Kathryn Lawson

I found these flatworms? on a vendor's coral (montipora) that I picked up from the meeting on Saturday. Anyone know what they might be? I found them while cleaning the frags before dipping, so they haven't been introduced to anything but the other corals I got from that vendor. They don't look like the "normal" red planaria I've seen in the past, and the monti frags do look like they might have been damaged by some sort of pest. Wondering how concerned I should be, what treatments I should use on the exposed corals, etc. Bonus question - also found the egg sacs also shown in the pics. The sacs are 3D and turgid (kinda like a disc-shaped bubble algae), and the inside dots are loose and seem to "rattle" around when the sac is moved. Any thoughts on what they might be? I'm thinking maybe some sort of snail, since they remind me of the egg sacs I've seen from freshwater snails and dove snails, except that those are flat/one-sided and attached to a surface, whereas these could be pulled off the surface they were on and kept their flattened-bubble shape

I use large snail shells! They supposedly like having their foot in a hole, and mine certainly seem to be happy with them. Makes it really convenient to move around as needed

How did you determine the volume or mass of the new brand of salt to add when mixing the saltwater - the same as your old brand? It could be that the composition of the new mix is different (more anti-clumping agents? fillers? other compounds?), so you need to use more of the new brand than you did with the old brand to get to the same salinity.

I love Pender! We see one of their avian vets for my parrots, and they also were willing to prescribe chloroquine for fish quarantine.

I have a fairly large, rectangular, sliding door trap in Woodbridge, VA if you want to borrow it!

Depending on how heavy/large the tank is, you might be able to drain it down almost entirely very briefly to enable moving the whole thing without disturbing the rock, etc. That's how I moved my 30 gallon peninsula while the window behind it was being replaced - unplugged everything and drained all but a tiny bit of water (just enough to keep the fish underwater at the very bottom) into a spare 30 gallon I keep in storage (learned the hard way when I had a tank leak to always have a backup option big enough to hold rock and livestock...), enlisted my partner to help me move the tank across the room, then refilled/plugged equipment back in. Covered the tank etc. during the replacement, then did the process in reverse once the window replacement was finished.

FYI: https://reefbuilders.com/2024/06/17/triton-transfer-barcode-kit-helps-out-icp-analysis-customers/

Well, that might explain why I never heard back when I asked how I could pay them to upgrade a free (5-element) sample test kit I'd gotten to the full test, back when my tank was really struggling (the packaging indicated it was encouraged/supported, but there was no way to do it on their site). I ended up going with Triton at the time, because the LFS closest to me carries them. It's definitely more expensive, but the turnaround time on my two tests has each been about a week including shipping.

Thanks! Unfortunately, it seems polyfilter is not rated for lithium, and because it's not technically a heavy metal it's unlikely to help. However, it seems that due to the extremely high amount of sodium and potassium in saltwater (compared to freshwater, for example), medium levels of lithium still cause minimal issues since usually the issues are caused by lithium replacing Na or K and messing up biological processes. At least, that's what I've been reading. I'll certainly keep polyfilter in mind for metal issues in the future though, thanks!

Interesting, thanks! I'll keep that in mind if I look more into other salts

Good to hear first-hand feedback! Have you been able to keep shrimp, clams, etc?

