Tricia's Reeftastic, Mr. Boombastic 120g

[YHSublime]

Thank you! I need to check and make sure I'm not going to be violating my lease by drilling into the cement, but I think it will be ok. Once I get the lights from Ken, I'll definitely take you up on that offer.

All you have to do is patch 2 holes in the drywall when you're done, nobody will ever know. But yeah, check!

[TrueTricia]

All you have to do is patch 2 holes in the drywall when you're done, nobody will ever know. But yeah, check!

 

LOL. I'm in!

[TrueTricia]

So I came back home from Thanksgiving weekend to an ammonia spike. I lost a lot of corals, but I'm hopeful a few ones are still salvageable. Most of my chalices and LPS are still doing just fine. My montis (already weak from the battle with the nudibranchs), are either dead or not looking good. Most of my acros are gone. 

 

I'm doing water changes, ordered more prime, running my skimmer wet, and I'm adding some more carbon (already had some). I'm happy to take any other suggestions.

[DuffyGeos]

Did you add something recently, or change something? Trying to figure out the Ammonia spike?

[pizzaguy]

Kinda puzzled also. How do you get an Ammonia spike??

[Shoelace]

I'm sorry to hear this but thanks for sharing so that others might learn in the event that the cause is discovered.

[TrueTricia]

I'm guessing it's still from the move. That's the only thing I can figure out. Ammonia levels are high and nothing else is off. We had to remove all the sand to move the tank. then replaced it once we got the new tank and stand finished.

[DuffyGeos]

I am thinking a minicycle......you stirred up some detritus, maybe some of your rock was half out of the water in your tub?

 

Probably a good idea to add one of these in the future for anyone moving tanks to monitor it for the first 2-3 months.

 

How long has it been since you moved the tank- 3 weeks? 5 weeks?

 

[Der ABT]

amonia alerts dont always work, ive had one fail and lost several nice fish in qt....not happy with them and do not trust them alone.

 

 

Amonia...you have a cat....my money is on the cat finding its new litter box

[TrueTricia]

amonia alerts dont always work, ive had one fail and lost several nice fish in qt....not happy with them and do not trust them alone.

 

 

Amonia...you have a cat....my money is on the cat finding its new litter box

 

Nope. Cats can't reach the tank and don't like going near the sump. Although I can't say that for 100% for sure.

 

I think Ken is right. I think I'm having a mini cycle. All the rock that is in the tank right now was in with my fish, so it was covered with a heater and all. But I definitely stirred up the sand when I removed it from the tank. I tried rinsing all of it out before I moved it into the tank through two rinse buckets, but I think that's my culprit.

 

I'm just happy the fish are doing fine. I've got more water being made today, and I'll pick up some more salt tonight too. At least not everything is lost.

[Der ABT]

ive had better luck with Cloram-x than with prime http://www.hikariusa.com/solutions/waterconditioner/cloram-x/

 

not sure why but didnt read the part about the sand bed being moved....i agree most likely culpret....but seriously check on the cats or finding a way to make sure they cannot squat over the tank/sump...had several friends swear the cats dont do it and then set up a video camera to catch the action after doing all sorts of other things to try and find the problem.

 

moving a sand bed is really hard if you ask me, another reason i love barebottom.

[DuffyGeos]

ive had better luck with Cloram-x than with prime http://www.hikariusa.com/solutions/waterconditioner/cloram-x/

 

not sure why but didnt read the part about the sand bed being moved....i agree most likely culpret....but seriously check on the cats or finding a way to make sure they cannot squat over the tank/sump...had several friends swear the cats dont do it and then set up a video camera to catch the action after doing all sorts of other things to try and find the problem.

 

moving a sand bed is really hard if you ask me, another reason i love barebottom.

Cats are nasty independent animals (yes I owned one from the pound). They have just figured out if they use the tank as a toilet 2 things will happen:

 

1- It will kill the fish, they float to the top....meal.

2- It will kill the fish, fish owner will now spend more time with me instead of the fish, and then I can ignore her even more.

