneman's 7 year old healthy Elegance became infected within several days of being exposed to sick ones.

.....unless he prematurely treated his coral and the treatment killed it .
or
The situation could be that once an Elegance is affected or damaged by light it develops some type of infection which eventually becomes contagious to healthy Elegance corals .

I have seen your Goniopora collection. Any input you may have here would be treated with a great deal of respect, at least by me.
I was unaware of Eric's 7 year old elegance. I wonder what the symptoms were for this coral? A 7 year old elegance is usually one tough coral. You may have a point. The population of these parasitic protozoans could have been at very high levels in his tank. Maybe he injured the coral while moving it into this tank adding to its vulnerability to these protozoans. One can only guess as to what really happened to it though. This is where my study is now. I am trying to buy healthy looking corals and placing them in with the ones I know to be ill. I only have one and it seems to be doing fine after several months. As soon as my LFS gets more in I will continue with this part of my study.

[John Kelly]

Here is the link about his healthy one becoming "sick". It is several posts down on the page:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=310425&perpage=25&pagenumber=15

bbl

[elegance coral]

Originally posted by John Kelly
Here is the link about his healthy one becoming "sick". It is several posts down on the page:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=310425&perpage=25&pagenumber=15

bbl

Thanks for the read. I think its obvious that his treatment is what killed the coral. What caused it to become ill is a different story. Maybe if he would have removed the sick corals and did a large water change the coral could have survived. We will never know now though. I still have one coral, that is in a 29gl tank with 7 somewhat sick corals, that has shown no signs of the sickness. I also have some getting much better in this tank.

I wish my lfs would get more elegances in so that I could move forward with my study.

[John Kelly]

Darrell,

Do you know (or anyone else) whether or not the ill elegance corals usually bleach first before they finally stop extending? Mine did.

Here are some pics I took of mine back in 2004. Compared to a healthy Elegance, it already appears somewhat bleached in the first photo:

2-22-04


2-25-04


3-06-04


I have some more pics somewhere, but I can't find them at the moment. The time period between the first pic and the last is 12 days, and I can't remember exactly how long the coral lasted, but I think it was at least a month or two. The lighting was 220w vho 50/50 bulbs and the coral was sitting approx 22" from the bulbs.

You wrote in your theory that Elegance has a very hard time adapting to low Kelvin temp lights. Is this due to the color spectrum itself or the generally higher PAR that the low Kelvin bulbs have when compared to higher 15k or 20k bulbs?

For reference, here is a photo of a local Elegance that is 16 years old. The photo doesn't really show just how brown it is:

[elegance coral]

I'm sorry to read about your loss.
I have some that have bleached and some that haven't. In my case it seems that the ones further away from the lights are the ones that bleach. I believe that in your case and mine the coral was just not getting enough light which caused it to bleach. I have moved mine closer to the lights and so far so good. I talked to someone here on RC (through E-mail) that said they were on a boat when an Elegance was collected from depth. By the time the coral was on the boat it had the swollen oral disk and shrunken tentacles. They naturally assumed this was due to the difference in pressure that the coral had just gone through. The problem with this is that some corals don't show these signs in our LFS. The symtoms don't show up until we get them home and place them under our lights. I believe it was the sudden change in light that caused this effect. I am more convinced that the root of this problem is lighting now then I was when I wrote my theory. I got a new Elegance on Friday. It was somewhat withdrawn when I got it. I decided to do a little experiment last night. I placed this new coral about 10" under a 250W 10K light and turned off all the others. In less than 2 minutes it began to puff up and withdraw its tentacles. I immediately turned the light off. The coral began to deflate as soon as the light went out. I did this several times to make sure I was seeing what I thought I was seeing. Each time I had the same reaction. I will be replacing the 10K with a 14k and doing more tests today.
I believe the problem is in part the PAR the coral recieves. I used kelvin temp because it is easier for hobbyists to relate to and more closely mimics the spectrum of light they would recieve at greater depth. I don't believe that low wattage daylight lighting has the same effect on these corals as higher wattage actinics do. The secondary pigments in these corals filter the spectrum and PAR that thier algae recieves. If we start out with higher kelvin lighting we can more closely match the end result of ligh the algae recieves.


