smoky water, multiple deaths, no clue

[rowan]

(why have i had to re-register when i've been a member for years???)

i'm going nuts trying to figure this out, and have tried multiple searches for days to no avail.

i have a successful reef tank (100g) thats been up and running for three years. at the same time i started a 150g fo tank. i know its probably a simple solution but for the life of me (and my fish) i cant solve it. i'm sick of thinking about it.

my fo tank had a great filtering system to begin with, but it was old, (i've had salt tanks since 1985) and eventually died (10 mo ago). money was tight at the time, and i bought two skilter filters to replace them. they did fine for a couple months.

a month ago the water began to cloud up, swirling gray, smoky. i read up on it, all my basic water levels were fine, except my ph was a bit low. i did a lot of serious water changes but it would only keep the water semi-clear for a day or so, then get worse than before. early this week, i could only see into the tank a couple inches.

the guys were starting to look distressed and i did a 50% water change on monday. tuesday it was back, maybe worse. some fish were mia. no one ate. i was doing 20g water changes every couple days for a couple weeks by this time, btw. nothing was helping.

wednesday afternoon i found my 11 inch lion fish upside down and dead. 10 minutes later, my new filters arrived. (i had ordered two magnum 350's last week with my tax return cash). i had to assume that the others were in there dead too. but i assembled the filters and started them along with the skilters.

thursday i completely drained the tank. i only had 3 damsels, a snowflake eel, and a pencil urchin left alive. my tank was a graveyard. it was a sad day. i put the survivors into a 20g hospital tank for now, with some live rock and a charcoal filter.

thurday night i washed the tank completely (water only), rinsed all the coral gravel with tap water and put the tank back together. (sad, but i lost hundreds of bristleworms). friday night i added water, dechlorinator, and salt. 2 powerheads to mix it all, and went to bed. when i awoke saturday the water was beautiful and clear and i felt very optimistic. the mag 350's seemed to be doing a great job.

i headed out to the lfs and bought 5 damsels to do my re-cycling. yes i'm aware that its no longer the way its done, but its the way i know how....i usually lose very few .

by late afternoon saturday, with the new damsels being in the tank only 4 hours, the tank was very cloudy again, and the damsels were gasping at the top. i removed them and they're in the hospital tank with the other survivors from before.

its the same swirling gray smoky water. i dont understand. i've totally cleaned the tank, the gravel, the large rocks.

what am i not seeing? what is the answer? i've never ever had this happen before.

help?

gael

 

[Anonymous]

Sorry about all of the carnage.

I would guess that one of your pumps may be leaking some sort of oil/lubricant since you emptied your tank completely. I imagine you cleaned out the sump also, if you have one that is.

I once had a pump in the sump slide into a sponge and suck who knows what into the tank. swirling gray cloud that killed just about everything, except the fish. I no longer have sponges in the sump.


Good luck.

 

[Anonymous]

fwiw:

another possible cause is your tap water-i would strongly suggest you immediately stop using it, and get a rodi unit to make all of your sw

 

[danmhippo]

During all these time, you had the skilters in it all the time, I assume. Try remove the skilter completely, and also remove any other powerheads, if any. Run the filtration again with just the 350s, and see what happened.

I had seen people's tank cloud up like yours and as previously said, it was leakeage problem. I suspect it could be yours too.

Furthermore, don't add anymore livestock into the tank until you can figure out this mystery first.

Does your magnum comes with the diatomous earth water polishing kit? If yes, use it for a few days and switch back to regular filtration and see what happened.

BTW, Welcome back.

 

[Will C1]

i beliveve the pump leaking theory might be the culpret, but if not it might be a low oxygen level in the tank you said the fish were gasping. is the top of the tank sealed? this is just a guess i would suggest inspecting the pumps first. do you have large rio pumps??

 

[Anonymous]

i would have to agree with jaue and danm. sounds like it is definitely something mechanical. when you do figure out the problem and if you decide to try again - you might want to rethink your water source as well, as vitz suggested. tap water can sometimes have ill effects on the overall health of a tank. but again, do as jaue and danm suggested to see if that's your problem.

keep us posted.

 

[rowan]

yeah, i cleaned out everything. i have no sump, but i cleaned out the skilters...everything.

thanks, gael

 

[rowan]

fwiw:

another possible cause is your tap water-i would strongly suggest you immediately stop using it, and get a rodi unit to make all of your sw

i was also thinking about it being my tap water. i use regular tap and liquid dechlor. its not affecting my other tank at all tho. wouldnt it make them both go bad?

i am positively buying a ro unit in the next few weeks.

thanks, gael

 

[rowan]

During all these time, you had the skilters in it all the time, I assume. Try remove the skilter completely, and also remove any other powerheads, if any. Run the filtration again with just the 350s, and see what happened.

I had seen people's tank cloud up like yours and as previously said, it was leakeage problem. I suspect it could be yours too.

Furthermore, don't add anymore livestock into the tank until you can figure out this mystery first.

Does your magnum comes with the diatomous earth water polishing kit? If yes, use it for a few days and switch back to regular filtration and see what happened.

