Even sadder day

[Jimnorris]

I think many of us have a sixth sense about our tanks. Mine kicked in about 4:00am today. I went to look at my tank---I turned on the two actinic NO lamps.
All corals and clams were doing fine.

Then as the fish started waking up. I noticed regal angel, scribble angel, tusk, sixline wrasse, one lawnmower benny and blue hamlet were dead!

So far all four tangs and two china wrasses are fine.

I did the following tests using Salifert test kits:

Calcium-----425
Alk-----------11.6
PH------------8.25
Ammonia----0
Nitraite-------0
Nitrate--------0
Magnesium---1350
Copper-------0

Also with my reflactometer SG is 1.025

Sometimes this wonderful hobby just makes you nuts??????????

My main concern is that I was not able to remove the angels, sixline and lawnmonwer benny (way in the very bottom back of the tank) I know this is going to test my tanks abiliity to handle a ammonia spike. I am thinking of getting acouple hunry hermit crabs today???? And also am making lots of fresh saltwater.

Can anyone think of anything I am missing??????

Thanks,
Jim

[adaminaustin]

stray voltage?

I am very sorry for your losses. :cry:

[Ed]

Wow! Sorry for your loss Jim. Was the temp normal? Perhaps a heater went nuts?

What can we do to help?

Ed

[Jimnorris]

I checked the voltage with a voltage meter it was zero (I do use a grounding probe)
The temp is at 80???????
Jim

[DeletedAccount]

Jim, I am so sorry! Let me know if there is anything that I can do.

[GaryP]

There are just so many possible toxics that could have caused this. Of course we always think of ammonia, but the list is long. Chances are you will never know what caused this. It would probably take an analytical research lab months to check for all the possibilities, especially when it comes to potential organic compounds. For example, many sponges as well as some corals produce toxic compounds.

My suggestion is a fairly aggressive program of water changes and skimming. I wonder if this could have anything to do with your problem with your fuge a few days ago. Could something have crashed or possibly something you did while replumping your system as a result of the fuge leak? The two events are a bit close to seem totally unrelated. It will probably be nothing more than speculation.

Sorry for your loss Jim. Been there. I know a loss like this always tears at your heart, not to mention your wallet.

Gary

[Pizazz]

Jim,

I am very sorry for your loss.

Might a serpent starfish help keep ammonia down? I have two in different tanks. The black one comes out anytime he is hungry and would be easy to remove if I needed to as he would just hold onto the krill I was feeding. The striped one is very shy and I rarely see it.

I got the black one at Aquatech.

[kaiser]

I don't know how much plumbing work had to be done after the Fuge incident, but I am thinking may be some glue or if You used some hose, oil from that hose. Most people don't realize it, but in the production of hose they use an oil on the inside and outside. But then again it is all speculation.
I am sorry for Your loss and hope that your system will recover soon.

[matt]

Sorry to hear about this, Jim. My first thought was some sort of fish disease, but you'd think the tangs would have caught it.

If you have an emergency with water quality, you can borrow my skimmer for a few days; my tank will be okay for a bit. I also have a canister I made that holds a couple of pounds of carbon; probably you have something like this, but you're welcome to it if necessary.

Matt

[captexas]

Very sorry to hear of your loss Jim. Amazing that something could kill so many fish in a short period of time in a tank as large and stable as yours. Even more suprising that whatever it is it hasn't bothered the other fish, clams, and corals.

I know the hungry hermits will help break down the dead fish, but after they are done you will be stuck with a bunch of hermits that could kill your snails and pick on your clams. As your tank is so full that it prevents you from pulling the fish our yourself, it will be hard to remove all the hermits when they are done with their clean-up job. I would suggest doing one large water change today to hopefully reduce whatever toxin is in the tank and then do small water changes over the next several days to keep up with removing the ammonia from the dead fish.

Again, sorry for you loss and please keep us informed if you find out what could have done such a thing to your beautiful tank.

[reefer]

sorry to read about your troubles, jim. what about parasites? also, i would remove the grounding probe and retest for stray voltage.
hth...
8)

[Triggerman]

well that sucks jim. i would run heavy carbon filtration immediately to get out any toxins that might be still left in the water before it affects anything else, matt's canister works great i've used it and hopefully i'll get him to build me one also. whenever those fish start decomposing within the next week you better watch out for all your other stuff. urchins and hermits can only help so much.

maybe try aiming direct heavy water flow along the back to blow the fish out from the crevices.

ray

[SueT]

Jim, OMG, I am so sorry to read this now after the other post about the sump. I really agree with Gary that these 2 situations seem to be too coincidental to not have some relationship. Then again maybe they don't. Whatever happened seemed to not be fish species specific either. I hope what fish are left will be ok for you.

I know I'm way over here in Houston but if you need anything you have my number.

Take care..

[Jenn]

Jim, I think everyone covered the options of what could have happened, but want to say sorry this happened to you.

