need advice on pale corals

[Amadod2]

Hi everyone, I'm looking for some helpful advice on my currently pale corals. Here is a little backstory to my tank. last year February i re started my tank from nothing, as i lost everything that summer during a power outage. in April i added a few corals and didn't do much to the tank, i believe i did two water changes from April to August, i know that isn't good but life got busy.After a few months I came back from my summer vacation and my dosing went a little sideways as it over dosed my tank alk and bleached almost everything. so i brought the levels back into check and every month since November i have been doing about 15-25% water changes, increasing them a little every month. i change my filter socks every 3-5 days and clean my skimmer cup. as for my perimeters when i last checked my phosphates where 0 ,my alk 9 and Cal 450, sal 1.25 and my temp no higher then 79,my nitrates and nitrites are also 0. i run a 6bulb T5, and i stopped running rowafos about a month ago. i know it takes time for corals to recover but I'm just wondering if any of you might have ideas as to why my corals or pale and what can i do to get more colour out of them.

[Myka]

It sounds like you need some nutrients, but first, which brand of test kits are you using?

Turning the lights down when corals are bleached helps them to recover too. Theu need nutrients in order to handle high light.

[Amadod2]

i use salifert and hanna checker. what can i use to add nutrients? i have some coral food "coral frenzy" how ever its expired I'm not sure if i should or could use it?

[iamfrontosa]

Can you post pictures ?

[Myka]

I do trust the results from those test kits. What do you have for fish? How big is the tank? What are you using for a skimmer?

Yes, please post pictures.

[adam84]

What bulbs are you using and for how many hours a day are they running?

[Amadod2]

For fish: 1-tomato clown, 1-bi color blend, 1- yellow wrasse, 1-poters angel, 1- sandsifting gobi

For bulbs: 4-ati blue + (3 of them just replaced), 1-ati purple plus that's 9months old, 1-ati coral + also 9 months old. Lights are on from 3pm-10pm, with 1hr start up and shut down with just 2 bulbs

For a skimmer I have a swc 180

I will try and get pics later today

[Amadod2]

Oh and my tank is 75g

[Myka]

Hmm, that's a lot of light over a 75-gallon. Which fixutre are you using? What type of corals are bleaching? Did the bleaching start after you replaced the Blue Plus bulbs?

[Amadod2]

I'm using a tek t5 fixture, my colors have always been pale. The corals don't look bleached just pale. A few of them are bleached and are recovering

[tang daddy]

This is typical of a low nutrient tank syndrome, if you add a few more fish and up the feedings there will be more food for the corals, IMO if you have changed the bulbs recently then the par on the new bulbs are too strong, for the time being I would keep up with waterchanges, feed more add more fish and perhaps only run the 2 blue plus and leave the rest off. Running all your lights will bleached the corals and basically nuke the bleached corals further. Do you get any sunlight or daylight in your home? If so that will help abit. Looking forward to some pics to see what state the corals are in.

[Default]

I bet you need to add nutrients. I use pohls xtra special and zeofood7 for nitrate and phos. I have a very small bioload in my tanks and need to add nutrients for my corals.

[Amadod2]

I'm trying to upload pics but its not working for what ever reason

[Amadod2]

Here are some pics, I don't know how to get the camera not to take them so blue, the corals look better in person

[iamfrontosa]

My thought, just add more food and raise your light up a little, maybe 6inch.
When I ran ULNS, I dosed KZ Coral Vitalizer, Amino, and Xtra.
The easiest way and cheapest is just to add more fish, and feed your fish.

Or you can just dose NO3. All you need is a trace amount in the tank.

[Amadod2]

i went to JL today to add more fish, but I'm not sure what to add... i would like anthis, and a few wrasses, any ideas out there?

[SoloSK71]

Maybe wait on adding more fish until you figure out what is going on with the coral? I know that is probably not something you want to hear, but it is the best thing for your wallet, the fish and and your emotional health.

Charles

[tang daddy]

Corals look ok to me, abit pale but not that bad.. if you add anthias be prepared to feed a bunch of food. A wrasse would be a nice addition, the tonozukai at Jl is pretty cool looking, I bought the larger one awhile ago. Now that you've stopped po4 removal if you add a couple fish and slowly increase the feeding by summer corals should look awesome. I am not sure why when you said corals I thought your Lps was pale. Sps is not a problem, just takes abit of time to colour up.

[iamfrontosa]

i went to JL today to add more fish, but I'm not sure what to add... i would like anthis, and a few wrasses, any ideas out there?

Doesn't seem like you have any fish in your tank atm.
Personally, some wrasses that will help combat pests and tang for algae (although this isn't your issue). I also like blue green chromis.

[Amadod2]

Yes I deffently wanted to add a few wrasses but slowly very cautious of doing things too fast, that's one thing I learned with all the mistakes I made

[Amadod2]

Hey Chris what fish do you have in your cube tank now?

[DKoKoMan]

A nice wrasse would be a good addition... they are active and nice eye candy.

[tang daddy]

Danny, I have a bunch of fish
5 lyre tail anthias
3 Bartlett anthias
Bi colour anthias
Sunburst anthias
Yellow tang
Hippo tang
Long nose hawk
Striped hawk
Cardinal
Sulawesi basslet
Yellow watchmen
Green coral goby
3 clowns
Purple firefish
Tonozukai wrasse
Longfin wrasse
The anthias I had more at one time but they slowly got skinny and disappeared, even with feeding a variety and 5x per day.