Duncan in Hiding

[Samhain]

My poor Duncan has gone into hiding! He's retracted down with just the very tips of his tentacles showing, and he's been getting progressively more withdrawn over the past couple days. I've checked my levels, and all seem somewhat ok. Here's a rundown.

SG 1.024
Ammo 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 20
dkh 8
Ca 440
Phos 0.25

The only thing that's changed in the past couple of days has been that I took the glass top off the tank, allowing the LED lights unfettered access to lighting the tank. Could it be possible that I am over-lighting my Duncan? The temp on the tank is 79 deg F, and it hasn't changed since removing the glass top. I also haven't seen anything picking on him, and I watch my tank a lot.

I did have a nitrate spike about a week ago, but it's been resolved for about 4 days now, and the withdrawal has been over the past two days. So what's up? Any ideas? Do you think it's just a coral behavioral thing? Is he sick? No signs of any brown stuff on him. Help! I'm really attached to the little guy, and I'm worried for him!

 

[little_fish]

I would turn the light down and reacclimate him to the new lighting, and do a water change. They are tough corals and he should pull through

 

[Samhain]

Unfortunately, there is no dimmer on the lights. They're either on day light, night light, or off. What I may do is try taking the glass off for increasing amounts of time each day until I just leave it off. I'm still doing every other day water changes (10%) to help with the nitrates, and they're holding steady at 15-20. Should I do a larger volume?

 

[little_fish]

I would actually turn down the light to be on for one hour a day and increase that by 30 minutes every few days until you are back to your normal schedule.

And a larger water change wont hurt any thing, but i would try and find out why you continue to have such high nitrates. I would guess you are probably over feeding.

 

[Samhain]

I will try that then. Should I just keep the blues on, or turn all lights completely off? And I probably am overfeeding. But the little thawed shrimp just drop so fast to the bottom that it seems my fish are still looking for food when half the feeding is sitting on the bottom of the tank. Maybe i'll try going slower with putting the shrimp in. But they're so stinkin' tiny, it's way too easy to grab too many!

 

[little_fish]

Ya i know its really hard not to over feed. I would suggest thawing them out and then squirting them out with a turkey baster. The fish will learn really fast that they get food from the baster and then you dont have so much hitting the bottom

 

[Samhain]

I'm actually using a baby medicine dropper and squirting in about 1 ml of shrimp at a feeding. It's hard to believe that it's too much, but I can cut back some! There's only two little fish (no pun intended) in there, so I guess they won't be eating too much.

 

[Smitty]

I bet it's the increase of lighting also...try placing the duncan in a slightly shaded/dimly lit area, or else on the sand bed. They don't need or like intense lighting. Good luck with it.

 

[Samhain]

The first two are Duncan's new home, on the sandbed about an inch and a half lower than he was and in the shade of a shelf overhang. The third one was where he was, in the triangle-shaped hole smack in the middle of the pic. I hope with the move he gets back to his old self; he was beautiful and so nifty!

 

[Gdbyrd]

Sorry about your Duncans : / They should pull through. I think it's probably a lighting issue too, it'll just take some time.

As to your nitrates:
Are you straining your shrimp before you feed? I put my cube out on a paper towel and let it thaw out there. All that gunky water gets soaked up by the towel. Then I use tweezers to grab what I want and drop that in the tank.

Also with feeding, I feed my fish once every week or two. They've been alive and fat for a year now, so they're certainly not suffering.

 

[reeftanker84]

no doubt its the lighting,nitrates arent off the charts so i doubt thats the problem,i feed my fish once a day with a mix of mysis and formula one frozen,nitrates less then 20

 

[Samhain]

He's doing a bit better now. He's come out of hiding most of the time, although he's not making himself as big as he once was.

 

[Samhain]

i feed my fish once a day with a mix of mysis and formula one frozen,nitrates less then 20

I may back off to feeding once a day, and straining the cube like gbyrd suggested. LA suggests twice daily for my two little guys, but if they're wasting food they obviously aren't that hungry!

LA also suggests spirulina brine and mysis, but my fish spit all the spirulina brine back out and only eat the mysis. I want them to eat a balanced diet, but it's not like you can force feed these guys! So most of the spirulina brine ends up on the bottom.:grumble: