mushroom coral not thriving

Question
QUESTION: I have an established saltwater tank. I added green mushrooms and they looked great. all of a sudden, after a recent water change, they shriveled up and aren't looking good.  I had mushrooms of a different sort before and eventually they also did the same.  However, I placed these near the top and out of the flow.  I add supplements to the water - the all in one stuff, iodine, coral calcium, etc.  any ideas on why these are now not thriving???

ANSWER: HI Craig. How clean is your tank? The only reason I ask is because in the study of corallimorphs it has been documented that these corals thrive better in water that is higher in organic matter than most reef tanks are allowed to accumulate. These organic nutrients are what is typically removed with aggressive protein skimming activated carbon, and very frequent partial water changes. They must have an extremely high nutritional requirement due to the fact that they do not require very bright illumination and will not thrive under the intense light given off by metal halides. In other words your tank may be too clean to house mushroom corals. Do you feed your tank any kind of coral food, liquid or frozen? This may help with their food requirements. There is also a condition where a mushroom that once looked healthy all of a sudden fails to thrive. There is no known reason why and more research may have to be done to figure out why this occurs. Unfortunately there is not allot known about the diseases if any of these corals and what could be a simple explanation is still a puzzle.

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QUESTION: First, thank you so much.  I have a 24gallon Nano and not really sure what the lighting setup is.  I change about 5 gallons a week which now appears to be too much.  I feed brine shrimp, squid, and Reef Nutrition's Roti Feast and Phyto Feast. The first has rotifer biomass and the second is microalgal biomass.  Both are liquid.

Answer
Hello again. Do you have any other corals in your tank that are thriving? Some other things to take into consideration with mushroom corals is they prefer an area of low water flow and dim lighting. They can also be sensitive to the toxins released by certain corals. All corals release chemicals that inhibit the growth of other corals too close to them. This ensures their place on the reef and keeps one coral from over growing another. If you are placing your mushrooms too close to another coral that has a stronger toxin then the mushrooms do then that may effect them as well. It sounds to me like you are feeding well but if you have a very active protein skimmer on your tank that could be taking out much of the liquid foods you are putting in there. You can always try turning off the skimmer or any mechanical filtration making sure you still have some water circulating, for a half hour after feeding. This will ensure that the food is getting taken up by any corals you may have and not just getting caught in filter media and skimmed out of the water.