Hammer Coral receeding!

[dakar]

Anyone got any idea what would cause this? Looks like the whole colony is slowly dying on us.

A few days ago she was just huge, now she's receeded completely from a whole chunk of the skeleton and looks like it's spreading inward towards the rest. Water params are stable, good lighting and moderate flow. The skeleton itself is almost 8" long with that receded 'arm' a good 3" or so.

[Reef_Angel]

Update on the hammer coral - I'm hoping that I have done the best thing possible for this beautiful animal. Such a shame to see this happen to it. I only wish I knew what could have caused this to happen. In hopes to further stop the spread, I decided to frag it into 3 pieces. Since the photo (above) was taken, more flesh died off separating the life into 2 viable pieces and the rest dead skeleton. If I would have left it together, it would have killed the rest off little by little each day until it died completely off. Maybe by fragging it and gently pushing some tank water through it with a baster, removing all the rotten build up in the skeleton ...may allow the hammer to heal.
Your suggestions as to where I should put the two frags during their healing time would be helpful. I was thinking maybe putting the areas that were dying off in the sand to heal. I don't know why really, but thinking other skeletal animals preferring the sand. I appreciate your thoughts on this. Thanks in advance!

[Whoyah]

Any word on the hammer?

[Reef_Angel]

Of the 2 frags left, one has died of very rapidly. We have one piece of it left now. I can hardly believe this. So far it's looking of and at least it hasn't continued to die at the same rate at the other one, so maybe that last piece will be alright. This one has left us totally shocked. It's just a wait and see process now on that last piece. What a shame.

[ramoth41]

Sorry to hear that Angel... Unfortunatly in my experiance once this starts you can't stop it no matter what you try. I have had other lps do the same thing. There are so many different reasons why that one never seems to fit the senerio. One day it's fine the next it's gone. I had every LPS in my tank go this way about 2 years ago starting with the really nice red and grean open brain that was almost dinner plate size! I also have seen the same thing happen to Elegance coral so I stopped buying them.
It really is sad to cuz without a reason you may never know what happened especialy if the rest of the tank is doing well. Sorry not much help for it.
sarah :smt022

[davejnz]

What kinds of soft corals are in the tank?Euphyllia can be sensitive to some leathers like Sinularia and Sarcophyton..

[dakar]

What kinds of soft corals are in the tank?Euphyllia can be sensitive to some leathers like Sinularia and Sarcophyton..

We lost another one of the 1/3 pieces that were split off... The last chunk isn't doing so well. we do have a small sinularia and a couple of sarcos, but they were over a foot away. Angel had placed the last currently surviving piece on the far left side of the reef, so it's at least 4' from any sinularia or sarco, crossing my fingers, but wasn't looking too well this evening.

[Reef_Angel]

I have everything spaced in such a way that none of the corals should be bothering anyone. All those corals have been in the same position for months now. Why would corals placement suddenly become an issue when they've been fine all this time? It almost seems like the hammer coral picked up a disease of some sort and it's wiping it out, rather quickly I might add. Dave gave it to me as a gift. You can see from the pic that it was huge and beautiful. So we had it for a month maybe in our tank and now this happens. I have to wonder if it had something brewing in it when we got it and it's now gotten to the point where it's dying off. Things to ponder I guess.

[davejnz]

that is one of the weird things about allelopathy(production of toxic compunds)in corals.Corals that are seemingly healthy for periods of time can all of a sudden recede.Placement in the tank will have little to do with it as the causitive factors are chemicals that are released in the tank.The only thing you can really do is run activated carbon 24/7 as it will help to remove these chemical toxins.I remember Reefluvr having the same problem with a Euphyllia and a Sinularia a while back.

[Reef_Angel]

How would you be able to tell that it's the sinularia and the hammer causing the hammer to die off like this? You mentioned the Sarco as well. We have 2 very healthy ones in our tank also in addition to the sinularia. The sinularia and one of the sarco's were placed in about the same proximity of the hammer. Both the sinularia and the sarcos look very healthy so you can understand my confusion on this.

Yesterday I fragged the last piece to attempt take off more die off before it reached healthy tissue again. I don't know if it's going to work. I think this is it for this hammer. If it doesn't make it through this last effort, then I did my best. What a shame.