gcfishreef
Experienced Reefer
- Location
- Centereach NY
Stop in the shop and ill help u out w a frag or 2
Tank disaster...
- Thread starter jejton
- Start date
So I finally found the strength and time to start fixing up the tank. I scraped most of the algae off the glass but left it on one side as my sea urchin still appears to be alive so maybe it'll help him to eat some. The final count seems to be: 1 firefish, 1 flasher wrasse and just about every stony coral except for my duncans ( HOF ! ) and 3 heads of that beautiful candy cane colony I had. I also noticed an extremely tiny polyp growing on the frogspawn colony skeleton and one or two heads of my hammerhead are fighting for life still.
I haven't yet decided on a solution for an ATO but did write to autotopoff.com and they asked me to do some diagnositic on the system which I haven't done yet. I'm leaning towards the JBJ with the optical sensor as I've heard good things about that. For now I'm doing topoff manually but at least the water is stabilized and alot of the microfauna is starting to reappear - micro stars and feather dusters for now. The next step is to get my quarantine up and running and start to restock corals and get a new firefish and wrasse. Anyone see nice purple firefish and flasher or melanarus wrasse in LI recently?
As for corals, I'm looking for torch, hammerheads, monti, digitata, sun corals, hairy mushrooms, and open to pretty much anything. I do have plenty of anthelia if anyone wants some for trade. It not only did not die but took over a section of the tank and I have no flatworms anymore!!! I also need some chaeto as that was wiped out. Local is great but I can pay for shipping too.
One positive thing did come out of this, well maybe two. One is that I learned to never leave the tank for long periods without going over in fine details the maintanance with the sitter. The other was that after I cleaned the tank a bit, my wife came down and saw how upset I was, and even got upset herself since she started enjoying looking at it and appreciated it once it took off, that she has, i dont know if the word is encouraged, but at least she is not asking me to sell it anymore and is understanding.
I haven't yet decided on a solution for an ATO but did write to autotopoff.com and they asked me to do some diagnositic on the system which I haven't done yet. I'm leaning towards the JBJ with the optical sensor as I've heard good things about that. For now I'm doing topoff manually but at least the water is stabilized and alot of the microfauna is starting to reappear - micro stars and feather dusters for now. The next step is to get my quarantine up and running and start to restock corals and get a new firefish and wrasse. Anyone see nice purple firefish and flasher or melanarus wrasse in LI recently?
As for corals, I'm looking for torch, hammerheads, monti, digitata, sun corals, hairy mushrooms, and open to pretty much anything. I do have plenty of anthelia if anyone wants some for trade. It not only did not die but took over a section of the tank and I have no flatworms anymore!!! I also need some chaeto as that was wiped out. Local is great but I can pay for shipping too.
One positive thing did come out of this, well maybe two. One is that I learned to never leave the tank for long periods without going over in fine details the maintanance with the sitter. The other was that after I cleaned the tank a bit, my wife came down and saw how upset I was, and even got upset herself since she started enjoying looking at it and appreciated it once it took off, that she has, i dont know if the word is encouraged, but at least she is not asking me to sell it anymore and is understanding.
Last edited:
- Location
- Montclair, NJ
That's good news Eric. It will be better than before :wink1:
- Location
- Far Rockaway 11691
jbj makes a unit with optical sensor or do you mean Tunze?
sorry to hear about your loss of inhabitants..i too will be going on vacation soon..i just bought an 18gallon container for my ATO..my JBJ has been doing great since i installed it..im just going to make sure all the float sensors are clean and running well before i go so that i dont come home to a small pond...when i had my 36bow i lost all my corals and som,e fish due to a heat wave..so i know how you feel..but good things you staying in the hobby!! go hug your girl!! my girl is happy with my tank as long as the clam is alive..hehe
DEL
:tub:
DEL
:tub:
Sorry
sorry for your loss. i don't have much, i just started a 215 gal mix reef, but if there's anything i can do to help let me know.
sorry for your loss. i don't have much, i just started a 215 gal mix reef, but if there's anything i can do to help let me know.
Another surprise - the pistol shrimp is alive! I just saw him and had to rub my eyes as I could have sworn I saw the corpse. Now I know it was a molt but all the other molts I've found were easily id'd as a molt and this time with the tank so out of wack I was sure it was a corpse but I just didnt have the heart to take it out to verify. The resilience of living creatures really amazes me.
- Location
- Syosset Long Island 11791
I almost left the hobby about 6 months ago and I tell you I would of really regretted it.
If your ever in Astoria come by I'll hook you with some frags. Happy Reefing!!
