View Full Version : Post house move crash
Hiya there,
I’ve been recommended these fourms as a good place to get some help!
I have been running a marine aquarium for a few years now with reasonable success, but since a recent house move things have gone pear shaped.
I moved house about two months ago and at the same time increased the tank from a 36x15x18 inch to 46x18x30 inches.
I made the move with out managing to make any fatalities, and apart from a shaky start things were definitely improving. I managed to move the entire contents of the old tank saving both the water and the substrate. I topped the new tank with de-chlorinated, salty tap water.
The corals were a bit battered in the move, but over a period of ~one month they were restored to their former glory. A few weeks ago one of the corals started to go down hill, it just failed to open every morning. It had taken a bit of a beating in the move and I bit the bullet and removed it from the tank.
I went away this weekend and (sods law) three more corals are dead. They have simply fallen off their rocks. Now I am running my tank with two external canister filters and 4x3ft T5 tubes. I’m aware of the decreased penetrance on T5 light, so I made sure that my corals were suitably placed near the surface. I am not using a protein skimmer or RO water.
I checked the salinity, nitrates/nitrites and pH and everything was acceptable. I cant help but wonder how high the phosphates are here as it is quite a rural area (South Wales, UK).
I am having to cut my losses and try to preserve as much stock as I can by replacing the water with re-buffered RO water. I will probably install a sump tank with a protein skimmer too.
I know there is a big to skim or not to skim divide and I have always had the stance that if it were essential, then everyone would have it…
Anyway, I am delving into the realms of the unknown for me, and I would be grateful for any advice you guys could give.
Thanks in advance.
Paddy
Just hang in there.....water changes will help a lot
mogurnda
09-06-2004, 2:31 PM
Sorry your first post has to be this one.
I wouldn't think high phosphates would be the problem with a rapid die off like that. Although phosphate can inhibit calcium deposition, I would also expect a big algae bloom if your phosphates were out of control. Worth testing, though, I guess.
What corals did you lose? Soft or hard?
Because I was distracted with other things, I ended up with a few mini-crashes in my 20. The first involved a Xenia that croaked (maybe heat, I don't know), but the toxins it released when it died killed a capnella below it and made every other softy in the tank retract and look awful. Once it was removed, I changed the carbon and gave a water change, everyone perked up (except the dead capnella, of course).
In the second crash, a purple montipora digitata died from a brown jelly infection, probably caused by a very abusive attempt at re-epoxying it in place. At the same time, my flow had dropped rather low because of a clogged SCWD wavemaker. That certainly didn't help things. A nearby orange digitata bleached and was dead within a few days, and the other corals in the tank looked pouty and awful. More carbon, more flow and an extra water change later, everyone perked up within a few days, and all have looked fine for months.
So, what insight can one get from this? I guess it just reinforces what people always say about making sure the water is clean (regular water changes and good skimming), and that everyone gets a lot of turbulent flow.
As I posted before, I fon't use a protein skimmer, although I think this is about to change. Cheers for the insight, I'm going to have a quick rethink about a few bits and bobs. I'll post back when I have some figures fo you...
Right. Well it's been a few months now.
I bought a Deltec Protein Skimmer and increased the frequency of my regular water changes but one by one all my corals died apart from my mushrooms (Although several of them have detached themselves from their host rock).
To further complicate matters, we had a plumbing problem which meant that the entire ground floor had to be evacuated so that new flooring could be laid. I moved the contents of my 500L tank into my 130L spare which was outside in the garage. I had 1kw of heating and the tank was lagged with several blankets for insulation. The flooring took about a month to sort out.
Last weekend, I started to restock my 500L tank - I used fresh (as in new) water and setup the rockwork. I moved one 500W heater and one canister filter across so that I could quickly prepare the tank to receive the fish.
Unfortunatley, it seems that i damaged the other heater at that point, because when I went to feed the fish one day later they had all died as the tank was cold :( I quickly moved the wet&dry Eheim canister filter over and am maturing my 500L tank with an amonia rich compound.
Its a real shame that after six months of fighting with the tank, I have managed to wipe it out overnight.
Anyway, looking on the positive side, I am treating this as an opportunity to set things right. The Tank is maturing away and I expect it will be two weeks before I can add my first fish.
