Pale SPS ????

[Pennoyer]

I have several SPS which simply won't color up. They are growing fine and all plate down nicely, but several stay very pale and even the ones which have decent color are not colored through and through like most seen here.

Of the most problematic SPS, one is almost white, another (Midnight Stag from LA) is a pale tan with hints of dark blue on its tips; another (Purple Haze from LA) is pale to very faint tan with hints of dark bluish purple on the tips. Question is: could these be receiving too much light; in other words, is a sign of too much light faint colors? They are pretty much directly below 250DE Megachrome Corals in ROIIIs about 8' above the water's surface; the corals are about 4" below the surface. All params stay very stable and are in check. I run the FM Ultralith system and suspect that the system is the culprit, but because other corals have retained nice color (Scripps Milli, Blue Milli, a turquoise tort, green slimmer and to some extent a Marshall Island Tri-Color) and because I have a purple digi that was purple for the longest, turned brown after a sump mishap and has remained brown for several months, I also think the FM system might not be the culprit. I realize without pics this is a tough ??? to comment on, so I'll try to get some tonight when I get home.

[cutegecko3]

i had a sps frag that was pale tan in with green polyps.that was its natural color.if you didnt receive them that way you may have a stability issue.

[damura]

Hi Pennoyer,

The question you're raising here is bugging every SPS keeper at some point in life. from reading a lot of material about the subject i reached the conclusion that there are 2 main factors affecting SPS coloring:
water quality, meaning: 1. sufficient addition of trace elements.
2. low phosphate levels .3. high alkalinity (8 - 10 dKH)
the other factor is your lighting which seems to be fine, i found it very important to strengthen the this by adding aqua medic "reef blue" T5 lamps, these really squeeze the colors out my SPS corals.
Amir

[DaddyJax]

What is involved in the FM Ultralith system? Do you have a sand bed? What size tank and how long has it been running? How many fish and what kind and how often do you feed and what do you feed? Do you run a GFO? Is you skimmer oversized? How much flow do you have?

[Pennoyer]

I took some pics last night but didn't have a chance to upload; will do so tonight. As for the above:

I think my skimmer is oversized for my system which is a 90 display, 70 sump and 20 fuge. I usually use 140 -150 total system volume considering subtracting for the LR and sand and adding the plumbing, SKimmer is a 6"x48" external neddle wheel made by Geo.

I have run the FM system for about 6 months.

I run about 1/2 - 3/4 cup of Warner HC phos remover in a phosban reactor. Changed every other month.

I also run 1 cup of carbon in each of two more phosband reactors for a total of 2 cups. Carbon is changed about every month.

The tank has been running since October-November of 05, but it was originally set-up in December 99, but I didn't start with SPS until probably January 03. Then Katrina took out the tank, thus the restart in late 05.

Display has about 4" of fine grain sand and about 100 lbs of LR.
Sump has another 150 - 200 lbs of LR and no sand.
Fuge has another 20-30 lbs of LR and no sand and various green macros. Grape Calurpa (came in on LR) and anything else that grows in there. I used to have Cheato, but it died when I first started using the FM system and I never replaced it.

Currently the only fish I have is a clown. Prior to a recent ich outbreak because of my stupidly deciding to upset everybody by adding a powder blue, I had a ~4" Regal, a 2" Orchid Dotty, a 3" Potters and a Green Mandarin.

Feeding was a mix of flakes (maybe three days per week) (Formula one, two and prime reef) and frozen (other days) (prime reef, Angel Formula, Plankton and Mysis). I would probably feed once per day most often and twice or three times per day sometimes. (weekends).

Flow is plenty. return pump is a Sequence 4200 returned through 2 x 1" Seaswirls and there is a closed loop with another Sequence 4200 (throttled back to about half) split by a HD-4Way Ocean Motions through 6 x 1.5" outlets at any given time. (2 ocean motion outlets at one time each with 3 outlets into the tank.)

Alk always stays between 3 and 3.5 meq/l
Cal always right at 400 - 435
Mag 1350 - 1375
pH 8.1 - 8.3 (morning - night)
Po4 and Nitrate undetectable (salifert, I know, it's not the best test for these values)

That I think covers it.

[Pennoyer]

Here are a couple shots of what I'm talking about.

[Pennoyer]

[Pennoyer]

Here are a couple that have held up decently.

[Pennoyer]

Sorru about the size, but I don't know how to resize.

[DaddyJax]

IMO, the first thing that jumps out at me is that you have almost no bioload and are running a lot of chemical filtration. It's too clean! 1 fish for 200 gallons of total volume is not enough. Do a search on Pale SPS and see that most of the time they all had little to no bioload.

[Pennoyer]

i figured that was some of the problem and will begin adding back fish again, but even when I had the fish listed above the same thing existed. I know the Ultralith is supposed to strip the water similar to Zeo, so maybe that is the route of the problem. What about supplemental feeding? I know this is a hot button topic, but maybe with the filtration I have I should target feed.

[eskymick]

I saw a noticable boost in color intensity after I started dosing Amino Acids to my reef ... the golden browns became much richer in depth .. and the blues and purples became more intense, as well.

I never have had an "issue" with green. Any green coral I've had has maintained a bright, nearly neon hue.

You may want to look into amino dosing.

[stony_corals]

Adds some fish, dirty the water a little as you've got a good export mechanism in place. Dose aminos.. This could be N limitation.

[Pennoyer]

I have never dosed aminos. Used to sporatically dose Reef Plus, but that was a while ago and before I really had SPS. Do you guys dose every day?

[stony_corals]

Yes, though ease into it...

[eskymick]

I dose aminos 3 - 4 times a week.

[Pennoyer]

What about the pale tan color. I always thought brown sps was a sign of too much nutrients in the water. Is it possible that not having enough is preventing the colored pigments from overtaking the brownish/tan pigments?

[DaddyJax]

Even with the fish you had listed above it was still not enough imo. I have around 40-50 fish in my combined 300g total water volume and feed once to twice a day. I also run a BB which allows my to export much faster and I use an oversized skimmer with no carbon and no P04 remover. In your case I would add some fish and slowly, and I mean slowly dose some aminos or none at all. With your export setup you are prepared for bear! Carbon, P04 remover, oversized skimmer and a fuge along with 300-400 lbs of live rock!! Add some more fish (5-10) and after a month see how your corals are responding and then add some more.
I am partial to chromis and wrasses along with anthias as well. Chromis and anthias are social and can live in groups and need daily feeding. This will get you the needed bioload and feed your corals. Wrasses(fairy) are great because they are peaceful and work with pest control and are always out and moving and are not too big.
I hope this helps!

[Pennoyer]

Sounds good. I collected the LR over the years as a way to seed the new tank after moves. It wasn't until I made my last tank move that I realized how much I had collected. Fish are on the way.

[DaddyJax]

Great!! Whatcha gonna get?

[twon8]

i agree with daddy jax, you are basically starving your corals while at the same time blasting them with light, a recipe for pale corals ime.

[Hendersonracing]

Feed More & More fish this should take care of the problem!

[Pennoyer]

I've got a new juvenille regal ready to ship to replace the one I lost . Probably going to add an oynx clown and three or four Bartlet Anthias, a six line wrasse, a flame or another potters and possibly a purple tang. Obviously not all at the same time.

[wentreefgirl]

The more the merrier, or colorier.lol. They have the potential, just need a boost. I can see the hints of color. Now the rest is up to you.

[DaddyJax]

Sounds good but be wary of the Angels. See about getting a school of chromis. They are very inexpensive and really add motion and color to a tank!