Edited December 2, 2014 by DuffyGeos

[gmerek2]

I remember that sad thread where someone couldn't figure out what the ammonia spike was from and eventually caught the cats taking a dump in the sump. I do doubt that was the case here. I had a mini cycle myself after my 1st move with the tank. Parts of rock that hosted algae is no longer getting the light it needs and dies, due to re arrangement. Coralline algae dies on glass and sand stir up all contributed. Stuff in overflow can die.

[TrueTricia]

Cats are nasty independent animals (yes I owned one from the pound). They have just figured out if they use the tank as a toilet 2 things will happen:

 

1- It will kill the fish, they float to the top....meal.

2- It will kill the fish, fish owner will now spend more time with me instead of the fish, and then I can ignore her even more.

 

LOL. Mine are definitely diabolical, but they love watching the fish. They didn't bother them when they were in tubs on the floor. Kevin also works from home. He hasn't seen anything suspicious. But we don't watch them at night. I guess I just need to finally make doors for the stand and then it will solve that problem all together.

 

I remember that sad thread where someone couldn't figure out what the ammonia spike was from and eventually caught the cats taking a dump in the sump. I do doubt that was the case here. I had a mini cycle myself after my 1st move with the tank. Parts of rock that hosted algae is no longer getting the light it needs and dies, due to re arrangement. Coralline algae dies on glass and sand stir up all contributed. Stuff in overflow can die.

 

That's what I'm thinking happened. My ammonia is crazy high right now.

 

I did a 40g water change last night. I kept everything circulating in the sump overnight to get the temperature up and the salt mixed. I added a huge bag of carbon in the sump. I started it circulating this morning when I woke up. Hopefully that helps, but I won't know until I get home tonight and test it. Maybe I can get Kevin to test while he's home. My Prime is also coming in the mail today, so I told Kev to call me when it arrives and I'll walk him through adding it to the tank.

 

I'll be pickign up more salt tonight and I'll do another water change. I also should test my RODI water. I haven't done that in awhile, and I have new DI resin I can add if needed.

[moga]

heater works well?.. check the heater..some corals are very sensitive on sudden temperature drop..and then chain reaction..

 

hope will find the cause and recover from your loss..

 

good luck~

[TrueTricia]

heater works well?.. check the heater..some corals are very sensitive on sudden temperature drop..and then chain reaction..

 

hope will find the cause and recover from your loss..

 

good luck~

 

Thanks!

 

Yes, the heater is plugged into my apex, so it's controlled and monitored. I got a million texts last night from apex after the large water change telling me my temp was low. I keep all the gadgets in the sump, so my apex graphs clearly show a deviance when I do water changes.

[TrueTricia]

So the crisis is drawing to a close. The ammonia levels are now non-existent. My nitrate is slightly up to around 10, but I'm dosing every day, so it should stop.

 

Before I left for Buffalo last weekend, I moved the poorest-looking corals to a different tank. Some are now looking significantly better. Others still died. I also removed a good portion of the sand from my big tank. It's not anything close to bare-bottom (I'm personally not a fan of the look), but I'm going to do a shallow sand layer. I'll probably remove even more. I vaccumed the sand over and over again, removing a total of about 40g of water before I called it quits. I think that really helped.

 

So now, the LPS in the tank is looking good, my softies are starting to open again, but all SPS is dead. I have a few SPS frags that survived in the small emergency tank.

 

So this weekend, I plan on redoing the aquascape and getting things settled in. I'll start rebuilding my corals and go from there.

 

I do have some questions about powerhead placement. I'll post a picture of the tank and outline my issues in another post.

[Jason Rhoads]

Very sorry to hear about these losses! It always sucks to lose animals even when they are just pretty sticks.

 

Just trying to play Devil's Advocate here: how old was your sand bed before the move, and how deep?

 

I have had no problems moving sand beds. My most-recent move was my 55g refugium which had a 7 month old bed that was 4 to 10 inches deep (sloping hill). I had to take most sand out to lift the tank, and didn't clean it at all.