This is a pic of my very first Elegance. We didn't have digital cameras back then so it is a pic of a 35mm photo. This is why the quality is so bad. This coral and the 16 year old coral in your photo were probably collected in 5 to 10 feet of water. They still needed time to adjust to very bright lights but didn't have near the problems that the corals of today have. My coral lived about 10" from 250W 55K MH, 2 110w actinic vho's, and 2 40w actinics. It would take a very very long time to get one of these new corals to servive under these lights.
I hope I have answered your questions and the information is helpfull.

[graveyardworm]

Not sure if I can help any with this. My experience with elegance corals is very limited at the moment. I have been looking for awhile for a healthy one, and finally found waht I believe is a healthy specimen in a fellow aquarists tank so I bought it. Here's a pic of it in the tank I bought it from.



It was in a 180 under 10k DE MH for a couple months, I'm waiting on more info from the person I bought it from to see how long he's had it and under what conditions.

I have no pics of it in my tank yet, but its under 3 overdriven 6500k NO flourescent 4 foot tubes and one 4 foot VHO actinic. Its in my 100g seagrass tank about 14 inches down on the sand. Its slightly shaded under a ledge. I have no idea on the PAR of the lamps, but they appear to be about the same as T5's.

Flow hasnt really been discussed yet. At the moment mine is in random flow, probably low to med.

[graveyardworm]

Just grabbed a quick pic of it in my tank. I've had it for a couple days.

[elegance coral]

I think you may have gotten lucky. That looks like a very healthy coral and looks like it may have been in captivity for some time. I hope you get that info from the person you got it from, so you can try to mimic what the coral has adapted to. Just remember to feed it once or twice a week small pieces of shrimp or fish. ( not from your grocery store) and keep the calcium level up. Good luck and let us know how he does.

[graveyardworm]

It's probably going to get fed every night, I have a collection of suncorals, and several other LPS in the same tank.

[elegance coral]

Originally posted by graveyardworm
It's probably going to get fed every night, I have a collection of suncorals, and several other LPS in the same tank.

WOW! I just checked out the thread on your system. I think your Elegance is going to be very happy! Nice job.

[John Kelly]

Originally posted by elegance coral
I have some that have bleached and some that haven't. In my case it seems that the ones further away from the lights are the ones that bleach. I believe that in your case and mine the coral was just not getting enough light which caused it to bleach. I have moved mine closer to the lights and so far so good.

If that were true, then it would be counter to your theory:
From your paper: "With what I have seen in my own tank I have had to rethink my stand on this issue. These corals are having a very hard time adapting to low Kelvin temp lights. Even 10,000 K with actinic supplemental lighting seems to be to bright. I believe that the shrunken tentacles and overly inflated oral disk is a symptom of light exposure. A sun burn for corals."

IME with Goniopora, it is too much PAR that causes them to bleach (and NOT a lack of Iron/Manganese either). A small change in lighting will produce a visible change in the coral coloration and zooxanthellae density, but it takes place over a period of months, not days or hours. A large increase in lighting, either when harvesting them or placing them under stronger lighting within a tank, can cause them to quickly release their zooxanthellae (bleach) and also internally damage the tissue very quick. The shrunken polyps and tentacles that result are from the loss of zooxanthellae, but the die off of the individual polyps are from internal damage caused by acute oxidative stress (sun burn).

Have you been able to closely study the decline of "infected" Elegances in order to establish specific stages and patterns of behavior?

[graveyardworm]

WOW! I just checked out the thread on your system. I think your Elegance is going to be very happy! Nice job.

Thanks, its still a work progress, the fun never ends.

I dont quite understand the bleaching under lower lighting. IME lower lighting generally causes a darker richer/brownish color to develop. Higher light intensities cause either a washing of color or in severe cases bleaching.

[elegance coral]

Originally posted by John Kelly
If that were true, then it would be counter to your theory:
From your paper: "With what I have seen in my own tank I have had to rethink my stand on this issue. These corals are having a very hard time adapting to low Kelvin temp lights. Even 10,000 K with actinic supplemental lighting seems to be to bright. I believe that the shrunken tentacles and overly inflated oral disk is a symptom of light exposure. A sun burn for corals."

