cyano

any picture would help and water parms

temp 80
salinity 1.24
ammonia, nitrites, nitrates 0
ph 8.2
calcium 480
alk 179 or 10 dkh

I can't get a really good pic right now since I just stirred it all up in there (not the sand bed mind you) but I got looking at it closely and realized that it seemed to have started and spread quickly over more of the lower flow areas of the tank. I took the closest powerhead and used it to "blow" all the old materials off of the rock that was now dead as well as anything else that was trapped on the surface of the rock (the blue clove polyps grow thick and could definitely have trapped alot of matter under them) then I readjusted the flow a little bit in the tank to try and make it a little more turbid. I also did a little pruning while I already had my hand in the tank removing my old dead acro and pulling out a little hair algae and discovered that that darned caulerpa has returned so I get to have this battle once again. As we all know too much can be a bad thing so thats where I will stop for now and allow things to settle down, I don't want to stress out any possibly dying corals any more than I have to.

now my rose millapora is the newest victime as it sweeps over my tank and looks at though the monti caps and toadstool leather are next on the hit list :'( I don't know what to do at all

I would start doing some major water changes and put some fresh carbon in. As stuff start dieing it going to release toxics into the water and make it worse. Im no coral expert but I would say it will start spreading faster if you dont get the water changed out. Maybe consider moving what you can to a fresh tank if you have a spare at least get out your most liked pieces. Hope someone chimes in that can give you better advise than me on the subject. Wish you the best of luck combating it

or maybe remove anything arounf the area since it seem to have started in one spot and spread out ward (sounds like a chemical attack for lack of better term) kind of like trenching to stop a fire if that make any sense.

I am going kind of thinking the same thing myself and will try to attack some of it this morning before work. I dosed iodide last night since that helps a bit with sick corals. I am going to do some water changes and retest water parameters but seeing as though it is spreading I don't think it is a parameter problem at all as if it was everything would shrivel at once rather than just spreading out like it is.

Everything that's getting killed is getting pulled out by me at the same time but what scares me is if it takes out my larger corals rather than the smaller ones, I don't even want to think about how bad this can be if the rest die at once

Hey Cyano, I've been watching this thread closely. I believe DJ has been Giving you great advise on your situation so I haven't been chiming in. I wish you the best of luck and hope that your tank heals up. I will pray!

Thanks hat, and DJ (nice to not be responding through my Iphone for a change, lol. I did a 10 gallon water change and plan on doing 10 gallons a day for at least 50% total volume, also I retested parameters and all still looks ok. I did a little more pruning and then went to work a little in the sump when I noticed the water level in the sump had dropped, I then looked at the inlet and the flow was down to a trickle, looked in the overflow box and found that the algae had grown so thick on the sides that it was choking the flow into it, cleaned that out and got it all flowing great again. I don't think that was the primary cause for whats been happening but I know that is going to reduce the amount of oxygen in the water so it could have been a contributing factor. I also vacuumed the top layer of the sand bed during my water change and pulled out some nasty water (I see no black on the underside of the tank in the sand bed) so perhaps that also will help out a little.

All of the fish, crabs, snails, and the cleaner shrimp all are doing great so whatever is happening is affecting only the corals (leads me to think it has nothing to do with water quality but maybe more a disease or bacteria) I will wait a day and see if what I have done at least slows the spread, if it does not seem to make a difference then rocks will start being pulled out in a last ditch effort to save any remaining coral. I do not have a spare tank I can put any of these in (my nano that i used as a quarantine has had the pump gone out and I am unable to find a replacement) so if I have to start pulling rocks they will be dried and cleaned to nuke anything on or in them, good or bad.

I am currently making more RO water as another bucket mixes with salt so I will be doing another 10 gallon water change this morning. my rose millapora has a little gasp of life in it I guess whatever attacked it could reach to the tips so I will leave it alone for a bit and frag it once I find a safe place i believe i can put a frag (plus it has enough stress right now i am sure. The toadstool leather laughed off the sttack by shedding it all off this morning and blooming again, that one made me laugh and truly appreciate the pure hardiness of the coral and made me think that all of my zoas will be fine, I have also never had any issues with my montipora as in it has survived it all and I have not had anything in my tank that does any permanent damage to it or come close to killing it so I am not worried about that one.

A new sign of death has sprouted up on the opposite side of the tank once again starting to only affect the snowflake polyps so I wonder if this is really only attacking them and (since they are everywhere) as they die the corals around them are absorbing any death toxin they release causing spotted and spontaneous crashes only in confined spaces, just a theory anyway.