Tank disaster: need the input of all experienced reefers!

[Reefcowboy]

Monday afternoon i took a pic of my tank and thought to myself: Wow my sps/Lps look really good now, colored up well and everything in the tank looks healthy...tank had been running for a month and i had just finished my first dose of Interceptor for a red bug problem i had. Bugs were gone, none of the corals seemed to care.

Tuesday comes around and i wake up my purple tip acro that i had from frag til 9" is white, blue acro white, piece of another acro white. Im like WTF! Turn on my lights turned out my nephew threw a large piece of "play dough" in my tank the night before, probably after i left it and went to bed...
So im freaking out on tuesday about all the stuff that probably hit my corals. I took all day( took the day off work) changing 95% of the water, removed old sand(had no choice what was in there). Went to the LFs they had no black sand so i grabbed white live sand. I work in sales so im answering the phone while changing buckets of water...you get the pic.

At night all new water is in, i transfer all pieces into the new tank and i was really exhausted from an all day tank hard work. When transitioning the sps, i noticed the new water had to be like 84 degrees and the container they were in, probably 76... I had no more containers or time to heat up the water. Tranfered everything cold turkey.

Wake up this am, some of the green slimer frags look 50%bleached out, another big green slimer colony looks lighter, my purple stylo is falling apart(tissue coming off). Some other acros are fine with polyp extension, and no color change. All LPS are fine/no change and some sps didnt seem to care so i think my water is ok now. I have fresh carbon running now.

Here are my questionssorry about the lengthy write up)

1- water params are stable, temp with chiller at 79F, i guess at this point i can just hope bleaching doesnt worsen. Lighting- i noticed if i leave just actinics on(i have t5s) polyps come out on the bleached pieces. At this point of stress, should i keep lighting on blues only for a few days to avoid more incentive for the zooxanthellae to leave the corals due to excessive light added stress?

2- it is recommended to repeat the interceptor treatment for a second week to guarantee killing the pests. I would hate to have them rebound and come back. Being that my system now is brand new with new water and sand(cycling started), should i still repeat treatment with the 25% wc the day after ?

3-i read that at times when sps bleach, they resort to feeding from the water column to recover, so i was thinking if maybe they would benefit if i feed them now. I have Red Sea's Reef energyA(particles of food for corals), and B(aminoacids). I dont usually use it, but maybe now it could help?

Anyways sorry for the big topic, i really appreciate all the opinions.

Here are a few pics of the tank before, after and some close ups of the affected corals.


Day before, tank doing excellent



Day after, new sand, water and pieces bleaching




Close up on bleaching pieces green slimers(outside pieces, center colony)



Stylo with tissue falling appart: should i remove it or wait for a recovery at this point?



Thanks everyone!

 

[Reefcowboy]

Anybody with recovery stories to motivate me at this point? My big green slimer colony survived Sandy! It cannot die...at least i hope it wont. I just hope they get a bit stable now and maybe recover...this really sucks!

 

[ecchybridLE]

really sorry to hear bout this bro, your tank looked really nice and clean. too me it sounds like you have done everything you could possibly do at this point to remedy the situation. at this point you really should try and keep everything stable as possible and hopefully all will bounce back over time. if you have control over the flow , maybe slow that down a tad as to let the polyps relax that is just a thought, but i have no real experience with this situation. if your alk is at say 7 , then probably best to keep it there and try not to fluctuate for a while. any amount of change will probably just cause more stress and not be helpful. i don't know where you ran your params prior , but i myself would check where they are now , and not doing anything drastic. keep it simple and do water changes every week. if you run carbon and gfo , dial back to the bare minimum needed for your system as you just did a 95% water change. hope any of this helps.

 

[prattreef]

If you have effectively stabilized things, your system will recover. It might get a bit worse before it gets better, it doesn't look to me like a total loss.
My system was on the brink of total collapse 4 months ago, and now most would not know and many think the system looks better than ever.

There is a long thread here somewhere. Good luck.

 

[prattreef]

http://www.manhattanreefs.com/forum/general-discussion/141672-crisis-pratt-reef.html

http://www.manhattanreefs.com/forum/general-discussion/141958-reefspond-rebuild.html

http://www.manhattanreefs.com/forum/general-discussion/142485-prattreef-recovery.html

 

[ducati335i]

Sorry to heat that.. Seems like you are doing everything right, i would give the lights less power.. I lost a lot during sandy (mostly sps) im talking straight bleached, dead... Left them in there anyway, and after a couple months I only had two that didnt come back... Leave them in there for a bit and see what happens... keep us updated

 

[MatthewScars]

And seriously you have a kid and not a cover for your tank?

BUY THIS NOW:

http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/index.php/catalog/product/view/id/1810/

 

[Reefcowboy]

really sorry to hear bout this bro, your tank looked really nice and clean. too me it sounds like you have done everything you could possibly do at this point to remedy the situation. at this point you really should try and keep everything stable as possible and hopefully all will bounce back over time. if you have control over the flow , maybe slow that down a tad as to let the polyps relax that is just a thought, but i have no real experience with this situation. if your alk is at say 7 , then probably best to keep it there and try not to fluctuate for a while. any amount of change will probably just cause more stress and not be helpful. i don't know where you ran your params prior , but i myself would check where they are now , and not doing anything drastic. keep it simple and do water changes every week. if you run carbon and gfo , dial back to the bare minimum needed for your system as you just did a 95% water change. hope any of this helps.