IME with Goniopora, it is too much PAR that causes them to bleach (and NOT a lack of Iron/Manganese either). A small change in lighting will produce a visible change in the coral coloration and zooxanthellae density, but it takes place over a period of months, not days or hours. A large increase in lighting, either when harvesting them or placing them under stronger lighting within a tank, can cause them to quickly release their zooxanthellae (bleach) and also internally damage the tissue very quick. The shrunken polyps and tentacles that result are from the loss of zooxanthellae, but the die off of the individual polyps are from internal damage caused by acute oxidative stress (sun burn).

Have you been able to closely study the decline of "infected" Elegances in order to establish specific stages and patterns of behavior?

I think we are getting a little mixed up because I am mixing symtoms. I will try to be a little more clear. I study animals, I am no writer.
I believe the problem that started all this is the fact that the corals come from deeper water. They seem to live very close to thier maximum depth. If we reduce the light below that which the coral recieved in the wild it bleaches. You are correct that corals will bleach due to being exposed to bright light. They can also bleach due to a lack of light. We have seen the hobby do this intentionally with H. Crispa. (I know this is not a coral) Importers would house them with no light so that they would bleach and become a beautiful white color. The good thing (if there is one) about one of these corals bleaching due to low light is that the danger of Oxygen poisoning is gone. Bleaching is one of the symtoms these corals are dealing with. Another is when the oral disk overinflates and the tentacles shrink. This seems to be due to stronger lighting. The corals comming into the hobby now seem to have a much narrower field of exceptable lighting than the corals from shallow waters. Shallow water corals can go in either direction, higher or lower light, with a wider range being exceptable. The deep water corals have no room for thier light to be reduced and can not handle the strong uv rays the shallow water corals have adapted to. This gives them a much smaller window they can servive in. With that said, the good news is that both symtoms are reversable. Most people have a fear of placing thier Elegance corals on the rocks, and understandably so. The flesh around the top edge of the coral is very easily damaged. If your Elegance is in the sand and it begins to bleach it will die if nothing is done. You could increase the lighting in the tank, but this is normally not practical. The only other alternative is to move the coral up on the rocks where it can recieve more light. You will be taking a risk doing this but if its not done there is no way the coral will servive. I keep all my Elegance corals on the rocks and allways have. It is much easier to adjust the light the coral recieves when it is on the rocks. At first sight of the disk swelling up and the tentacles shrinking the coral must be moved to a slightly dimmer area of the tank. These adjustments in light levels should be done in small steps.

Have you been able to closely study the decline of "infected" Elegances in order to establish specific stages and patterns of behavior?

Yes. Well kinda. My corals are improving. Even after these corals have been moved into a more suitable environment they continue to struggle. The stress they have been under is great. The fight will be far from over. They will shrink up much smaller than normal. They may produce mucus or slime that can choke the coral off from the surrounding water. This slime is most abundant in the mornings. It will need to be removed without stressing the coral. I simply wave my hand over the coral and flush the slime away with the current. I also try to remove this slime from the tank if I can. I have looked at it under 600x magnifacation and can see no signs of life. They will only do this for a week, maybe two. you will need to run a good machanical filter durring this time to keep detritus from adding to this problem. After this the polup will very slowly begin to open more. It will take many months for the coral to get back to a normal appearance, but once they have made it through the slime stage they seem to be home free. That is if you can keep the other inhabitants off of them. This is not a process for the community tank.
Did that make a little more since?

[elegance coral]

Originally posted by graveyardworm
Thanks, its still a work progress, the fun never ends.

I dont quite understand the bleaching under lower lighting. IME lower lighting generally causes a darker richer/brownish color to develop. Higher light intensities cause either a washing of color or in severe cases bleaching.

The dark richer/brownish color is caused by the population of algae in the animals tissues. If the light is insufficient for photosynthesis the animal will bleach. I'm not sure if this is because the algae is dieing off inside the coral, but that is my guess. Corals bleach under high light because of Oxygen poisoning. The algae produce more oxygen then the coral can handle causing it to dispel its algae in self defence. It is very common for a coral to expel small portions of its algae when first placed in a bright aquarium. You can see the brown slimy looking stuff comming out of the corals mouth when they do this.

[graveyardworm]

Here is how understand zooxanthallae in coral tissues. There are different colored zooxanthallae. The different colors are have different roles under different light intensities. Under low light the browns move closer to the surface to collect as much available light as possible. True under extremely low light or no light conditions the animal will either expell its zoos, or the zoos die, either way the coral becomes bleached, but under low light ( barely sufficient ) the browns move closer to the surface. As light intensities increase the brown zoos move farther into the tissue revealing other tissue colors which help to reflect light so the browns dont overwork and pollute their environment.