All right, everyone... more updates! I swapped out the vinyl tubing for silicone, and did 6 ~30% water changes (12 gallons) over the last two months. Sent off an ICP test last week, and got it back this morning - tin is totally gone!! Phosphates are also down - 0.03 according to Triton, so I'll pull the (3 small) phosphate absorbing cubes from the sump and just continue to monitor/slightly dose nitrate. Algae has receded significantly, which has been really nice. The addition of 5 captive-bred tuxedo urchins definitely helped in this area also, but even before they were added, algae growth rates were decreasing to manageable levels. I've seen a bit of cyano forming down at the sand/glass interface and in a few corners, but it has not been spreading past those lower-flow areas (absolutely nothing like the issues I had previously!), and my remaining corals are doing well, so I'm inclined to just keep an eye on nitrate levels and maybe try to increase flow a bit more. Now for the interesting news... I now apparently have high silicon and lithium levels. Given the reducing tank issues, I'm not terribly inclined to worry about the silicon for now, but I do remember thinking that my DI resin would be due for a swap soon, so I'll take a closer look at it. I did just last week find a magnet that the seal had broken on from a (name-brand) frag rack in my sump while cleaning out the remnants of the algae accumulation there (no CUC down there), so that has now been removed. I have had carbon and Cuprisorb in the system since finding out about the tin, so it's possible it removed most of the metals that leached from it, but left lithium (it's not reported to remove lithium). There is also the distinct possibility that since there are no other metals, the lithium is instead coming from my new salt (Instant Ocean, not reef crystals). I've seen discussions of high lithium levels being "normal" in IO salt, and I'm not aware of any major concerns from elevated levels - anything I should keep watch for? Planning to mix up the salt in my bucket just in case things settled out weirdly, but otherwise just monitor as I slowly try to reintroduce more sensitive livestock (inverts). Thanks for all your input, and I'm so relieved that my tank is heading back in the right direction!! Link to results: https://www.triton-lab.de/en/showroom/icp-oes/210461

The DC pump is convenient because it lets you make more fine adjustments compared to tweaking the valve, but the valve will definitely need to be adding some restriction in the first place to prevent all that noise!

Whoops, yeah, thanks for catching that detail - the second emergency drain is effectively higher up because of the length of PVC pipe that I completely forgot to mention! I see the other photos now - it looks like your overflow box has two drains and can be set up Herbie style if you want. I see you've got the PVC extending the emergency drain, so all you'd need is a valve on the first drain - I'd recommend putting it at the end of the pipe right before the entry into the sump, so the majority of the pipe is completely filled with water and will minimize any trickling noise from after the flow restriction.

How many drains do you have? Just one? There's some different types of plumbing setups folks use to manage noise - I think BRS had a decent discussion of them. The Herbie overflow style is what my tank uses, with two drains. The first drain has a valve on it that you adjust to keep the water high enough that it's not sucking air into the siphon down the pipe. The second one acts as an emergency overflow in case the first one gets clogged. I've struggled with the adjustments, but now that it's dialed in (and my new pump isn't fluctuating the flow randomly any more!), it's totally silent. Only time I'll hear noise is while putting my hands or other things in and out, since that makes the tank water level fluctuate and thus impacts the overflow box water level

Welcome! I'd suggest also joining PVAS, the Potomac Valley Aquarium Society, which focuses on freshwater. They have monthly meetings with small auctions, as well as two all-day auctions each year - a good way to rehome any extra fish!

Hey folks, my ICP test results are back!! Results here: https://www.triton-lab.de/en/showroom/icp-oes/210778 Interestingly, just about everything is in a good range, with the notable exceptions of phosphorus (which we knew) and... tin. While it's possible it's a false positive, the level is high enough to seem relatively unlikely. A quick search has informed me that along with other standard heavy metal sources like malfunctioning equipment, tin can come from plasticizers in flexible tubing... I am using vinyl tubing for my drains and return line, and have gone through two sets because I had to increase the tubing size to decrease head pressure on my return pump and enable higher drainage rates to accommodate higher flow rates! Also, float glass is apparently made by pouring molten glass onto molten tin. If a manufacturer isn't careful to track which side was touching the tin, it can end up on the inside of the tank instead of the outside like normal. My tank is an Aqueon, so I wouldn't be terribly surprised if this was the case for my tank. As a bit of history, my system was running (totally fine) for 6+ months before moving into the current tank (started small and upgraded, and then had a leak). I also didn't use a sump (or flexible tubing) at all until this fall, which was right after I started having issues with algae growth (I'd previously used a simple HOB and added the sump so I could have a refugium and extra filtration). So both of these potential causes of tin didn't start out with my system, and might explain why things were going well for quite a while before taking a downturn. Also interesting is that SPS are particularly sensitive to tin. Before the tank crash that I've been associating with the major cyano bloom and alk swing, I was having some odd issues with SPS dying back. The alk swing was almost certainly from me starting to dose kalk in an attempt to help the struggling SPS. Looking into potential options for tin removal, it seems cuprisorb is often recommended, and luckily I actually even have some already (had for a freshwater tank that had been having issues with shrimp and I'd wanted to rule out heavy metals). I'm thinking I'll be adding some to my system today!

