***help*** fish emergency

[MASTRO1]

Hi everyone; I will fill you in so that maybe you or some of your friends might have a clue as to what the hell is wrong with my tank. By the way I have the 65Gal red sea 250 aquarium. I had it for abot 9months. About 3 weeks ago I came home and saw that I lost 4 shrimp(2 cleaner 2 fire). The next day I lost and 3 fish(Blue Hippo,Foxface,Yellow Tang). I checked my readings and all was normal. I did a 15gal water change, and hoped for the best. The following day I lost my tomato and ocellerus clown and my last cleaner shrimp. The local stores said they can't find anything wrong with my water and that something foreign must have gotten into the tank and poisened the water. (Examples they have given me was windex or air freshner) Which my wife and I are sure never happened. So now I was told to do numerous waterchanges for 2 weeks. So I did a 15gal water change every other day for 2 weeks. While changing carbon, bio, and phosphate ban regularly. During these water changes I lost a red fromia star, half my hermits, half my nassarius snails, and bubble coral. My leathers, torch, and toadstools closed up but did not die. My brains, ricordia's,mushrooms,sunpolyps, other hermits, snails, sand sifting stars and clam have not been affected. So at this time I got my water checked again and it all looked fine so I was told to get a few fish because everything looked good and with all the water changes if there was anything poisoning the water it should be gone now thanks to the numerous gallons I have changed in the last two weeks. So yesterday I picked up Another yellow tang, blue chromis and a gold stripe maroon clown. They were all from an established tank which the man had for 3 years. I acclimated them (DRIPPED) for about an hour and a half. I put them in around 10PM. They all ate and seemed fine. Then I noticed they started breathing heavily. About 3hrs later the yellow tang was dead. Overnight the blue chromis was gone and tonight around 6PM I found the clown dead. So this is where I am now. Please if there is anyone out there that knows what the hell is going on I would appreciate the help...
Thanks!
Sincerely,
Louie

 

[fallenlordz]

Sorry to hear about your loss :sad2:

I really would not know what to do. Wonder if something is wrong with the original water source. I would not buy anything for the time being, until everything gets sorted out in the tank.

Maybe more experienced reefers can help you here.

If it was me I would do a complete breakdown of the tank (pressure wash that tank good:tub and redo it with ro/di water. Thats just me.

 

[TRIGGERMAN]

1st of all you should have taken the fish that were still alive and put them in another tank..there is a very large chance you could have saved them. Seconly adding all those new fish was the stupidest thing you could have done..you are just throwing more money in the garbage or perhaps down the toilet LITERALLY. IF anything you should have put 1 small cheap fish like a chromi in there to see if it lives before throwing in a bunch of fish especially more expensive ones like tangs etc. It sounds to me like there is definitely a serious problem with your system and I would also assume a toxin of some sort, perhaps not on purpose but by accident.

Do you have any kids or relatives living with you or is it just you and your wife?

Personally I would say start from scratch dump all the water get rid of the sand and rock as that can hold in chemicals. Clean the tank very thoroughly. You MIGHT be able to reuse the rock later on after cleaning and drying it out but I am not an expert. I'm sure many people will chime in but definitely DO NOT ADD ANYMORE FISH WHATSOEVER.

 

[Killerdrgn]

For one thing you're probably putting in too much livestock in too small of a tank, creating a good environment for parasites and other nasties. I read no mention of a skimmer on this tank, or live rock for that matter.
You say your readings were fine, but what are the numbers and what test kits are you using?
Did you try to medicate the tank with something? Such as copper based medications?
There could be a lot wrong with this tank, You first need to get much more specific about the details of your tank.

And which local store was it that convinced you to buy that many more fish? They obviously do not have your best interests in their minds.

 

[JonnyJ]

i wouldn't ditch anything just yet. I agree adding that many fish at once was not the smartest thing but lets try to figure out whats going on rather than bash the guy.

have you checked all of your equipment? heaters - maybe it cracked? power heads? something possibly Rust?

Have you changed any thing in the tank before this occurred? any reactors?

do you dose?
also when you say your levels are good please be more specific, also list the test kit brands you are using and make sure you check the exp. date

 

[aznt1217]

To the responses above... It's a rsm250 a skimmer is built in.

This sounds crazy but check your temperature when your lights are fully on. What water tests were done?

Only thing I could think of that would kill the fish are abnormally high phosphates and temperature.

 

[Kdocimo90]

Have you tested your salinity as well?

 

[TRIGGERMAN]

For one thing you're probably putting in too much livestock in too small of a tank, creating a good environment for parasites and other nasties. I read no mention of a skimmer on this tank, or live rock for that matter.
You say your readings were fine, but what are the numbers and what test kits are you using?
Did you try to medicate the tank with something? Such as copper based medications?
There could be a lot wrong with this tank, You first need to get much more specific about the details of your tank.