Questions:
1) I have no substrate at the base of my tank - I didn't want to move the old stuff over as, well, I couldn't exclude the possibility that it was contaminated. What should I use for a reef tank? Would the fish prefer sand, or a fine coral substrate?
2) I am very reluctant to add corals for a while as I am starting to wonder if it is the lighting that is to blame. The tanks has water to a depth of 60cm and is lit by 2x 3ft Marine White 39W T5 tubes, and 2x 3ft Actinic 39W T5 tubes. Is this sufficient?
3) What do I add fist, a few hardy soft corals, such as muchrooms, or do I go with the more sensitive fish, such as boxfish?
I'd be gratful for any advice at this point as, well, it is getting hard to stay motivated to persue this hobby.
Here are some pics of my tank so that you can see how low the rockwork is from the top.
http://www.zen53176.zen.co.uk/1.jpg
http://www.zen53176.zen.co.uk/2.jpg
http://www.zen53176.zen.co.uk/3.jpg
corriewf
02-08-2005, 2:48 PM
Oh I like the BB.
fishman89
02-08-2005, 6:21 PM
definately go with some hardy stuff. YOU JUST LOST EVERYTHING.Definately let your tank get started over with hardy fish and corals etc. Then work your way up.
woninil
02-08-2005, 9:48 PM
You said you moved house? And that is where you got your water-is it possible there is a connection-something with the plumbing in the newer home
Hopefully, whatever it WAS, it is now non-existant
Best of luck
to answer your question about the corals and lighting we first need to know what kind of corals you hosted.
Also for substrate I reccomend some oolitic sand... you can get some nice sand like agramax live and southdown tropical play sand.
just form your post sounds like you had 80 watts total of light.. is this correct? What Kelvin value do your blubs have and how old are the light bulbs.. perhaps they are old and the spectrum has changed since new...
For a 48 inch tank I would be using atleast 220 watts of light. (but thats just me)
SnakeIce
02-09-2005, 1:01 AM
from what I understand T5 bulbs are a straight power compact flourescent. I don't know if that recomended wattage is for pc bulbs or not. the T5s can be made to put out slightly more light than the folded pc bulbs because of reflectors and less restrike of light on the bulb.
I have four 39W tubes in two D&D MegaTwin T5 Units - so that a total output of 156W. I have contacted D&D for their spec list to see what percentage of light will travel 60cm deep - I'm afraid that the physics is beyond me :)
All my corals died - they were a mixture of hard and soft - infact the only things that did live were my mushrooms, and even then some of them detached themselves from the rock. My LFS blamed the fact that i was using tap water (although I had been using that for 18months at my old address previously with no problems). Anyway, we put it down to the water quality, so I started skimming and using RO.
Six months later my coral was still not surving more than a week. It would go into the tank and open up beautifully for a few days, and then overnight just close and fall apart. I am hoping that there was something undetectable poisioning the coral and that now it has gone.... but if my problems persist, then it must be the lighting.
I only have a six inch tall hood, so it is going to be difficult to add/replace the lighting... Anyway - I have rebuilt the reef and am waiting for it to mature before adding my first fish... it's just a shame to have to go back to square one :(
Right, D&D have said that the lighting will support soft corals down to a depth of 800mm and hard corals down to a depth of 400mm.
I used BioMature (which i think is an amonia/nitrite rich solution) to help mature the tank. I tested my tank for nitrites today and found none! Unfortunatley, I didn't test the tank for nitrites on day one... I have tested for nitrates and found '5' (ppm i think - scale of .02 - 10) which is significantly higher than when i started.
I set the tank up last weekend and managed to save my Eheim Wet&Dry as well as the rock from my old tank. My other canister filter had to be cleaned out before being used. I guess that it would be possible for my tank to 'instantly' mature as I am transferring over all the old filter media... I wasn't expecting this... so i am unsure as how to proceed. The last thing i want to do is to add fish right before the initial nitrite spike!
Could the tank be mature enough already?
If, so what fish should i introduce first? I am thinking along the lines of true perculars, chromis or damsles...
I will also consider introducing a small amount of hardy soft corals (mushrooms?) when the tank is mature.
Any adivce would be gratfully received! :)
I used 40lb of live sand and have bought two percular clowns and some mushrooms. They look tiny, but it's a start :)