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Experience with burnt tips (1 Viewer)

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Anybody have a story they care to share. Or does anybody know for sure why this happens? I’ve yet to figure it out and this is the first time I’ve ever had this happen.

Let me give a little background info as the tank was when this occurred. I’ll also give my opinion as to why I think it happen at the end.

Tank was about 5 months in and thriving- on track to be best tank I’ve ever ran.
No carbon or GFO running
PAR 200-250 at top of rocks / 100-150 on sandbed
Started Triton 5/8 - ALK 8.1 dKH
ALK on mid point 5/18 ALK 8.2 dKH
Stopped Triton 5/31- ALK 7.61 dKH
Highest ALK reading during the 3 weeks of Triton was 8.9 dKH on 5/13
5/10 Miyagi Tort was 1st coral that started to burn and have round bleach spots at base
Majority of Tips started burning 5/15 - 5/20
Reduced lighting 5/20
5/22 reduced lighting significantly and did 50% WC
5/23 burning seemed to slow down /reduced ALK dose
5/27 burning started again
5/28 50% WC / reduced ALK dose again
5/29 slowed down again
5/31 tips burning again/ Triton stopped

5/31 Started ESV / Did 20% WC
6/1 Burning slowing down
6/8 Burning stopped

Today 7/4...tank thriving again.

From what happened and reviewing all my documentation and talking it over with several other reefers I feel this could have been a trace element overdose.?

Any Thoughts?? Opinions? Stories? Would like to fully understand and learn from this.
 

frankc

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I have never had this happen so I can't offer any useful advice, but I'm glad your tank is doing well again. Your idea about trace element overdose sounds as good as any.

What is "ESV"?

Did you happen to measure nitrate or phosphate during this episode?
 
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I have never had this happen so I can't offer any useful advice, but I'm glad your tank is doing well again. Your idea about trace element overdose sounds as good as any.

What is "ESV"?

Did you happen to measure nitrate or phosphate during this episode?

ESV Bionic 2 part dosing solutions

You know I did. wink wink. I have excellent notes during the whole episode. On 5/8 when I started Triton the PO4 was 0.06 ppm. By 5/31 when I stopped I brought them up to 0.34- thinking maybe it was a nutrient issue (Nutrients too low). The NO3 was between 7-12 ppm during that time. Even with higher nutrients and low par the burning continued despite all my efforts. All from top down, and only the M. tort stated at the base with one round spot. It was the first coral to be affected out of all the acros. What was really funny is that the Walt Disney never got affected and thrived the entire time. Stags really took it hard as well as many other acros. However, I didn't loose too much. Lost a few acros, but still have the majority of the corals so the tank is still pretty full.

When I did a water change the burning briefly stopped, because the water was being diluted along with the trace elements, but as the doser kept dosing- it would begin to start again. I finally figured things out and pulled the plug on Triton on 5/31 and after a few weeks the tank was not burning anymore. Like mentioned above...Initially...I thought it was a low nutrient issue combined with lighting, but in my case it was not. It was indeed the trace elements in Triton Core7. I'm not sure if I got a bad batch or if my tank simply couldn't handle it. Either way it was enough for me to say goodbye to Triton.

It's a shame because Triton produced one of the best tanks I've had, but I think they changed the formula. It seems to be a lot more potent now. Too potent for my tank. It basically overdosed the corals. This is something you wouldn't expect with the Alkalinity readings I provided. Starting at 8.1 and only getting as high as 8.9 during the entire period isn't a significant jump. Now if I would have started at 8.1 and got a reading of like 10.6 I would think that is a significant jump. Anyway, my Alk consumption obviously declined the entire time after I started using Triton and begin to climb shortly after stopping it. So it's likely I may have received a bad batch. I'll just stick with ESV from now on. They've been around forever and I trust them. The simpler the better.
 
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