Fungia Plate Coral Help!

[bfishy22]

Hi guys,

I have noticed my fungia plate coral has receded quite dramatically, as I can start to see his white skeleton on the edges. He doesnt seem to be extending his tentacles and im not sure what could be wrong with him.

As you can see in the pictures, he isnt opening up and inflating like usual and notice the browning on top.

My params are: 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, 5ppm nitrate, 8-8.2ph, 8 alkalinity (getting this up as we speak).

I have tried moving him out of the flow and I recently introduced a goby that has been spitting sand on him constantly - I decided to move him up higher just now.

Also recently upgraded the light to a much better one - most of my corals seem to be doing alright (torch, frogspawn, hammer, duncan, goni).

Also I noticed the other week the plate had literally moved onto one of my small frogspawns and killed it - what happened here? Didnt even think they could move.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks guys!

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[WVfishguy]

Fungia need to be fed occasionally, like an anemone. You never mentioned feeding it - are you doing so? My Tongue corals & Fungia liked to eat silversides.

A lot of people don't realize Fungia are motile. An associate of mine - professional aquarist, mind you - repeatedly tried to place a Tongue coral (close relative of Fungia) on a rocky outcropping, and expressed frustration when it kept falling to the sand bed below. I don't know what he thought was happening, but it was apparent he believed it was a sessile animal.

This is not my field of expertise, but because they move around, it may have been poisoned/stung by a tank mate.

[bfishy22]

Originally Posted by WVfishguy

Fungia need to be fed occasionally, like an anemone. You never mentioned feeding it - are you doing so? My Tongue corals & Fungia liked to eat silversides.

A lot of people don't realize Fungia are motile. An associate of mine - professional aquarist, mind you - repeatedly tried to place a Tongue coral (close relative of Fungia) on a rocky outcropping, and expressed frustration when it kept falling to the sand bed below. I don't know what he thought was happening, but it was apparent he believed it was a sessile animal.

This is not my field of expertise, but because they move around, it may have been poisoned/stung by a tank mate.

Hi, thanks for the response. Yes I have been feeding it - i feed all my corals every 3 days. Stinging is definitely a possibility I have a fair few aggressive corals, ill try moving him away from everything. I have a hammer coral in thr middle of my tank - apparently their sweepers are up to 6 inches but none of my coral around it have been stung as far as I know. Should I move them anyway?

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[WVfishguy]

All Euphyllia have dangerous sweeper tentacles, so, yes, I'd maintain a space around them. You might try placing rocks around the Fungia to limit its movement. Others should chime in here, because, as I said, I'm not an expert on Fungia.

[homer1475]

Do not move it up in your rockwork. They prefer the sandbed and a shady spot, not direct light.

I have 3 and all 3 are on the sandbed and under a rock outcropping to be partially shaded. As far as feeding goes, mine get a few NLS pellets everyday when I feed my fish. It's pretty cool to watch them roll a pellet up to their mouth.

[mathman7728]

Have the same problem and I think it is brisstleworms. I say that because I noticed several worms directly under the spot where I could see skeleton where once there was flesh. I’ve been told that brisltworms are ok but I think they be more problematic than thought.

[homer1475]

If you have bristle worms on corals, they are actually doing them a favor and eating dead flesh off the coral, not eating living flesh.

Although a lot of people attribute them to eating their corals, they cannot as they only have a tube for a mouth and prefer to eat detritus, dead flesh, and decaying matter. Basically they eat soup not hard matter.

[bfishy22]

Originally Posted by mathman7728

Have the same problem and I think it is brisstleworms. I say that because I noticed several worms directly under the spot where I could see skeleton where once there was flesh. I’ve been told that brisltworms are ok but I think they be more problematic than thought.

Interesting you say that because I am dealing with quite a serious overpopulation of bristleworms. Never saw any around the fungia disk though.

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[bfishy22]

Originally Posted by homer1475

If you have bristle worms on corals, they are actually doing them a favor and eating dead flesh off the coral, not eating living flesh.

Although a lot of people attribute them to eating their corals, they cannot as they only have a tube for a mouth and prefer to eat detritus, dead flesh, and decaying matter. Basically they eat soup not hard matter.

