Button polyps not growing?

[Jcs401]

I purchased these button polyps(photo attached). I have had them in my nano (24g jbj led, protein skimmer in 1st chamber, carbon and those acrylic fake live rock in second, upgraded 1200 maxi-jet in return 3rd) all water levels seem very normal however the polyps just arena seem to be growing and some on opening and detaching and latching on in other areas of the tank. Normal or what can I do/help make them healthy. I use substrate called FUEL and coral vite and dose calcium. Any suggestions?

 

[Mrjoshua313]

How long have you had them in the tank.

 

[Jcs401]

About two weeks maybe 3.

 

[Bectan01]

What are your parameters? Anything else in the tank effected? How old is the tank?

 

[MINItron]

I wouldn't expect to see the colony grow that much in 2 or 3 weeks. If the are releasing and floating around then it sounds like they aren't happy with the location. Zoanthids aren't normally that picky, not too strong light, and not too strong flow with reasonably clean water.

As long as you do regular water changes and keep your calcium and carbonate up the only thing you should ever need to feed them is the occasional fine meaty food. Mine eat the floating leftovers when I feed my fish their frozen carnivore diet. There is always some small bits of mysis and whatnot that they gobble up greedily.

The only things I add to my tank are water, food, pickling lime and vinegar. I have another calcium supplement that I use about once every 3 months. My zoanthids are budding all over, but really don't cover much more surface than the did two months ago.

 

[Gregcoyote]

Pickeling lime and vinegar?

 

[MINItron]

Pickeling lime and vinegar?

A small jar of "kalkwasser" costs $15 at my LFS a big bag of pickling lime costs $2-4 depending on the season and where I can find it. They are the same thing, and the pickling lime is made as a food product so usually is refined to higher standards.

Vinegar is a carbon source to feed denitrifying bacteria and encouraged nitrate removal.

 

[Gregcoyote]

Got it. Hadn't heard it called pickling lime before, my mistake. The vinegar is pretty acidic, why that rather than a more ph neutral carbon source?

 

[MINItron]

5% white vinegar isn't that strong of an acid, and something like 24 mL is all it takes to completely convert 1/2 teaspoon of lime into calcium acetate. It makes the incorporation of the calcium easier as it has less tendency convert straight to calcium carbonate and come out of solution. Instead it is more apt to convert to calcium bicarbonate, which we want, and the bacteria get the acetate for energy to break down nitrate.

 

[Gregcoyote]

How do you dose them?

 

[MINItron]

1/2 teaspoon lime and 2 tablespoons vinegar in 2 liters of RO water. I use it as my make up water. That is about half of the lime that can actually be dissolved in that volume of water, but I have a lot of evaporation, and don't need that much calcium. I am using more vinegar than is necessary to convert the lime because I am looking for the extra carbon for denitrification.

 

[Gregcoyote]

How long have you carried on this regime?

 

[MINItron]

I have been doing this for about three months. I moved a month and a half ago and took all of the sand out of my main tank which was a nitrate/phosphate source. I change 5 or 10 gallons once a week. When the calcium crawls over 480 or so I stop the lime only until the next water change, but continue the vinegar with every top up. If I don't catch that the calcium has crossed that threshold I start to get aragonite sand forming.

 

[Gregcoyote]

You think this is better than dosing calcium chloride, or even kalkwasser (lime water) because the vinegar helps some of the calcium to go into solution? And the additional benefit is the vinegar is a carbon source. I will stay tuned to hear the long term outcome of this as it is interesting chemistry.

 

[MINItron]

It is kalkwasser, just at a cheaper price. When I started researching how to keep my calcium and hardness up I found that kalkwasser was better because it is balanced between both. It also typically contains a certain amount of magnesium as a byproduct.

I had been contemplating carbon dosing for quite some time, but was afraid to do the vodka dosing as there are too many negative side effects that I have read about. While I was reading up on kalkwasser I found several good articles outlining the calcium acetate method, and discussing the actual chemistry involved. It is the simplest method, and it is relatively hard to screw it up. It maintains the balance between calcium and carbonate hardness while being difficult to overdose.
When you use CaCl you have to be careful because if you dose too much you will drive the carbonate down. With Calcium Hydroxide (CaOH) if you dose too much you just make sand, that is unless you radically overdose in a very short time.

Dosing with kalkwasser also helps to precipitate phosphates. Though I don't really have a problem with that.

 

[Gregcoyote]

I've used kalkwasser most of my reef keeping history and a homemade calcium chloride and sodium bicarbonate drip in a doser. I monitor weekly and dial up and down as needed. But I like your method.

 

[MINItron]

I only use my CaCl when my Ca drops for some reason. I haven't used it in ages. Since I arrived at my current dosing schedule I haven't had any problems maintaining calcium and hardness in a nice steady range.

 

[DeathclawRowe1]

Don't button polyps need lots of calcium?

 

[Sniperhank]

Don't button polyps need lots of calcium?

No. They do not form a calcium skeleton as sps and Lps corals do.

 

[CaptainJugz]

From the "for what it's worth department", of all the corals I have had good successful growth from, button polyps have been the most finicky. I have had a one polyp frags grow into colony of hundreds, and bought colonies of hundreds to watch them dwindle away....just sayin. I find SPS and LPS actually easier to manage than these softies sometimes.