Is the show on both 3/23 and 3/24? Asking because your post says 3/23 and Saturday, but the flyer only says 3/24 (Sunday).

Super cool, thanks for sharing!!

A good update finally!!! Chemiclean seems to have taken care of almost all the cyano! My fish and inverts have thankfully been totally fine (my firefish seem pretty terrified of all the air bubbles, but they have made a few short appearances), and excitingly, every coral that remains alive has shown marked improvement, better than they have in weeks! Zoas are open, lobo has puffed back up some, leathers and pulsing sinularia are showing polyp extension, etc. The only one still struggling is my toadstool leather, which I now realize must have something other than cyano going on, and is still melting away as the red-brown patchy growths on its surface spread. Can softies get brown jelly or something like it? I'm going to try to see if I can cut a clean frag tomorrow, maybe dip the remainder in iodine. Given the remarkable improvement in coral health, I want to make sure the cyano is knocked back pretty hard for now. I left the first dose for 72 hours instead of 48 (since I still saw small amounts of cyano in the sand, overflow box, etc. at 48 hrs). Since I still see a few remaining traces of cyano tonight at the 72-hour mark (and thinking along the same line as how for human/animal health we use a longer course of antibiotics than needed to simply alleviate symptoms, to avoid development of resistant strains) I decided to run one more round of chemiclean, and added the dose tonight (second round as needed is recommended by Marc Levinson and some others). I'll let that go for 48, maybe 72 hours again, then do a big water change and add carbon to remove any remnants of the chemiclean. Nutrients are doing reasonably well, especially since I'd figured the chemiclean killing off the cyano would result in a nutrient spike, but it seems that it didn't release too much. Phosphates are up a bit but nitrates have reached the point where I absolutely need to start dosing now to avoid hitting 0 (also why I'm going with a second round of chemiclean, since nitrate dosing really stimulated cyano growth last time). Nitrate: 0.1 Phosphate: 0.22 Alk: 9.6 Calc: 411 Mag: 1120 Anyway, I'm so relieved that something finally seems to be going right! Now I just need to make sure I keep pushing things in the right direction and don't let the cyano rebound. I'm going to slightly increase the dose of Microbacter7 after the second round of chemiclean is done, and perhaps resume dosing of live phyto. Anything else I should consider? Should I start daily water changes again after chemiclean round 2 is done? Thanks for all the support, everyone - it's really been helpful to get feedback throughout this struggle!

For ICP, I tried to upgrade a free sample I had (free version is just 5 elements, mostly what I've already been measuring). The packaging indicates I can pay a bit and upgrade it to a full test but I can't seem to do it on the company's app or on their website. I sent a message to their customer service days ago with no response. Just ordered a kit from a different vendor. I saved a sample from before I added the chemiclean, so will probably use that.