I see, thanks for the info. Can you ever have too many bristleworms? I see them absolutely everywhere in my tank and have actually been setting traps for the big ones which are quite effective.

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[Pond Boy]

If you have a over population of Bristle worm's you are feeding too much.

[bfishy22]

Originally Posted by Pond Boy

If you have a over population of Bristle worm's you are feeding too much.

Gotchya. I feed the fish once a day and the corals every 3. Would you recommend I cut back?

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[Pond Boy]

Originally Posted by bfishy22

Gotchya. I feed the fish once a day and the corals every 3. Would you recommend I cut back?

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I would..

[slief]

Originally Posted by homer1475

Do not move it up in your rockwork. They prefer the sandbed and a shady spot, not direct light.

I have 3 and all 3 are on the sandbed and under a rock outcropping to be partially shaded. As far as feeding goes, mine get a few NLS pellets everyday when I feed my fish. It's pretty cool to watch them roll a pellet up to their mouth.

That has not been my experience as far as light though I would agree that they don't like or need very strong light, they are photosynthetic. I have more than a dozen now and all are on the bottom of the tank but not in the shade and I have some serious lighting on my tank. Granted the tank is 24" deep.

OP, if it does die, don't remove it. I had one Fungia die in my tank and it's constantly shitting out new plates. I have at least a dozen from it and even a year later, it's still producing new fungia. Also, I don't think it's your alk. Natural sea water is around 7.5 dkh. 8 in my opinion is just fine. Some corals can be finicky but one thing you didn't mention was the age of the tank. They really do best in a mature system and as such, i wouldn't recommend them for a tank that is under 12 months old. You also didn't mention your livestock or if you did, I must have missed it. Some fish may pick at them which will irritate them. As for bristle worms, as noted above, their populations are typically limited by the amount of waste and detritus in your tank. Judging by some of the macro growing on your rocks, the presence of some cyano that I see and the amount of worms you have in your system, that tells me you need to work on your husbandry. Vacuuming, blowing the rocks off, staying on top of Po4 etc. Lastly, bristle worms are detritivores/scavengers. They don't usually mess with corals.

[Jekerry]

Slief, i’m very new to this so curious about the mature tank comment. If the water parameters are all correct, what makes a mature tank different? Is it microbiotic life? Stability? Or what?

Thanks

[slief]

Originally Posted by Jekerry

Slief, i’m very new to this so curious about the mature tank comment. If the water parameters are all correct, what makes a mature tank different? Is it microbiotic life? Stability? Or what?

Thanks

Over the course of the first year or so, a new tank/systems will go through all kinds of biological changes. Different strains of bacteria diversify and colonize, different types of algae come and go etc. It’s a part of the system becoming self sustaining and building it’s own mini ecosystem that can support wider ranges of life. It’s a level stability beyond what we can measure and that biological maturity is critical to the health of many harder to keep organisms such as various corals, anemones as well as other invertebrates and even certain fish because the water is going through chemistry changes during the first year or more. This is why having patience in this hobby is so critical. I won’t even put any coral in a new tank before the first 5 or 6 months unless the system is just a transfer. Even after 6 months, I go very slow because I know that some stuff just won’t tolerate those changes mentioned above. Some may think that’s silly but my experience has taught me that being patient results in far less losses which most new hobbyists find very discouraging. There is an old saying in this hobby. Nothing good happens fast in this hobby and it’s so true.

[Jekerry]

Thanks slief! Makes sense!

[WVfishguy]

Originally Posted by Pond Boy

If you have a over population of Bristle worm's you are feeding too much.

I used to believe this until I had a massive outbreak in a 75 gal. The tank had been running for about 17 years.

There were hundreds of bristles everywhere. It went from a normal number to gross overpopulation in two weeks.

I assumed there was a dead critter somewhere, but there was not. I had not changed the type of or amount of food, but I cut back anyway. No change.

Every comment on 'net forums stated bristles only over produced when the food source increased, which made sense to me. Trouble is, I could not find the food source.

I ended up buying a bristleworm trap. My health is poor and some days I can't do much. I was unable to put the trap in immediately.