I havent read through Eric Bornemans entire Elegance project to understand what he went through and observed, but I think there's more to it than just light otherwise I feel that Eric would've quickly picked up on this and it would've been shown in his report.

Here's something I read this is how I interpreted it. Originally the Elegance coming in were a hardy coral collected in relatively shallow water. Then something happened perhaps it was deeper collection that was part of the problem, but it appears that the problem was a pathogen of some sort which made its way into warehouse stock tanks infecting new corals as they came in. As the issua with elegance became more real and people became more aware demand for the coral slowed and there was far less collection, and without the corals in the stock tanks the pathogen worked its way out of the systems it was in. So now we're starting to see more healthy unaffected elegance in the hobby.

This may have been in Erics report, I can try to dig it up.

[redFishblue]

Originally posted by elegance coral
I believe it was the sudden change in light that caused this effect. I am more convinced that the root of this problem is lighting now then I was when I wrote my theory. I got a new Elegance on Friday. It was somewhat withdrawn when I got it. I decided to do a little experiment last night. I placed this new coral about 10" under a 250W 10K light and turned off all the others. In less than 2 minutes it began to puff up and withdraw its tentacles. I immediately turned the light off. The coral began to deflate as soon as the light went out. I did this several times to make sure I was seeing what I thought I was seeing. Each time I had the same reaction. I will be replacing the 10K with a 14k and doing more tests today.

My elegance showed the same reaction when I was switching between a 10k and a 14k 250w de bulb to check which color I liked better. It would react almost instantly when the 10k was on...the tentacles would retract and it would puff up. But after a while, it would return to normal and actually look more "full" than before under the 14 which it normally is under. It might have been just momentarily shocked at the par increase but not sure if it would cause long term problems. My other corals might have not liked the increase in the light but it so much more easier to see it in the elegance because it has so much tissue to expand or rectract.

[elegance coral]

Originally posted by graveyardworm
Here is how understand zooxanthallae in coral tissues. There are different colored zooxanthallae. The different colors are have different roles under different light intensities. Under low light the browns move closer to the surface to collect as much available light as possible. True under extremely low light or no light conditions the animal will either expell its zoos, or the zoos die, either way the coral becomes bleached, but under low light ( barely sufficient ) the browns move closer to the surface. As light intensities increase the brown zoos move farther into the tissue revealing other tissue colors which help to reflect light so the browns dont overwork and pollute their environment.

I havent read through Eric Bornemans entire Elegance project to understand what he went through and observed, but I think there's more to it than just light otherwise I feel that Eric would've quickly picked up on this and it would've been shown in his report.

Here's something I read this is how I interpreted it. Originally the Elegance coming in were a hardy coral collected in relatively shallow water. Then something happened perhaps it was deeper collection that was part of the problem, but it appears that the problem was a pathogen of some sort which made its way into warehouse stock tanks infecting new corals as they came in. As the issua with elegance became more real and people became more aware demand for the coral slowed and there was far less collection, and without the corals in the stock tanks the pathogen worked its way out of the systems it was in. So now we're starting to see more healthy unaffected elegance in the hobby.

This may have been in Erics report, I can try to dig it up.

From what I have read on Mr. Bornemans project he consentrated the bulk of his research on dead or dieing coral tissue. This is how he found these Protazoans living within the coral tissues. Julian Sprung also found these protazoans. What they can not say is if these are opertunistic parasites or the cause of the problems. All they can say is that they found them and that there is no known cure. I haven't read anwhere that anyone has done research to find out how to care for them. What it takes to keep them alive and healthy in our aquariums. This is why I began my research. Once these protazoans were found it seems all the research stoped. Who's to say what Mr. Borneman would have found if he would have consentrated his research into keeping them alive. I have corals that are recovering. I have seen the results of different lights on these corals. I can safely say that lighting plays a major role in their survival.
I just bought a sick Elegance on Friday. In my area they don't seem to be getting any better. They are now collecting a limited number of Elegance corals from Australia where they don't need to dive to great depth to find them. These corals from what I have read don't seem to have this problem. This may be why we are seeing some healthy Elegance corals in the trade now. As long as we are collecting these corals from deep waters I believe we will continue to have this problem.
I'm just curious, did you read my theory at the begining of this thread? I covered some of the isseus, you brought up here, in that paper. Thanks for your input and good luck with that new Elegance.