Hey, everybody. I have switched over to Instant Ocean salt for the daily water changes now, and the tank move during window installation went surprisingly well. I decided to not stress about doing a major water change with everything else going on, so I just drained the tank down and filled it right back up again with the same water once moved. It's now back in its original spot, just with a new window right behind it. Unfortunately, over a week of H2O2 dosing hasn't seemed to have much of, if any, effect and coral health still keeps going downhill. Water quality parameters have improved somewhat, though nitrate is almost gone and I'll need to do something about that in the next few days. Current parameters: Nitrate 0.6 Phosphate 0.18 Alk 9.8 Calc 940 Mag 411 Given that the main part of my crash seemed to happen right around when I started trying to raise my nitrate levels in an unsuccessful attempt to counter the cyano, starting nitrate dosing again with everything but the cyano in even worse shape than before didn't seem like a good idea. I finally decided to use the cyano treatment option I'd been holding off on: following a major round of algae and cyano removal tonight, I dosed chemiclean. I don't seem to have nearly the tank diversity I had pre-algae/cyano, and I'm feeling perilously close to giving up on the whole tank. I have an extra air pump set up in the main tank with tons of small bubbles, and have an additional fine bubble air stone in the sump, along with my skimmer cup removed so the foam overflows back into the tank, and my tank drain line opened up so it gurgles and constantly pulls in air (annoying, but worth it for the extra aeration). I also added back in all the macroalgae I removed before starting H2O2 dosing, and removed the carbon in my sump to prevent premature removal of the chemiclean. I think I've done just about all I can do right now, though please let me know if there's anything I missed! Going to wait 48 hours, then do a 20% water change, add carbon, and put the skimmer cup back on. Here's hoping everything goes ok...

A question for you helpful folks: I'm going to have to temporarily move my reef tank on Wednesday for window installation. The current plan is to drain the display at least halfway and "slide" it over to the middle of my desk for the day (it's currently on the end of my metal-framed desk, in front of the window). The desk and the sump underneath can stay in place, thankfully! I'm picking up Instant Ocean salt tonight, and am wondering if this might be a good time to do one larger water change with the new salt to really boost calc and mag levels and drop phosphate, but also worry about shocking my system with the sudden change. Any idea what might be a safe amount of water to change out? My display is a 29 gallon tank, with a 10 gallon sump (but the sump is not filled all the way - there's some extra space even when the return pump is off and the pipes have drained). My current daily change volume is 3 gallons. I actually have an empty spare 29 gallon tank, so I technically could do even a 100% water change. (I learned when my first 29 gallon sprung a leak a few months in that I always want to have a backup option to hold all the tank contents!)

Thanks everyone! My nutrients are definitely headed in the right direction now, though I think I'm probably going to have to start dosing nitrate tomorrow. Parameters after tonight's water change and cyano/algae removal are: Nitrate 3.0 Phosphate 0.22 Alk 10.8 Calc 405 Mag 1020 Calc and mag are still low, but I haven't switched salt yet (partner was going to get some while running errands near Petco today but the store was closed by the time they got there, so I'll probably go myself tomorrow). Aesthetically, I do like having sand in my aquarium, and more importantly, my next planned livestock addition has been a pistol shrimp and goby pair (obviously now I'm going to wait until my system is stable), so I do really want to keep some sand. That said, there is a lot of detritus building up in corners and low-flow zones, which I doubt is helping the nutrient situation. I had a bunch of frags on the sand also, further hindering flow. I moved them up onto the rocks tonight, and plan to stir up/siphon a bit of the sand bed every other day or so during the water change. Hopefully that will let me get the junk out while minimizing nutrient spikes and overall disturbance of sand bed life. Regarding cleanup crew, I've had a really tough time getting snails. Earlier in the thread I described specifically picking out 5 actively-climbing snails (3 trochus, 2 turbo) from a reputable local store, but once in my tank they would extend from their shells but seemed unable to grab onto a surface or climb. This lasted for a number of days (I tried a number of different surfaces, etc) until they eventually died and further spiked my nutrient levels. I'd had the same thing happen in the past, getting an active snail from a different reputable local store, and once in my tank it would extend from the shell but not actually grab anything. I know @ReefdUp said not to worry too much about CC losses, but this pattern of immediate incapacitation with originally active snails seems very suspicious to me. I was talking about this with folks at the last WAMAS meeting and I think it was @nburg who mentioned he'd seen similar behavior followed by death when moving a snail he'd had for a while from a tank with low phosphate to a tank with high phosphate. I didn't drip acclimate the snails (I'm coming from freshwater where snails are practically as hardy as rocks, so although I'm used to using drip acclimation for shrimp, it didn't occur to me to do it for snails), so I think I'll try some snails again once my phosphates are lower (sub 0.1?) with drip acclimation this time. For other CUC, my remaining tuxedo urchin (had 1 rock boring and 2 tuxedo initially, but the rock boring one died at the same time as those 5 big snails, and I haven't seen the other tuxedo since then) has been doing a really good job clearing even the really strongly "rooted" algae from the areas it covers. So once the tank is stable for a while, I'll probably get a few more tuxedo urchins as well, along with hermits and snails, and ideally some money cowries.