Thank you for the good advice! Im keeping everything stable, and the bleaching has not gone worse today, so i guess if i keep things stable for the next couple of days the pieces affected will bounce back...i lowered the flow on the mps about 10%, but im concerned about the lights...dont know if i keep lighting schedule normal or cut hours a bit...

 

[Reefcowboy]

If you have effectively stabilized things, your system will recover. It might get a bit worse before it gets better, it doesn't look to me like a total loss.
My system was on the brink of total collapse 4 months ago, and now most would not know and many think the system looks better than ever.

There is a long thread here somewhere. Good luck.

Thank you for the links, its great to see your system bounced back.
Im doing as you recommended, keeping things stable and hope it gets back up

 

[Reefcowboy]

Sorry to heat that.. Seems like you are doing everything right, i would give the lights less power.. I lost a lot during sandy (mostly sps) im talking straight bleached, dead... Left them in there anyway, and after a couple months I only had two that didnt come back... Leave them in there for a bit and see what happens... keep us updated

Wow, that brought my hopes back up. How many pieces were bleached that came back you would say? My bleached ones are maybe 75% bleached, but you can see color still on them....think there is hope here?

 

[Reefcowboy]

And seriously you have a kid and not a cover for your tank?

BUY THIS NOW:

http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/index.php/catalog/product/view/id/1810/

Thanks for the link, i dint know about those kits...actually it was my nephew, i dont have kids(yet). Thing is my wife took my nephew to go eat ice cream and i didnt know, so i was so tired that went to bed before they were back...that is the only time it could have happened since the big piece of playing dough was right in the middle of the tank when i woke up. Kids man...

 

[reefer4eva]

How is the polyp extension on the corals?

 

[MatthewScars]

Thanks for the link, i dint know about those kits...actually it was my nephew, i dont have kids(yet). Thing is my wife took my nephew to go eat ice cream and i didnt know, so i was so tired that went to bed before they were back...that is the only time it could have happened since the big piece of playing dough was right in the middle of the tank when i woke up. Kids man...

You dont know about those kits? You do understand if you had them, none this would have happened...right?

You wouldnt have lost a grand or so in coral for these $50 frames?

 

[Reefcowboy]

How is the polyp extension on the corals?

Thanks for the question, i was going to post again asking a related question. All corals have polyp extension, even the pieces that bleached have them out now much more than yesterday. I noticed the base of a slimer frag that bleached has today a darker tone of green, i really hope that tone starts to build up on the frag again...
The polys out are a good sign, meaning the coral is at least not receding maybe?
What do you think? Ive never had my corals bleach, had had my sps from frags and was always patient, so i dont really know how to act now after this problem happened...

 

[Reefcowboy]

You dont know about those kits? You do understand if you had them, none this would have happened...right?

You wouldnt have lost a grand or so in coral for these $50 frames?

I understand matthewscars...if i knew my nephew was coming home with my wife i would have told her to lock my office where my tank is..or watched the kid... I have a wife and a dog only 99% of the time, i wouldnt have guessed the little rascal was going to come to my house that day. I bought the rimless tank bc i like the clean look, and because i have no kids otherwise i would have gotten a canopy/closed top tank.

 

[MatthewScars]

Oh, missed the rimless part.

Good luck.

 

[saltwaterinbrooklyn]

Here's a few words of advice ........ Keep working at it!!! You will correct the issue!! We are in love with a hobby that is designed to work against us , reefing is a constant battle to bring the ocean to our homes and keep it alive !! With everything from temperature to playdough grinding at us , we still press on to align all the right keys that make the reef thrive .

This tank was amazing before you upgraded , and now like many reefers before you , you are facing adversity ........... What are you prepared to do about it??!

 

[jcdeng]

This is where it went wrong:

"i took a pic of my tank and thought to myself: Wow my sps/Lps look really good now, colored up well and everything in the tank looks healthy."

You jinx it. Sh*t always happens when you feel good about your tank, or when you say ah, my tank finally looks beautiful.

All jokes aside, I think you did a pretty good job saving it, the arcos don't look all that bad to me. I think u should use the blue light and dose amino acid in your tank to help them bounce back. And also I would still go forward with the 2nd treatment.

 

[Reefcowboy]

Here's a few words of advice ........ Keep working at it!!! You will correct the issue!! We are in love with a hobby that is designed to work against us , reefing is a constant battle to bring the ocean to our homes and keep it alive !! With everything from temperature to playdough grinding at us , we still press on to align all the right keys that make the reef thrive .

This tank was amazing before you upgraded , and now like many reefers before you , you are facing adversity ........... What are you prepared to do about it??!

Thanks saltwaterbrooklyn! You are right, sometimes we get a curve ball and must learn to deal with it. I was looking at the tank now and think the damage has been done, and things shouldnt get any worse knock on wood. From now on i will just keep things simple and stable...

 

[Reefcowboy]

This is where it went wrong:

"i took a pic of my tank and thought to myself: Wow my sps/Lps look really good now, colored up well and everything in the tank looks healthy."

You jinx it. Sh*t always happens when you feel good about your tank, or when you say ah, my tank finally looks beautiful.

All jokes aside, I think you did a pretty good job saving it, the arcos don't look all that bad to me. I think u should use the blue light and dose amino acid in your tank to help them bounce back. And also I would still go forward with the 2nd treatment.

Thanks for the advice, that is what i will do. Hopefuly when the acros bounce back i will be able to compare their colors, be relieved and forget this. I look forward to making this tank healthy again. This time though like you said, i wont celebrate not to jinx the whole sh*t!