High Nitrate, Coral Death, Clam sick

[montana]

Our tank has been up a year now. We have not lost any fish, but have had some coral deaths. About 3.5 wks ago we lost our open brain coral which we had for 8 mos. Up until this time we have always had great water parameters. We tested nitrate - which has always been zero -and it was high (which may have been result of brain coral death - ? or cause?). Did our usual 10% montly water change at that time (3.5 wks ago). Nitrate still continuing to run high. Today's parameters:

Nitrate 25-30
Amonia 0-0.1
Nitrite 0.1
Calcium 450
Phosphate 0.1-0.2
pH 7.95
SG 1.019
water temp - constant at 78 to 80.5 throughout day

Do you think our nitrate reading is inaccurate, since nitrite & ammonia are okay? Although our phosphate has always been zero before, and I see our pH is a little low as well.

Have not added any new fish for several months. Have:

Foxface lo
2 blue damsels
3 royal gramas
Clown
Powder brown tang
lawnmower blennie
bi-color blennie
coral beauty angel
brownbarred goby

6 conch snails
12 nassarius snails (but we haven't seen many in a while)
torch coral
mump coral
carpet anenome
condy anenome
bubble coral
corcea clam
Birdsnest coral died about 2 months ago

Are we feeding too much? We typically feed 3 times per day. Each feeding consists of 1 small cube of frozen mysis shrimp & 1 sm cube of brine shrimp. Also give the Foxface Lo and Tang a few small (1/2 in wide x 2 in long) strips of dried seaweed once every other day. Give a squirt each of phytoplex, chromoplex & zooplex once per week as well. Give each of the anenomes a small shrimp 1-2 times per week.
This has been our routine for months.

Today our corcea clam looks sick - it is shrinking with much of the inside of the shell exposed. It was fine last night. HELP!
Another water change is in order - should we do more than our typical 10%?
THANK YOU!

 

[SnowManSnow]

If it were me this is the course of action I would follow.

#1 Untill things get under control reduce feeding to only 1x every other day.

#2 Look for any decaying fish, snails.. crabs.. Anything that is dead remove it.

#3 Do a 30-50% water change once and follow it with about a 10% every day for a week.

#4 Run your skimmer 24/7 (if you don't already)

These are just some things I would do if it were me. Hope things turn around for you.

Also, make sure your water change water is the correct salinity and temp (since it will be so much of a change).

Good luck. Keep us posted as to how things develope@

 

[dnorton1978]

Also when you do your water changes be sure to aerate the water for at least 24 hours prior to adding salt. Then let set up for another 24 hours with aerator and powerhead.

The water change will help reduce your nitrate quite a bit. You could get a second opinion on the test results with your LFS too, but with the deaths, something is clearly off.

The salinity seems pretty low IMO for a reef tank. Around 1.025 would be ideal IMO. The PH will come up on its own with the water changes, if you aerate them and use a powerhead that is.

I agree with snow on the feeding. As well as cutting it back in general. THose little cubes of mysid are quite a bit of food.

What size tank are we talking about here? Also on your water changes do you use RO/DI water?

What do you have for flow, and lighting. I am more curious to know what led to the deaths, than the current problems. Not that I am not concerned for you, but looking for a way to prevent it from happening again..

 

[Anonymous]

First thing that pops into my mind is the SG is waaay too low for most corals...it should be nearer to 1.025. Raise it slowly over the course of a week or so. Secondly, since nitrate is the end product of ammonia to nitrite to nitrate it is very possible you will read nitrate and no ammonia. In other words there was an ammonia spike you didn't catch.

I'd do as Snowman suggested, with the addition of thawing the cubes before feeding them and putting them in a fine net and rinsing them with tank water. Frozen food contains a ton of excess nutrients and rinsing it helps to put less gack into your tank.

Also, as asked above, how many gallons is the tank?

 

[montana]

My signature at the very bottom of my first post contains all the info on our tank - 120 gals, etc. As you can see, yes, we use RO water.

I thaw the cubes of frozen shrimp in a cup of water that I take from the tank, then just dump the cup of water with the thawed shrimp back in the tank - I should be rinsing it thru a net instead?

Yes, have run our skimmer 24/7 from day one, and I really do believe it does a great job. But, we have had the system up for a year now and have not done anything other than daily/weekly maintenance and routine cleaning - emptying cup, rinsing sponges.... is there any sort of nmore thorough maintenance/cleaning - say on an annual basis - that needs to be done? Maybe that is something I need to check with the manufacturer about - ?


Thanks for all the suggestions.

 

[montana]

Also....I am assuming our corcea clam is dying, since we have had it since last May and it has never shrunken up like this before? Should I get it out of the tank NOW before it contaiminates it, or should I give it another day or so?

We have been sooo lucky that the system has run so well since we set it up a year ago - until now!

Thanks for all your help!

 

[montana]

Okay, now I am freaking out a bit. I just checked the corcea again and there is a long (5") flourescent spiney tentacle sticking out from it. Should I remove it from the tank right away? SHAME ON ME I have a quanrantine tank, but it is not set up!

 

[trido]

On a bi-annual basis it is a good idea to empty the sump and vacuum the detritous out of the corners. Also the pump impellers should be cleaned to. Also, your sig says Lifereef berlin system. What kind of sand bed do you have in the tank and how deep is it. Do you occasionally storm the tank? Do you ever clean the detritous out of the bottom of the overflows? Have you lost any fish lately?
And yes, If you havent pulled the clam out already. You may want to seriously consider it now.

 

[montana]

I don't know what you mean by "storm the tank" - !?

We have had no fish deaths - aside from a fairy wrasse that jumped out!

We have never cleaned the detritous out of the bottom of the overflows. All we do is use a powerhead to blow out rocks when we do water changes, a turkey baster to do the same periodically, and we vacuum sand at water changes. We do have a sand-sifting goby that is continually sifting (and getting sand all over the rocks) but he seems to do a good job in helping to keep the sand clean We have about 1" of live sand. We only have 6 large snails and a dozen or less small ones. Do you think we should get more?

We removed the corcea clam and it was D-E-A-D and stinky. Did a 10% water change and will do another on Wednesday. Everything else looks healthy.

Cut back to one feeding per day - 3 cubes of frozen brine/mysis - and a few pieces of seaweed for the tang and lo. So, I am supposed to be rinsing the frozen food instaed of just thawing it and throwing it in?