Great find, bad parameters

DSR

DSR

AC Members
Apr 10, 2009
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Tulsa, OK
Went to LFS to take back a protein skimmer that didn't work and wouldn't fit (long story). I was looking at their live rock and saw an interesting piece with some coraline but quite a bit of green algea. There in the green stuff was one very nice soft coral polyp. Open with the tentacles a blazin' I asked the lady, who was new how much, she said $10.99. It was a small piece of rock. When I got it home I noticed that there were four other corals some with green centers and some with very hot pink centers. The pink ones were very small and were not open, but the green one was amazing. Very stoked until I tested my water.

My water parameters are out of whack. I have nitrites, ammonia and nitrates present. the results were:
ph 7.6
NH3 .25-.50 (couldn't see very well)
No2 .25
Nitrate was pretty high as well (can't recall exact)

I am assuming that this will likely cause big problems with my live rock and coral hitchhikers. Tomorrow I am going to hunt down some RO/DI water (the place I usually go is closed until Thursday) I will then do a PWC. How much should I change?
 
Will do. I am going to get the water this evening when I get back from work. I am just hoping that the LFS in this area actually sells RO/DI water. If not I will have to drive into Tulsa. Thanks for the help.
 
I picked up a give gallon jerry can this AM. At lunch I am going to run to the nicer of the LFS and pick up some RO/DI. I think it should be fine waiting another 5 hours to go into the tank. I think what happened is one of the bumble bee snails died and is creating the ammonia spike and cycle. The fella at the other LFS said no cycling would happen as the LR was all ready to go... Of course, it is entirely possible that I misunderstood him.

What to do about the low pH? I am assuming that that means my alkalinity is low as well. Do I need to add something to stablize the alk in order ot raise the ph to the appropriate level?
 
What to do about the low pH?
Click to expand...
You could buffer it, but in my experience that is an artificial fix. If something died and you don't have enough scavengers to clean it up, remove it. If the salinity is off, or you've recently switched to a new salt, fix it.

Otherwise, it should correct itself. If it does not correct itself, something is amiss. If you have to continue buffering it, you are not really solving the problem and maintenance is going to be a constant hassle.
 
Was the rock submerged during transport from the LFS to your house? If not, some die off could have happened, depending on how long it was out of the water. Even if it was kept moist with wet newspaper or paper towels between the LFS and your place, some organisms can still die off within a short period of time if they begin to dry out (sponges especially). This is why most places that sell LR online stress that LR must be recured once it arrives after shipping, even though the rock will come wrapped in wet newspaper / paper towels.

If there was enough die off in your tank, in their efforts to process the ammonia, the bacteria can create a demand for oxygen as ammonia is converted to nitrite and then to nitrate. A decrease in dissolved oxygen can result in an increase in dissolved carbon dioxide (bacteria respiring carbon dioxide), which results in a drop in pH. If the alkalinity level in the tank is less than ideal, the pH can drop more easily. Even in a small tank, the death of a single bumblebee snail should not be enough to cause what you're seeing, unless your bumblebee snails are much, much larger than the ones I have and have seen.

Do you know what the pH and alkalinity levels were before you added the new rock?
Also, how much rock did you add and how much water did you need to remove from your tank to add it? (Decreasing the total water volume decreases the tank's overall stability.)
 
The amount of rock I added was very minimal. It is maybe 1" diameter and 4-5 inches long. I think it is tonga finger rock. There was a piece of detritis on sand that I gently scooped out later and it smelled so incredibly bad. Not sure if it was plant debris or what, but very unpleasant perhaps that had something to do with it.
 
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