[elegance coral]

Originally posted by redFishblue
My elegance showed the same reaction when I was switching between a 10k and a 14k 250w de bulb to check which color I liked better. It would react almost instantly when the 10k was on...the tentacles would retract and it would puff up. But after a while, it would return to normal and actually look more "full" than before under the 14 which it normally is under. It might have been just momentarily shocked at the par increase but not sure if it would cause long term problems. My other corals might have not liked the increase in the light but it so much more easier to see it in the elegance because it has so much tissue to expand or rectract.

Now thats an interesting point that I havn't thought of. Thanks for bringing that to my attention. I will start some more testing on this tomorrow. I have some questions going through my mind and this may answer some of them. I think this may be very helpfull to what I'm doing. Thanks again.

[graveyardworm]

I did read your theory I may need to read it again. I tried to find some sort of conclusion to Erics Elegance project here and on another site, but couldnt find any posting of end results. I'm sure I read something a little while back just cant seem to find it now.

What I did find was some info like you said that he had very few healthy specimens to examine and then he was having trouble finding a lab to do the histology. So there were many complications.

[John Kelly]

Originally posted by elegance coral
I believe the problem that started all this is the fact that the corals come from deeper water. They seem to live very close to thier maximum depth. If we reduce the light below that which the coral recieved in the wild it bleaches.

The "maximum depth" theory is a good one, but then the corals would be coming out of the water saturated with zooxanthellae and very brown. As soon as they were placed in any decently lit tank, they would lose some zoox. If they were placed in a heavily lit tank, they could easily burn. So as you are saying, you can't place them in any lower light than they already come from because they will bleach and you can't place them in any higher lighting than they come from because they will be burned. I have seen Goniopora "puff up" many times before where the tentacles/polyps are pulled in, but the body is filled and huge. It usually occurs more frequently when they are new to the tank and under stronger lighting than they were previously. Bleached ones will often "puff up" more frequently too, so I believe there is a correlation between puffiness, zooxanthellae regulation, and lighting. Over a period of months, and once the coral has had time to adjust the zooxanthellae and fluorescent proteins to the lighting, the puff up behavior decreases and stops. The loss of zooxanthellae by itself will cause the tentacle extension to be much less than normal, even if the coral is receiving plenty of target fed food. I would guess that the less zooxanthellae an Elegance has the more it would puff up or remain puffy and the more it's tentacles would remain retracted. It takes months to for a bleached Goniopora to recover, and like you said, it takes months for Elegance to recover, so it sounds like there is a possible close relationship of the symptoms between the two types of corals.

From what you are describing, it sounds like there are Shallow Water Elegance and Deep Water Elegance that come into the hobby. The purchaser wouldn't necessarily know the difference though. If a person purchased an Elegance from deeper water, it would be more brown from the increased zooxanthellae density; unless it had already lost some of it and/or was "sick" (burned). The tentacle extension would already be affected on a "sick" Elegance, due to some lost zooxanthellae, so that would be the first clue to look for when judging the overall health.

If a person was wanting to purchase an Elegance, it sounds like they would want to start off with a specimen that was saturated with zooxanthellae and extending it's tentacles nicely, place them under medium lighting, target feed them heavily (in case they are under too low of light), watch for them to "puff up" (in case they are under too high of light), and be ready to move them according to their behavior if need be.

[John Kelly]

Here is a photo of the 16yr old Elegance that I previously posted a photo of, except for this was taken 8 months later and the lighting had been moved higher off of the tank. This is what I would expect a Deep Water Elegance to look like when it is harvested; an increase in zooxanthellae density, thicker tentacles, less fluorescent proteins (= less UVR protection):




Edit: Same coral 8 months earlier under more intense lighting. The bulbs and wattage are the same, but the lighting is moved closer in this pic. Notice, decreased zooxanthellae density, thinner tentacles, more fluorescent proteins (= more UVR protection):

[tranboy]

In my experience with keeping elegance corals. I find that feeding them small pieces of choped up shrimp will also keep them health. Mine where under power compact lighting so the lighting wasn't that intense.