[TrueTricia]

Very sorry to hear about these losses! It always sucks to lose animals even when they are just pretty sticks.

 

Just trying to play Devil's Advocate here: how old was your sand bed before the move, and how deep?

 

I have had no problems moving sand beds. My most-recent move was my 55g refugium which had a 7 month old bed that was 4 to 10 inches deep (sloping hill). I had to take most sand out to lift the tank, and didn't clean it at all.

 

 

It's the only answer I can think of. The sand bed was 7 months old, but the sand had all come from previous WAMAS tanks of unknown ages. It was 4-6 inches deep depending on the spot (also had a slope).

 

During the move, I moved all the corals into a 20g tank. I then moved all the fish into a 40g tub. I put some rocks into the 40g tub with them. Both of these "tanks" were heated and aerated with powerheads and an airstone. The rocks with the fish remained covered in water at all times.

 

I put the remainder of the rocks in another bin and filled that with water from the tank. This tub was not supplied with a constant heater (the one I had for it broke), but I occassionally put a heater and an airstone in from one of the other tanks. The sand was removed from the 90g tank and put into a plastic tub. It was left wet, but not really covered in water (probably my mistake).

 

Once the 120g was set up (approximately 2 weeks later), I rinsed the sand in some water from the new tank, and then put about 2-3 inches in the tank. I opted to go for a more shallow sand bed on this tank. I let the sand sit for a couple days. Nothing tested crazy, but there was some ammonia. I suction cleaned the sand bed, added some prime, and figured I was good.

At this point, I was getting ready to leave for Thanksgiving break in a couple of days, and a bunch of tubs on the ground wasn't going to work for a small vacation. So I went ahead and put the fish in the tank, along with the rocks that had been in their tub. I added the corals from the small 20g tank. I also figured I was good since everything had come from the 90g and had been controlled since then.

 

The next morning, the corals were dying. I tested the ammonia, and it was toxicly high. I added more prime, increased my skimmer, emptied a gigantic container of carbon into a mesh filter and added it to the tank, and did a 40g water change. All of the fish were still alive. Nothing had died (besides corals).

 

I checked pH, temperature, ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate. The only thing that came back postitive was the ammonia. I guess I didn't test for calcium and alk, but given the toxic level of ammonia, I jsut assumed that was the cause. I took out sand, continued doing 40g water changes, continued to add Prime, and moved the carbon bag from just in the big sump chamber to inside the baffling. Now, everything is looking much better. My LPS is puffing out nicely. I didn't lose a single torch, hammer, or trumpet.

[epleeds]

That sucks. Let me know when your ready for more sps. The corals need a trimming.

[Seahorseconservancy]

photos would help us understand what you are doing

[TrueTricia]

photos would help us understand what you are doing

 

It's not "doing." It's already done. My ammonia went back down on this past weekend, because when I got home Monday evening from out of town, it was at 0.

[Incredible Corals]

I am thinking a minicycle......you stirred up some detritus, maybe some of your rock was half out of the water in your tub?

 

Probably a good idea to add one of these in the future for anyone moving tanks to monitor it for the first 2-3 months.

 

How long has it been since you moved the tank- 3 weeks? 5 weeks?

 

 

 

If you have meds in QT that are not Seachem they mess up the reading on the that seachem ammonia alert.  If you use Seachem copper and seachem ammonia alert badge they work great together.

[TrueTricia]

If you have meds in QT that are not Seachem they mess up the reading on the that seachem ammonia alert.  If you use Seachem copper and seachem ammonia alert badge they work great together.

 

I had one of these in my tank in the office. I wasn't that impressed with it. I left work for a few days on a work trip, and the autofeeder malfunctioned, dumping TONS of food into the tank. I came back, and the silly Ammonia alert read normal. There was no way that it was normal.

 

Good news is that the tank is doing better. When will Apex come out with an ammonia probe? Or a nitrate probe?

[DCReefer1964]

Ok Ms T ! I like novels but love comics some pics please!