Last night (Tuesday) I spent 4 hours siphoning cyano (and algae) and trying to clean it off of corals. This is after I spent multiple hours on Saturday siphoning out all I could get then. I feel like I'm fighting a losing battle against cyano - it's growing back so fast, and my livestock health just keeps going downhill. My bubble tip nem was fully detached and shriveled up on the sand bed, my Kenya tree completely dissolved into goo (ended up removing it entirely), and cyano grew on my toadstool leather since Saturday (update, regrew overnight also), worsening the erosion of flesh that started with previous cyano growth on it. Flesh has entirely peeled off the chalice and bowerbanki I got recently from @ReefdUp, and I've also lost multiple heads of a blasto that got covered in cyano between Saturday and now. On top of everything, my pump seems to be having issues, whining really loudly and changing flow rates around which makes my overflow gurgle really annoyingly (and yes, I cleaned the pump). Not going to go into this issue here, but it is a resurgence of a previous problem I thought I'd resolved, so I was feeling extra frustrated Tues night. I know that when things go wrong in a reef tank it's really easy to overreact, change too many things all at once, and totally crash the system. But I also don't think the livestock in my system is going to last much longer unless I do something other than the daily water changes. I typed most of the above text last night (Tuesday), but decided to hold off on posting and see how much cyano grew back in a single day. A surprising amount of cyano grew back just over the course of 24 hours (and livestock health further declined), enough that I decided I really did need to do something about it other than just repeated siphoning. Current tank parameters (Wed night before daily water change. Haven't switched salt yet so calc/mag are still low. I plan to buy some new salt this week): Nitrate 7.4 Phosphate 0.29 Alk 10.7 Calc 382 Mag 940 In reading about cyano in the reef aquarium, it seems that there's actually multiple microbes that have similar growth and are commonly labeled "cyano". Cyano is sensitive to H2O2 but sometimes not ChemiClean, and spirulina is not sensitive to H2O2 but will be killed by ChemiClean. I tested and the cyano in my system seems to be sensitive to H2O2, so I'm going to start there. Recommended dosing is 1ml of standard pharmacy 3% H2O2 per 10 gallons of saltwater, every 12 hours. Few side effects have been reported other than slightly negative impacts on algae, including desirable macroalgae (so I pulled mine and am keeping in a separate container for now), and possible sensitivity with Lysmata shrimp (which I don't have). So I added the first 4ml dose tonight, right into an area of high flow, and will see how things go! Since phosphate is so much higher than nitrate, I also decided to add two small cubes of "phosphate removing media" that I'd gotten for free a while back. I don't want to drop phosphate too fast, and I certainly don't want to bottom it out, but I do want to get it lowering slightly faster than it is currently, especially since my nitrate is now right about where I want it. I'll keep monitoring closely. One final update - I finally set up automated phyto dosing with a lit, aerated setup next to my sump! I've been culturing it elsewhere in my house for a while now, but kept using it to culture pods, and continually forgot to actually bring it upstairs and dose my tank! I know the H2O2 dosing may counteract the phyto dosing in the short term, but I'm timing the doses to have minimal overlap, and more importantly, now it's in place end ready to keep going once I'm done with H2O2 dosing. Sorry for such a long update, and sorry for going against some of your advice to wait it out! I'm hoping my decisions make some amount of sense, especially in light of my struggling livestock. If it was just an aesthetic issue, I'd happily wait it out, but I don't think I have the time for that in this case.