****

thanks, i've removed the skilters and now have only the two mag350's running. i also have a powerhead going, but i'm using it to shoot some air into the tank.

my magnum came with a polisher, but i dont know if its a daitom polisher. it didnt come with diatomaceous (sp) earth. i have no experience with that.
its a sleeve of fine fabric that slides over the motorized area. kinda like a bio wheel. btw, it comes with two biowheels per unit, i have them both running.

i'll not add any more livestock till i figure this out. thanks
gael

 

[rowan]

i beliveve the pump leaking theory might be the culpret, but if not it might be a low oxygen level in the tank you said the fish were gasping. is the top of the tank sealed? this is just a guess i would suggest inspecting the pumps first. do you have large rio pumps??

i have no rio pumps, unless thats what drives the skilters. i'll check that out. i thought maybe it was from low oxygen, and i've had a powerhead blowing air into the tank. doesnt seem to make any difference

i'm not sure what you mean by the top of the tank being sealed. its acrylic, if that means anything to you.

if i were to check my powerheads for leakage....how would i do that? they're not too old, maybe 2 years, used sporadically,cleaned regularly.

thanks, gael

 

[rowan]

i would have to agree with jaue and danm. sounds like it is definitely something mechanical. when you do figure out the problem and if you decide to try again - you might want to rethink your water source as well, as vitz suggested. tap water can sometimes have ill effects on the overall health of a tank. but again, do as jaue and danm suggested to see if that's your problem.

keep us posted.

thanks i've got quite a day ahead of me with all this. honestly i'm sick of trying to figure it out. i've been really racking my brain.

any possibility it could be some bacteria bloom?

gael

 

[Anonymous]

fwiw:

another possible cause is your tap water-i would strongly suggest you immediately stop using it, and get a rodi unit to make all of your sw

i was also thinking about it being my tap water. i use regular tap and liquid dechlor. its not affecting my other tank at all tho. wouldnt it make them both go bad?

i am positively buying a ro unit in the next few weeks.

thanks, gael

the makeup of your tap water can radically change from one day to the next-as municipalities add agents to water sources w/out ever notifying you

wells are also a dangerous source-as whatever is in the ground, also gets into the well

i experienced a massive die off of f/w fish in a store system, once-drove me nuts trying to figure out why-until i started to do some 'digging' with the local water folks-turns out that they had started to add an algaecide, and a coagulant, to the water coming from the main (quabin) reservoir-one of those compounds was based on aluminum.

there are also a slew of other 'volatile, and highly volatile, organic compounds' which may also be present, and even permissible, albeit in very small amounts, in tap water.

i'd suggest you ask your local city hall for a copy of the federally mandated quarterly analysis of your local water supply, per epa reg.s- it may be extremely enlightening :wink:

 

[rowan]

[/quote]the makeup of your tap water can radically change from one day to the next-as municipalities add agents to water sources w/out ever notifying you

wells are also a dangerous source-as whatever is in the ground, also gets into the well

i experienced a massive die off of f/w fish in a store system, once-drove me nuts trying to figure out why-until i started to do some 'digging' with the local water folks-turns out that they had started to add an algaecide, and a coagulant, to the water coming from the main (quabin) reservoir-one of those compounds was based on aluminum.

there are also a slew of other 'volatile, and highly volatile, organic compounds' which may also be present, and even permissible, albeit in very small amounts, in tap water.

i'd suggest you ask your local city hall for a copy of the federally mandated quarterly analysis of your local water supply, per epa reg.s- it may be extremely enlightening :wink:[/quote]



i see your point, but wouldnt it have also messed up the quality of the water in my reef tank? its doing just fine, clear, healthy, etc. if its environmental (chemical spray, air-borne toxin, etc) then my reef, in the same room 5 feet from the fo tank would also have the problem, no?

you know that song by queen? the one that goes "i'm going slightly mad"

i'll call the water peeps on monday, see what they have to say. they mail me a yearly report.

thank you
gael

 

[Anonymous]

any possibility it could be some bacteria bloom?

hmm, i wouldn't think so unless maybe you were doing something that would cause that - like overfeeding. and even then, i don't think you would have seen what you described as "the water began to cloud up, swirling gray, smoky".

 

[rowan]

hmm, i wouldn't think so unless maybe you were doing something that would cause that - like overfeeding. and even then, i don't think you would have seen what you described as "the water began to cloud up, swirling gray, smoky".

ok, well i came upon this site, which is why i thought maybe bacteria...
http://w3page.com/fishline/troubleshooting.php
read the sixth and seventh one down....

gael

 

[rowan]

Does your magnum comes with the diatomous earth water polishing kit? If yes, use it for a few days and switch back to regular filtration and see what happened.



ok, i'm a little slow. i just got what you're saying about the daitom filter. yes, the mag came with a water polisher. i took out the carbon filter and replaced it with the polisher. i only did it on one of the two, i have two installed on the tank. i looks a bit clearer, altho that might be wishful thinking. also, it always looks a bit clearer in the daylight.

gael[/quote]

 

[Anonymous]

hmm, i wouldn't think so unless maybe you were doing something that would cause that - like overfeeding. and even then, i don't think you would have seen what you described as "the water began to cloud up, swirling gray, smoky".

ok, well i came upon this site, which is why i thought maybe bacteria...
http://w3page.com/fishline/troubleshooting.php
read the sixth and seventh one down....

i guess it was the "smoky" part that threw me off.

 

[Anonymous]

fwiw:

in fw tanks, at least-there have been (many) instances of bacterial blooms being triggered by tap water issues-sometimes resulting in a rapid and severe bloom, that quickly affects the fish inhabitants

 

[Chris Witort]

Are you using a phosphate remover? If left in for more than two days they will start releasing white cloudy material into the water!

 

[AllenF]

If it was the water quality, then all of those water changes you did just accelerated the problem.


Try doing nothing for a couple of weeks and see if your tank clears...


I found out the hard way about my tap water