If your ever in Astoria come by I'll hook you with some frags. Happy Reefing!!
I have this one on two of my tanks and I have never had a problem since I set them up. It has a back up in case the float get`s stuck.http://www.gapproducts.com/ATO/ATO.htm PM`d you.
I can frag you a nice piece of frogspawn, candy cane, deep purple birdsnest, red digi cap and have a relatively large colony of paly's / zoo's ready to go if you want them. Just give me a pm when you are ready to start restocking.
J, glad to read you are staying in. I also felt like you did, and also decided to stick with it. I tell you my reef is doing better then before the crash................
I don't have much, but you can stop by and see if there is anything that you like and can be fragged...
I also felt like you did, and also decided to stick with it. I tell you my reef is doing better then before the crash................I don't have much, but you can stop by and see if there is anything that you like and can be fragged...
This story keeps getting better. I was working on the tank and when the lights were on i saw what looked like something moving in the overflow - just a shadow - which could have been just some algae. Now I've been meaning to scrape the paint off the back of the overflow for some time - algae grows there anyways - because my clownfish keep jumping back there. Now to my surprise I found my wrasse back there! So the only fish I lost was a purple firefish, plus the corals. I also saw what looks to be an anemome in the overflow. How big do aptasia and majano's get? This one has to be at least 4" long at the stalk and 3" across at the disc. I'll try to get a picture later.
I picked up some frags at an LFS yesterday. When I got around to releasing the frags, I realized the employee there didn't properly bag the frags. He double bagged the frags but didnt close the inner bag so all the water spilled out between the bags leaving the frags either with no or little water. I have them in my DT now and am hoping they make it. One looks ok but the other two look to be in bad shape ( LPS ) so we'll see :irked:. It seems like everything that could happen to a tank, has happened to mine. The only thing I've avoided is electrical disasters (please God lets leave it like that as thats what terrifies me most) . I caught one of the PC's almost falling into the tank a couple months back since the supporting brace detacheed from the hood at one end. That was a close call.
I picked up some frags at an LFS yesterday. When I got around to releasing the frags, I realized the employee there didn't properly bag the frags. He double bagged the frags but didnt close the inner bag so all the water spilled out between the bags leaving the frags either with no or little water. I have them in my DT now and am hoping they make it. One looks ok but the other two look to be in bad shape ( LPS ) so we'll see :irked:. It seems like everything that could happen to a tank, has happened to mine. The only thing I've avoided is electrical disasters (please God lets leave it like that as thats what terrifies me most) . I caught one of the PC's almost falling into the tank a couple months back since the supporting brace detacheed from the hood at one end. That was a close call.
give it one more try .. i had a different problem was gone for 2 days and when i came home my chiller dropped down to a chilling 35 degrees and lost everything when i mean everything the sand was even dead.. The chiller was only about 4 months old . called the company and they told me that tey were not responsable for the livestock but the would fix the chiller . I had to pay for shipping back to them . They fixed it and they picked up the tab for shipping it back to me ...
I lost mush , torches ,hammers, clams, bubble, rbta, and alot of frags
plus all my fish Yellow, Hippo foxface, gsm clowns ,sailfin , manderin, and a few others that i dont remember...
so try one more time
I lost mush , torches ,hammers, clams, bubble, rbta, and alot of frags
plus all my fish Yellow, Hippo foxface, gsm clowns ,sailfin , manderin, and a few others that i dont remember...
so try one more time
Yes it something always seems to go wrong when your not at home. I found this out too a few times with my controller blowing fuse's and shutting down my whole system. I came hom to a 60 degree reef tank and started having heart pompitations, I fixed the problem but its always scary to leave your tank for some time. You can never go away and not have it rome through you head constently. Good luck to you.
So I emailed autotopoff.com to tell them what happened. They apologized -didnt offer any compensation or reimbursement for livestock ( not that I was expecting it but it would have been nice ) - and asked me to run a test on it. So I tested it with a lamp and lo and behold it works fine. There must have been something lodged in the float switch or salt creep or something that I didnt see and either fell out while it was sitting dry on a table or dislodged by me while testing. So I'll use this for now but will have to consider what to do before I next go away for more than a few days. Eventually I'll upgrade it but right now I'd rather use the money for other things if I can.
On another note, I drained the overflow during a WC last night in an attempt to get the wrasse out into the sump. Well that worked but now I can't get the wrasse out since there's too much rock for it to hide in in the sump!
On another note, I drained the overflow during a WC last night in an attempt to get the wrasse out into the sump. Well that worked but now I can't get the wrasse out since there's too much rock for it to hide in in the sump!
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