# Is it possible my water is too clean?



## Grosse Gurke (Jan 3, 2003)

I have these corals that puff up when they are healthy.....i dont know the technical term for them...but they bloom to feed. Well....they have been looking rough lately....and I had no idea what was going on. So I turned off my skimmer last night...and today they are looking much better. Is it possible I have been overskimming my water and that is not allowing them to feed on anything? My frogspawn is doing fine...as is the other totally soft coral I have...but the ones that are branchy and harder...that do this kind of blooming thing have not been doing well.

Not sure if this makes any sense at all.....


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## No0dles (Dec 16, 2003)

from my understanding it's really hard to over skim and take out many of the trace elements. i dont think that's the problem but then again i'm not hundred percent on that either.


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## Ægir (Jan 21, 2006)

The problem isnt trace elements prob, its more likely food particles just arent reaching them before they get skimmed and or filtered out... you could try spot feeding them weekly, or i always unplug my return pump and turn off powerheads when i feed, once a week i will feed and turn on a powerhead that circulates water to keep food moving.... sometimes i will leave it for 20 to 30 min and then turn on the return pump once all the small particles and food are eaten


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## nismo driver (Jan 27, 2004)

if your not getting any algae growth i would go ahead and feed your fish more and maybe turn back to a dryer skim


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## Grosse Gurke (Jan 3, 2003)

My skim is like coffee and I feed my fish daily. I dont have any algae growth other then the purple or green hard stuff. They certainly do seem to like the skimmer off though.


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## jman785 (May 8, 2005)

I run my skimmers to where the skimmate feels wet but quickly drys up while rubbing. Its although it does build a dark coffee colored skimmate below the bubbles once it fills up the cup.

I imagine its caused from the skimmer removing food from the water column. This can be fixed by target feeding 1-2 times a week as skunkbud stated.

I'm not sure which species of coral your talking about, maybe a sun coral. Snap a pic GG and I'll ID it and can better answer your question


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## Grosse Gurke (Jan 3, 2003)

Yeah...I figured pics would be needed. I will see if I can get some tonight.


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## His Majesty (Apr 5, 2005)

pics will indeed help

the frogspawn and soft coral are generally hardier and easier to keep. they generally do well in most average/good conditions and any compentant SW tank owner can keep them decent and healthy

the 'branchy and harder' corals are most probably acros. short for something but i can't remember ill look it up for you. Acro corals are harder to keep and are very sensitive to water condition, light and food. 
they may also be sun corals but i cannot be sure without pictures. sun corals are also sensitive more so than other corals. they generally like slightly darker areas. over hangs and such. they also are picky when it comes to food. but im not sure these are the corals you have. again can;t be sure withough pics

as stated already i do not beleive you can even over skim a tank. don;t think its possible. however there may be something in your skimmer which is being circulated around the tank which is causing the problem. i suggest cleaning out your skimmer and doing a small water change. see if that helps.

i also beleive its not your water thats the problem. probably food or water flow issues

it be easier to diagnose with some pictures.
till then hope this helps.


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## jman785 (May 8, 2005)

Acro stands for Acropora. Its a hard coral and requires a minimum of T5 lights, MH lights...although I have seen some Acro's grown under VHO's with great success.

It is possible to overskim a tank. Removing too much plankton and food items in the water column. Other then that, there isn't anything else that its removing other than proteins and toxins from corals.

Sun corals will accept feedings of Mysis, etc. pretty easily, you can read more here from Mark's website.

http://www.melevsreef.com/suncoral.html

also if your interested in a good read here is one that Eric Borneman did.

http://www.reefs.org/library/aquarium_net/0797/0797_3.html


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## nismo driver (Jan 27, 2004)

i re read you pst and teh "blooming" thing is usually refered to as polyp extension or PE.. its not uncommon to have acros the do not have pe during the light cycle, or if you have a fish / shrimp / crab that irritates it. the other possibility is the water movement, if its too constatn in one direction or it my result in diminised PE. and it can also be lighting..

if you think about it in terms of whats happening during the light cycle the zooxanthellae is absorbing light to fuel photosynthetic process that makes a large contribution to the nuritiment of the coral the polyps are filter feeding to also contribute to feeding the coral. im thinking it could be possible the coral is gaining enough food it doesnt need to show PE during the day.


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## Grosse Gurke (Jan 3, 2003)

The thing is...this was just recent. They were doing fine for months...and then they just started not looking so hot. Im still working on getting pics...but nismo is right...it is polyp extensions.


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## Puff (Feb 14, 2005)

ive found that my LPS thrive with slightly dirty water, and my SPS thrive in really clean water.

when i only had LPS they were all doing awesome. i added SPS (and a new skimmer around the same time) and the LPS lost a lot of their healthy look, some even died off (Ca and Mg and all that were kept in check). my zoas mostly died away. i lacked on cleaning for a while and the LPS took off again, while i lost a couple of SPS. now i seem to have reached a decent equilibrium and have both growing pretty decently.


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