After a week had passed, the tank crashed; all the worms died at once, polluting the tank. After a massive water change & cleaning, the water parameters were fine.

I still have no idea what happened.

[Pond Boy]

I can assure you there was a food source or they would not have populated in such a manner. All living things need nutrition without it they die I think that is why your tank crashed they ate up whatever food source they had and died.

[WVfishguy]

I apologize for hijacking this thread.

[bfishy22]

Originally Posted by WVfishguy

I apologize for hijacking this thread.

Haha no worries you have brought with you a wealth of information!

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[Pond Boy]

Originally Posted by WVfishguy

I apologize for hijacking this thread.

Not a hijack in any way you offered up your experience that's how we all learn.
Text can be a bit hard to convey the meaning sometimes...

[anthonys51]

Originally Posted by slief

That has not been my experience as far as light though I would agree that they don't like or need very strong light, they are photosynthetic. I have more than a dozen now and all are on the bottom of the tank but not in the shade and I have some serious lighting on my tank. Granted the tank is 24" deep.

OP, if it does die, don't remove it. I had one Fungia die in my tank and it's constantly shitting out new plates. I have at least a dozen from it and even a year later, it's still producing new fungia. Also, I don't think it's your alk. Natural sea water is around 7.5 dkh. 8 in my opinion is just fine. Some corals can be finicky but one thing you didn't mention was the age of the tank. They really do best in a mature system and as such, i wouldn't recommend them for a tank that is under 12 months old. You also didn't mention your livestock or if you did, I must have missed it. Some fish may pick at them which will irritate them. As for bristle worms, as noted above, their populations are typically limited by the amount of waste and detritus in your tank. Judging by some of the macro growing on your rocks, the presence of some cyano that I see and the amount of worms you have in your system, that tells me you need to work on your husbandry. Vacuuming, blowing the rocks off, staying on top of Po4 etc. Lastly, bristle worms are detritivores/scavengers. They don't usually mess with corals.

What a great response.
Will just add one thing. Don’t move them around. Once there flesh gets ripped they can go down hill quickly
I have 8 and like stated I don’t find they need shade just put them on sand bed with not a lot of flow and leave them alone. If you want you can feed it once a week, but I would feed more if I where you. Once person stated for you to feed less, but saying to someone to feed less when all you stated was you feed once a day isn’t enough info. Do you feed handful of flakes or 2 flakes ? Do you do water changes if so how often and how much. Do you blow your rock and clean your sand when you do these water changes. Also what’s your flow like. Although fungia don’t like direct flow. I feel glow is very important in all Reef tanks.


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[bfishy22]

Hi gus there has been a bit of a development. Came into my room today to see a long brown string coming off my plate coral. Could this possibly be brown jelly? It sort of just drifted off it, into the powerhead and disintegrated.

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[lionfish300]

Originally Posted by slief

That has not been my experience as far as light though I would agree that they don't like or need very strong light, they are photosynthetic. I have more than a dozen now and all are on the bottom of the tank but not in the shade and I have some serious lighting on my tank. Granted the tank is 24" deep.

OP, if it does die, don't remove it. I had one Fungia die in my tank and it's constantly shitting out new plates. I have at least a dozen from it and even a year later, it's still producing new fungia. Also, I don't think it's your alk. Natural sea water is around 7.5 dkh. 8 in my opinion is just fine. Some corals can be finicky but one thing you didn't mention was the age of the tank. They really do best in a mature system and as such, i wouldn't recommend them for a tank that is under 12 months old. You also didn't mention your livestock or if you did, I must have missed it. Some fish may pick at them which will irritate them. As for bristle worms, as noted above, their populations are typically limited by the amount of waste and detritus in your tank. Judging by some of the macro growing on your rocks, the presence of some cyano that I see and the amount of worms you have in your system, that tells me you need to work on your husbandry. Vacuuming, blowing the rocks off, staying on top of Po4 etc. Lastly, bristle worms are detritivores/scavengers. They don't usually mess with corals.

I do dip my sps with Bayers Advance insects killer. What should I do with the Fungia? Thanks you

[anthonys51]

Dipping with Bayer kills pest. If you notice brown jelly on lps corals Iodine dip might help.


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