snails dying with out any reason.

[Luis]

ok, this is the whole story:

a week ago my xenia elongata started looking wierd but my Xenia umbrelata was ok (wierd, because the first xenia that get upset when something is wrong is always my umbrelata) I ran a water test and everything looked ok, then I noticed that my sponge was dying (it had been doing ok for the last four months) I did a 30% watrer change just to be sure... then yesterday I notice that my snails where upside-down over my sand bed I tooked one by one and I place them over the rocks I ran another water test and I got same good results, today my snails where death.

some clues: I place a bag of carbon a month ago ( I bought an aquaclear replacement bag; I know is not a very good carbon but it's all I could get here in baja.) I removed it yesterday. I couldn't find a test kit for phosphates and silicates in my area to test my water , I noticed that my phosphate kit is very old and I think it's useless. Do you thing the carbon leached phosphates or silicates and that kill my sponge and snails?

My umbrelata still fine same as the other corals but my elongata still flat...

this are the results I got twice:

Calcium: 400 ppm
Temp: 79
Salinity: 1.024
Alkalinity: 10 dKH
pH: 8.2
Nitrate: <5 ppm

Any ideas or other factors can kill snails overnight?

Thanks.

 

[Anonymous]

Copper or Osmotic Shock are the two most common ways to kill snails overnight. Phosphate won't. Starvation usually takes a lot longer.

Osmotic shock can easily happen with a large water change if you're not careful.

I'd looks for an accidental chemical contamination of some sort.

 

[Luis]

Thanks for your reply, but before I did the water change the sponge and the xenia were upset already and when I do a water change I always check salinity and themperature and my tank is 120 gal so the changes are very subtle.... and I use reverse osmosis water so I can not get cooper (I think) .

I will keep looking for possibilities...

 

[coralfarmin]

do they have much alge for food ?

 

[tinyreef]

some clues: I place a bag of carbon a month ago ( I bought an aquaclear replacement bag; I know is not a very good carbon but it's all I could get here in baja.) I removed it yesterday. [...] Do you thing the carbon leached phosphates or silicates and that kill my sponge and snails?

Any ideas or other factors can kill snails overnight?

did you replace the bag of carbon you removed with a new one? you don't plainly state this so i'm asking. did you replace it at night?

oxygen deprivation is what i'm thinking. typical night-time respiration can already lower O2, coupled with fresh carbon (which can/may absorb a lot of O2, never had this happen to me but i've heard talk of it) could've led to the snails being smothered.

it's a reach.

 

[Anonymous]

Sounds to me like you got some mild poison in the tank. Did you do any work with toxic chemicals? Sometimes you just forget what you were touching that day.

Last week I almost put my hands in the tank after cleaning my gun with a copper solvent. I waited till the next evening and many hand washings to put my hands in.

 

[Luis]

Thanks guys for all your replies.

I'm thinking about this threat like a police investigation to find out who's my snail assassin and the funny thing is that at this time I'm one of the suspects 8O ....

I have not replaced the carbon yet because like I mention before the only carbon I can get in the area is those carbon replacements for aquaclears made for freshwater mainly, I don't want to place another bag until i'm sure is a good carbon, Do you thing is safe to place a new bag of the same material?

I have a refugium full of chaeto and it's under a light period of 24/7 and a venturi protein skimmer and a sump then I think my oxigen level has to be acceptable and my rocks and the back glass are full of algae (I never clean my back glass) so the snails had a lot to eat, before this problem I was thinking to get more sanils and some small urchins to help them :wink:

I keep rinsing my hands all day long because I keep doing things in my tank all the time (rescuing corals that fell down, feeding my tubastrea, fraging my corals, etc) but i know sometimes we forget for a sec to rinse our hands doing the first impulse to save a coral that felt down upside-down, I will start thinkin on that.... the only thing that comes to my mind and could be a poison for my snails is my windex. Do you think a small trace of windex in my hands can kill my snails? that's a clue that point at myself as the culprit of this investigation

my xenia still flat and the other corals still ok

Thanks again

 

[Anonymous]

What device do you use to measure salinity when you mix new saltwater for water changes?

 

[Luis]

Hi Guy

I use a refractometer.

I've been thinking about the death sponge.... the sponge was the first creature who died in my tank, it didn't die little by little it just die in one day, the question is: when sponges die that fast; can they release toxic compounds into the water or just ammonia?

 

[Anonymous]

Both but mostly just ammonia.