what a rough week. first i added some stupid estes sand to my tank, and everything just about died by the next morning. i removed the sand and put new caribsea in. the only things left living were 15 hermits and my 2 cleaner shrimp. even all my snails died. now my tank is having some sort of ammonia spike and it hasn't gone down in the last 3 days. even worse, now the nitrites are increasing. i figure it's going through a tank cycle again, even though all the sand i added was inert, and i removed all dead and dieing things. but i haven't seen an ammonia spike like this since i first started my tank. i just bought a used fluval from a fellow member, and now i found out it has a leak. the entire area around my tank had a big puddle around it today. things couldn't be worse right now. i'm starting to bring my fish out of hypo treatment and will be putting them back into the main tank in a few weeks. i don't know if i should just quit now. school is starting up again and i know i won't have as much time as i have been donating to my tank lately. just feeling a little exhausted by my tank right now. i was hoping i could bounce back and leave my tank alone, but now it just doesn't even seem like my tank wants to bounce back.
about ready to quit
- Thread starter Mantis806
- Start date
tank was setup back in march, 2004. 65 gallon AGA with a DIY internal overflow. 1" drain and 3/4" return. 15 gallon AGA sump, divided in half. first half is where the water drains into, and cheato is growing on top of a 3" sandbed with some rock rubble. water flows over a baffle into the sump area. the sump area contains a euroreef ES5-2, 200watt visatherm, and rio 1700 return. i had about 60 pounds of southdown in the main tank. but it's less than that now b/c i sucked a lot out while trying to get all the estes out. i have about 50 pounds of figi live rock that i bought from fishtown. it came in the walt smith box, so i guess that's where they get it from. also have about 30 pounds of base rock. very dense heavy rock. did bi-weekly water changes of about 10 gallons. used the coral life salt at first, then switched to oceanic, and now using IO. the tank has been fish free for over six weeks. i only use a tap water filter and i usually let the water sit for a few days after mixing. i do random tests on my new water. livestock included: open red brain, short tentacle plate, kenya treet, xenia, frogspawn, 4 different types of zoos, pagoda, 2 cleaner shrimps, a bunch of hermits and snails. everything happened the day i added the sand. i did a 10 gallon water change on the same day to help the water clear up. this all started to happen at the begining of the week. o yea, my lighting is the dual 96watt PC from coral life and a 65 watt bulb on the fuge. hope that's enough info.
bad coffee
Inept at life.
- Location
- Location: Location:
I'd keep doing major water changes. Since you only have a few critters, I'd do at least a 50% change to knock down that ammonia and nitrates.
What kind of sand did you add? was it construction sand? if there was some nasty stuff in the sand, it probably mixed with your southdown. You might need to pull the whole sand bed, and lay in new sand. If you're sure it was the sand, I'd pull it out. All of it.
And by puting a little work into it now before school starts, you could let it go through it's regular start up 'cycle' for a few weeks. just do waterchanges every week or so, and then when you're READY to put some time into the tank, it will be ready for you. I didn't realize how much I missed my tank until I set it up again.
Hope this helps.
BC
What kind of sand did you add? was it construction sand? if there was some nasty stuff in the sand, it probably mixed with your southdown. You might need to pull the whole sand bed, and lay in new sand. If you're sure it was the sand, I'd pull it out. All of it.
And by puting a little work into it now before school starts, you could let it go through it's regular start up 'cycle' for a few weeks. just do waterchanges every week or so, and then when you're READY to put some time into the tank, it will be ready for you. I didn't realize how much I missed my tank until I set it up again.
Hope this helps.
BC
- Location
- Ossining, NY
Mantis,
Fiji has lost many of their reefs because of silt deposits - this happens when small particles of sane and dirt float in the water column and find thier rest on the reef. Since there is no fresh water coming into your reef, that is likely another candidate for doing damage.
I would continue on the water changes, this is the best way - I would also use a turkey baster to get any of the particles off the rock and animals.
Good luck with it.
House
Fiji has lost many of their reefs because of silt deposits - this happens when small particles of sane and dirt float in the water column and find thier rest on the reef. Since there is no fresh water coming into your reef, that is likely another candidate for doing damage.
I would continue on the water changes, this is the best way - I would also use a turkey baster to get any of the particles off the rock and animals.
Good luck with it.
House
- Location
- Queens/Flushing/Whitestone/NYC
Hay Anthony,
Pull yourself together, everything will be fine. I never encounter anything close or similar so don't have much off suggestion but i think you should definetly find someone to house your livestock in the meantime, to prevent more losses. My tank is probably not the best suitable tank, but everything is running well and i do have some space, let me know if i can help with anything and good luck.
Pull yourself together, everything will be fine. I never encounter anything close or similar so don't have much off suggestion but i think you should definetly find someone to house your livestock in the meantime, to prevent more losses. My tank is probably not the best suitable tank, but everything is running well and i do have some space, let me know if i can help with anything and good luck.
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