And which local store was it that convinced you to buy that many more fish? They obviously do not have your best interests in their minds.

Sounds like the 5 fish he had is really not alot especially in a 65 gal. He said the tank was up for 9 months so it should be fully cycled he probably had the fish for a while I would assume several months so if everything was fine until now something foreign caused this rapid death to happen

 

[KathyC]

Sorry for all of your losses.

Can we get some specific info on the following:
ALL parameters - including PH, temp, SG.
Are you using ro/di water?
Are there any powerheads in the tank
A pic of the set up

Please do not add any further fish at this time.

 

[KathyC]

Sounds like he is doing a FOWLR not a reef tank so the 5 fish he had is really not alot especially in a 65 gal. He said the tank was up for 9 months so it should be fully cycled he probably had the fish for a while I would assume several months so if everything was fine until now something foreign caused this rapid death to happen

Maybe not Trigger - he has quite a few corals in there

 

[JimmyR1rider]

Really dumb I know may get flamed but is ok I have big shoulders- you hadnt gotten shocked while your hands were in the tank did you? I know I know the stray voltage thing is so far out of the box but hey a bad heater ya never know? Sorry for your losses, and wish you the best from here on out.

 

[TRIGGERMAN]

Maybe not Trigger - he has quite a few corals in there

DUH missed that part somehow it's time for some eyedrops my contacts are getting crispy smh annoyingggggggggg lol

 

[Dre]

As you can see there are many possibilities take your time, make a list and check them off the as you go along.Did the fish start dying immediately after you made a water change?Have the LFS check your salinity and Salt Mix, two less possibilities.

 

[Dre]

Really dumb I know may get flamed but is ok I have big shoulders- you hadnt gotten shocked while your hands were in the tank did you? I know I know the stray voltage thing is so far out of the box but hey a bad heater ya never know? Sorry for your losses, and wish you the best from here on out.

It's not far out at all ,it happen to a well known member a few days ago.The person lost fish and corals, so not far out at all just one less possibility.

 

[JimmyR1rider]

Yeah if were talkin about Awilda is what popped into my head and why I mentioned it. Thanks though:smile:

 

[Chraddam]

Sorry to hear about this...I hate crashes, but apparently everyone has to deal with a major one at some point. I don't know where you are at right now in terms of correcting the issue, but I think it is best that you A) add NOTHING ELSE to the tank(see Kathy's comment) B) get whatever is alive OUT OF THE TANK and into a hospital/QT tank C) determine exactly what is wrong with your tank. There are plenty of people close by(including myself) that would be more than willing to come out and attempt to help diagnose what is wrong with the tank. There are so many possibilities, I hope you can determine what is causing this disaster.

Good luck!

 

[coralnut99]

For fish and corals to go that quickly even with what seems like a decent acclimation procedure, I'm leaning heavily toward poisining of some sort. After 9 months you would think it's cycled, but something could've triggered a new cycle, like overfeeding, etc. It's still relatively new. Fwiw, I would never trust water tests done at a LFS. They may seem like nice folks, but they ARE in the business of selling livestock. Learn to do your own water tests. Also I think water changes every other day would just make water parameters just go nuts. I think the best suggestion here has been to just put the brakes on adding livestock for a bit and let the tank stabilize, and focus on water tests. It doesn't sound like you have much livestock left, but if you still do after all you've lost, I'm starting to think you have just added too much bioload at one time at some point, and threw the cycle backwards as I'm thinking.

 

[Killerdrgn]

He/She just pm'd me a response.

I do have a protein skimmer. It comes with the red sea 250. I did purchase 65LBs of live rock. My readings are...

PH 8.2-8.3
Salt 1.025
Ammonia 0
Nitrate 0.25
Nitrite 0
Phosphate 0
Calcium 480

I use the profi test kits. Plus my local stores check them for me regularly.

I would say the phosphate reading is false. Plus now we need to know what type of inhabitants did you have? Did you have something like sea cucumbers or sea apples?

 

[marrone]

Can you explain how the fish died. How were they acting, where they scratching, breathing heavy, flashing or towards the top of the tank, before they died? How did they look after they died? Was there film on the body or was it burned, like from ammonia? These things are important as it could be a number of different things, like high ammonia, low oxygen & high CO2 to a parasite in the tank.

 

[jaa1456]

Did you use any liquid Garlics or extracts? I really doubt all the new fish died in one night because of a new cycle. Maroon clowns are very tough and it should have lived through a full cycle. My bet is on something used to dose the tank ot some type of medication or treatment. If there was copper in the tank the brain corlas should be dead by now.