the light just went out. i have to remove all the rock out and catch the fish right? what do i do about coral? i am goig to use a 20 long. so remove the fish and keep the coral in the tank?it will not be easy but i will try.
what else can i do to make things better.
i use water that is very close to the temp of my tank. can i put the fish in a bucket or how should i get them in the 20?
The tank will probably be low in oxygen while the corals are dying. Pick up an Air stone and get if possible get one or two more air lines going into the tank.(with one or two more air stones if possible)
If you want to save the LR and the microfauna and you are 100% sure all the corals are dead and gone, you might consider daily %50 water changes on the tank and picking up the flow in the tank a lot, but lets cross that bridge when we come to it.
This could be a good restarting point if you want to look for the silver lining. Hard to do when all the crap is going down hill. Really sorry this happened. Hope we have been at least a little help. As Bellamy(Icy) said it is hard to judge exactly what to do with out standing in front of the tank and being able to read all the animals. Check your PMs, you have my cell.
Before you remove the fish and/or corals wait untill other people weigh in and give their opinion. I am by no means omnipcient, but turning the lights off cant hurt. It will slow down everything’s metabolism.
I would keep the system running as is for the corals. You would be surprised what some can live through and even if 99% of the animal dies all you need is just a little bit to eventually re-grow the whole colony and more. I’ve said before always give them a chance. At my old job we had a hammer coral die and I threw it in the fuge, under a salt incrusted PC bulb in a slow flow fuge, new polyps developed on the side of an algae incrusted Skelton.
I can’t say for sure that pulling the fish would be the best idea, but it doesn’t seem as if they are doing great in there right now. First off wait an hour and then see if you can see if the fish have slowed down a little. Then decide if you are going to pull them or not.
If you decide to move the fish:(not saying is is the best move, hard to tell)
If you pull them make sure the salinity and temps are matched and that is just about all you can do. Pull about 2 gallons of water from the tank into a bucket and pull the fish out into the bucket. Slowly add water from your new tank over the course of 30 minutes and then dump the whole bucket fish and water into the new tank.(make sure you don’t over fill your tank with too much water and spill on your mothers floor)
Brett,
If you want shoot me a PM with your mailing addy and perhaps I can drop by after work tomorrow.(around 5ish) I have been having some car trouble recently so no guarantees, but perhaps we can come up with a plan of action then.
i would love to call u jon im just to upset to talk right now. i will wait until tommrow until i do anything stupid. would turning the temp down help?
so i have a 20 gallon full of water and 2 bukets with a total of about 8 gallons of salt. should i make more?
While lowering the temp might slow the breathing on the fish slightly I wouldn’t recommend it. Turning the temp down probably wouldn’t help and most marine fish will show ich worse if the temp lowers. I wouldn’t mess around with temperature.
If you want shoot me a PM with your mailing address then I will have it saved into my GPS tomorrow incase you decide to give me a call tomorrow for assistance.
As far at the corals go if it makes you feel any better I brought that xenia rock into DPA and have ton more just like it, so at least you know it is something that isn’t extremely rare you will never get your hands on again. If things turn for the worst for the corals and you lose it all I will get you started with a couple of frags once things have fully recovered. We’ll wait for xenia though until we are sure the tank is fully stable. Just take it easy for time being. Make sure you have some good notes of everything you have done so far.
Many of us have gone through crashes before. We just have to look back and try to learn from what has happened. At least this wasn’t a 300g tank full of acros. (On that note does anyone have the link to the guy who fresh water flushed his tank because his skimmer went crazy and lost a massive established tank full of acros?) Hang in there and good luck.
tang looks a litle better but still breathing hard. would it help if i put a fan on the tank. this would be like a 18in diamitor fan. or would it just cool the tank?
tangs gills are beating but i thin it has slowed down a little. i see a few stars on the sand bed. i think i should also mention that ive seen a couple bristle worms floating around
Bret check your alk and mag like I asked as well, if they are on the lower end of the range and your water is still cloudy then its something else, if they are high, that’s why your water is cloudy. If you don’t have test kits, don’t worry about it.
This thread seems to be getting quite confusing with move the fish, don’t move the fish, move the corals, dont move the corals, do this, do that. I’d take the overall advice of don’t do anything, just wait it out, stop changing things. Run more carbon, and have fresh salt mixed up to the same parameters (all of them) as the DT tank.
I’m not as experienced as most on the forum, but one thing that is an underlying all time theme, ONLY BAD THINGS HAPPEN FAST, i.e. don’t do anything fast. #1 rule for most situations, panic only makes it worse. 95% of all scuba related deaths are from panic and if the diver just calmed down and assessed their situation they would be fine. The same can be said for this hobby.
Don’t lower the temp if you do do it less than you think would lower it 1°, this is a change, your tank doesn’t need more drastic changes right now… If your tank is low on O2, add an air stone (or two), make sure the skimmer is pulling in adequate air. If no air stone an air pump with a tube will help, a PH with a venturi will help.
If you don’t want to turn the lights out, just running actinics will help your fish relax more and will still provide some energy source for your corals.
What does your phosphates look like? How is your RO/DI unit?
And remember don’t take just one person’s advice (def. not just mine!), let others weigh in (as Icy said) and pick the best path forward. Calm down, it will be ok.
Do you have other test kits to verify your #s? If dead things are in the tank your ammonia should show it.
It would just cool the tank.
Everyone has assumed your salt number was a typo and you meant 1.0245 but you have not corrected them. Your next post still had .0245. Could you test the salinity and give us the exact number? Are you just forgetting the 1 or is it really .0245?
An air stone couldn’t hurt. Leave the temp.
Testing Mag and calcium and such would not cause these issues. High ammonia yes but since he has done many water changes these numbers should be corrected or diluted.
[quote=“a1amap, post:53, topic:1095”]
Testing Mag and calcium and such would not cause these issues. High ammonia yes but since he has done many water changes these numbers should be corrected or diluted.[/quote]
Provided the source salt is on par, yes they should def be corrected/diluted. But if all are on the high end he could be getting percip causing the cloudiness. It’s doubtful, but it is something you can test for to rule out the cloudiness.
If there are dead things floating around they will start to cause ammonia, trites, and trates.
Yes he should be removing all dead livestock
salt is between 1.024 and 1.025. i have no skimmer. i have no ro/di. i ll test again right now
i have melty shrooms and red candy canes what do i do with those?
the real problem is the shroom look like someone to a blade to the end of them and cut them all up. the brain has all this blackish stringy stuff on it but i can still see live tissue. all zoos look fine. toadstool looks bad but not like its going to melt or rot.
Test resalts 2/2/09 9:18
amm 0
ni 0
na 0
didnt get to test ph
In the mean time take a look at your corals and decide which ones you really want to keep. You may have to end up fragging these and sharing with fellow reefers to save or placing them in a separate tank with cycled LR or other filtration. It will help to know exactly which ones you want to frag and which ones you want to keep in the 25. Remember if the tank conditions are as bad you say, the mother colony might not survive the fragging.
What’s your source water? City? Well?
I almost hate to add anymore to this thread as it seems to be spiraling out of control. I noticed that the size and number of fish are too much for such a small tank. I find it hard to believe that the ammonia is 0 with all of the stressed and dying coral. Are you sure your test is accurate?
I would lean towards small daily water changes (10-20%), and removing all dead and dying corals. Once the tank stabilizes I would be finding a new home for the naso.
I am sorry you are going through this. Good Luck.