What Happened to My Leather - HELP!!

[idrum]

Have (had?) a beautiful creamy white spaghetti leather which grew rapidly and became the showpiece of my tank. Noticed this morning it was slumped over badly and appear to be losing some of its flesh - put my hands in the tank to move it - before I did that though, I sort of whisked the water above it to potentially shake loose any detritus - as I did this, a good portion of its 'flesh' flaked off into the water.

Now the coral is still slung over and has lost a bunch of its 'flesh'

Any idea what the cause is? I'm assuming perhaps stung by another coral - the closest is a green hammer. My Galaxea and Elegance are over 6" away from him.

Or, is it some type of water parameter poisoning?

Also, should I worry about this affecting the health of my fish - i.e. ammonia spike as when a fish dies.

Thanks in advance

[amcarrig]

Perhaps it was stung by your hammer. Can't judge the water parameter theory unless you post them. I would think a rotting coral will pollute your tank but can't say for sure.

[scubadude]

A Hammer will definately sting a leather! also another thing you might consider is the leather may be getting to big...and I have heard of corals "melting" and dropping their wax-like residue on to the SB or watever is under them to form a new baby frag....if your piece is getting stung/or to big I recommend fragging it or moving the hammer! From the sounds of it the leather is getting very big...and its hard to find a good spot for a hammer...so I personally would probably cut the pieces off that look bad...and discard them and then I would even cut a few more pieces that look good and make baby frag colonys that you could sell possibly to your LFS ....if you do frag then you might want to squirt a tad of iodine in there after...for healing HTH

[idrum]

OK - now the leather just about croaked - when I move it - basically flaked off into nothing - similar to shedding skin. So I'm assuming its dead.

Now all other corals are retracted (Leathers, Colt, etc) - also notice that there seems to be a big blow up of algae - blooms on the glass and hair algae growing in my in tank refugium.

Did a water test and noticed that I'm showing a bit of nitrite and some significant nitrates.

Could the nitrates be the cause of the algae bloom and the coral 'dying' and others retracting?

Also - I am now - 'brewing' up some water for 15-20% water change. I know the experts want you to 'age it' for a day or two, but I'm worried about losing all of my corals in the meantime. Should I worry about this?

Also, what could have caused the nitrate bloom - the dying coral itself or perhaps too large of a bioload? Add this to a new problem I've never had before.

Help - I have a new 8 week old puppy in the house and this will about kill my patience!!!!

[bongobrian]

Idrum- reading your post this morning was kinda ironic for me because I was just about to make my own post on the very same topic! I found my leather in the exact same conditions last night as the one you described for your leather. Are you sure the leather is completely dead? these corals can fool you. I've seen mine in this shape before and it completely recovered. My leather was also one of the "showpieces" of my tank. Very beautiful piece. But now it is slumped over with deteriorating flesh just days after looking completely healthy. I havn't changed anything about the conditions of the tank, the coral just seems to do this on it's own every once in a while. I havn't lost hope yet because again, I've seen this happen before. Leathers are extremely hardy and I still have my doubts that yours is completely dead. I guess we would need to see it to make any kind of judgement. Your nitrate levels and algea blooms are almost definitely relative to the dying pieces of the leather coral. Remember though, if there was "flesh" that came off then that might be the only part that is decomposing and causing the rise in nitrates. Nitrates are fertilizer for algea. I just wanted to say that there is probably still some hope for your coral (and mine). I'd say your best bet is to leave the coral alone as much as possible. Try not to touch it. Put it in a place where it can be propped up.. maybe resting next to a rock. Try to get it in some good current. Probably just medium current since you don't want to agitate the wounds. Make sure you have iodine in your water. Put an extra drop or two to help it heal. You might be surprised and start seeing the leather making a come back. Good luck!

[scubadude]

IMO I would try and take out watever you think is dying or dead and scoop up any dead matter....then do a LARGE water change (40-60%) this will have a much better chance at saving your corals....they may look a little ill at first but they should come around...and if they dont then wait another day or two and do another large water change. Also on another note....its normal for leathers to shed/wax their skin but this sounds like a more serious problem...so if you truly have some problems in your tank and judging from the way you explained your nitrate/trite problems (there should be 0 trites) you do....then LARGE w/c's...and make sure you have good quality RO/DI water or else it will be like putting gas in the fire to say the least. HTH

[Barry N.]

Just went throught the samething a few weeks ago only think I could think of was that my Xenia crashed and contaminated the water thus getting my beautiful BIG leather toadstool. Does your water smell bad? Do as suggested above, water change and throw in some carbon. It took me a few good water changes and cleaning some LR that had the dead stuff on and now everything appears to be ok. Never found out what made the Xenia crash as I have had it for 5 months.

Good Luck
Barry