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Help. I came home yesterday and my water was cloudy (whitish color, not yellow), all the corals were closed up tight, and the house smelled like dead something. All the fish are alive.
The skimmer is foaming like crazy, pushed the lid off.
I did a 20% water change and am going to do another change today.

Does anybody have any ideas what's going on? Am I going to wake up tomorrow to a dead tank? I'm leaving the lights off for a couple of days in case it's an algae bloom. I"m stumped because there is no ammonia or nitrate spike. Maybe the corals are fighting each other? I added 4 new frags last week. Up to that point all my corals were all growing and healthy.

NUMBERS:
Ammonia, nitrite and nitrate are all 0. PH 8.1, calcium 340; alk 8.9. Phos. .07

Tanks is Red Sea Max 250 AIO, 66 gal
LED lights by Steves Lights
Aquamaxx 1.5 HOB skimmer
Reactor for carbon and phosban
Daily 2 part automated dosing
ATO

Water is RODI, Red Sea Coral PRo salt

Livestock: 2 clowns, 2 anthias, tigerface, coral beauty, lawnmower, 6-line wrasse, royal gramma
CUC: snails, hermits, cuke, cleaner shrimp, brittle star, serpent stars, long spine urchin
 

editour2

Junior Member
Location
Suffolk County
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Do you have a refugium with grape caulerpa? Sometimes they have a spawning event which leaves the water milky white. Otherwise I agree with Warren regarding the cucumber possibly dying. Water changes....water changes....water changes.
 

Spartanwarrior

Reefer Always Learning
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make sure you run the UV at the correct flow rate for bacteria and not protozoa. very different flow rates, check online for your products specifications if not included in the package.
if you don't mind me asking, what UV did you buy? I ask because there is a lot of crap being sold out there. its all about contact time of light to water. these small, compact UVs are almost useless from what ive been able to discern from internet experience. I went with Pentair Aquatics line and its ENORMOUS but besides a bit of cyano early on in my cycle, I haven't had any algae or bacterial blooms in the 10 months running.
 
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Saturday update:

Yesterday I bought and hung a Deep Blue 9W UV sterilizer. By the evening the water was looking a little clearer and the smell wasn't filling the house anymore. To answer a question, no I don't have a refugium. And I did see the cuke alive and happy (hard to tell) last night.

This morning many inverts are gone. Removed a dead cleaner shrimp, 2 urchins. Hermit crabs and lots of snails are gone. They are hard to find and remove so I wasn't surprised that ammonia was .2-.3 I just changed 20G (all I had on hand) and started the RODI unit to make more for tomorrow. The SPSs have all bleached, the softies are closed tight, the toadstool perked up last night but is droopy again today, the the BTAs are barely hanging on.

Strangely, all the fish seem unaffected. They are active, eating normally, and not gasping for air.

So keep your eyes out for my postings. I may have a lot of good equipment to sell soon. December doesn't seem to be my month, last December my tank cracked and exacuanated (made up word.) Now this....

Thanks for your suggestions and support.

I attached a pic of my tank in happier times. Lots fo coral growth since then <sigh.>
 

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