[Henry]

wow Jim sorry to hear. If you need any spare tanks to move stuff to, I have a couple you can borrow if needed. Best of luck

[R.Allard]

Jim sorry for the loss man. :(
this is what i did to retrieve a couple of fish that went belly up
in my 110 i know your tank is longer but i think mine was alittle taller
29.5 inches..
if you can see any part of the fish take a long piece of 3/8 in plexi tube
(home depot,lowes)and slice the end at a 45 then hook the other end
to a piece of 3/8 hose. start a syphon and when the fish sticks to the
tube fromm the syphon stab it hard enough to go through the fish.
2nd part
stop the syphon and run a piece of 25lb test fishing line through it till it
comes out the end of the tube. (you night need to run a hanger through
the tube first to clear out the small piece of fish) get a smaller piece of plexi tube and do the same thing except suck up the fishing line
untill the line comes out the end of the 2nd plexi tube. stop the syphon
and pull the two tubes taught hopefully this will be strong enough to pull the fish out. might need to move alittle bit of rock but atleast youll get the fish out.
hope this helps
Robert

[Jimnorris]

This is my theory so far. The major difference in my tank from the lost of my refug. is surface skimming. At night my oxygen was falling below saturation. During the day photosynthesis brought it above saturation. I think some on my fish die to lack of oxygen! I have now installed a sump and overflow and surface skimming is no longer a concern. What is needed is a good oxygen test kit.
I am also now in need of a GOOD protien skimmer.
Thanks for help.
Jim

[MikeP]

Jim, the animals you had croak are (mostly) fairly active, I am guessing that you could very well have had oxygen depletion. One fish dies and it can chain react as bacteria bloom and oxygen is used up - this would be doubly bad without the refugium and they overflow to necessitate churning the surface and exchanging oxygen. I can't see it going south that fast though. The china wrasses are Anampses species which I am pretty sure bury in the sand and hibernate at night, might be their burying actually saved them?

Another possibility is one of your corals or clams spawned but you'd see the gametes in the water I'm guessing. FYI the tusk was missing Friday evening when I went to pick up my clams. It's possible it could have been a disease - did they fish have flared gills when you found them or any blotches or lesions? Velvet is the only thing I know of offhand that could kill that fast.

Real bummer, I really liked your fish and your tuskfish and black perculas were the inspiration for me copying that in my tank :( I was pretty sure those percs were getting ready to lay eggs from the cleaning behavior they were doing Friday. Don't know what to say - it's depressing but I'll help you get it sorted out and working again if I can.

One more thing - how long had the blue hamlet been in the tank and was he quarantined? Several of the fish that died are some of the hardiest in the hobby (clowns, tusk, hamlet) so it makes it even more mystifying.

Let me know if there is anything I can do to help and I shall endeavour to do so.

[whatsareef]

Jim,
If you plan to start a refug again let me know and I can bring you the caulerpa I got from you.

[Sherri]

Geez Jim....I get home from Thanksgiving trip to read this nightmare. I am so sorry. I have an AquaC Urchin Pro Sump Skimmer that I am very pleased with. Don't know, someone may suggest a better choice. If there is anything any one of us can do to help...pls let us know. And keep us updated on how it is going. Talk about a sixth sense kicking in...

[OrionN]

.... At night my oxygen was falling below saturation. During the day photosynthesis brought it above saturation. I think some on my fish die to lack of oxygen! ......
Jim,
I am sorry to hear about your problem. I think you are right on here. Death of fish with corals not affected and recnet loss of surface skimming suggest O2 problem. Good luck with your problem. you must be broken-hearted with the death of your fishes especially the angels.
Good luck. I use a PM bullet XL2. I love it.
Minh

[GaryP]

I had a similar problem with my first tank. In this case it was because of hair algae dropping the oxygen level at night. O2 saturation in saltwater is only about 7 ppm, as opposed to about 13-14 ppm in FW. Fish start to crash at anything less about 5 ppm. That's a pretty narrow window. It would make sense that fish die-off would occur at night when there is no oxygen being produced by the algae in the tank.

Gary

[Instar]

I have several observations on this:
First, the pH is not low enough to indicate a condition of extreme O2 depletion, CO2 build up.
Second, the only way to crash the oxygen saturation is to stop running the over flow into a sump or part of the sump or a makeshift sump while working on getting a new refugium. Did you do that? A good over flow and spillway like it should be done, should be vortexing the water enough to compensate for a lot of the CO2 build up at night. Since CO2 is heavier, it can also go over the overflow and to the floor, thereby creating a clear zone for surface agitation at night in the main tank.
Next, what is the measure of the ALKALINITY? Meq/L or dKh ??? With that calcium, dkh, pH and Mg, it looks like you have a major shift in the buffer system to a secondary Mg buffer and that you are very out of balance. The corals care less about all this than you can imagine, but, its very hard on the kindneys of the fish. In an extreme, Uremic blood poisoning is then quite possible in the fish. I'd have to see the tank, but, its really not that easy to keep things in balance once you start adding kalk and buffers.
Next, when you fragged that Kenya tree, it was done inside the tank. You need to be running Activated Carbon to remove that toxin created there as well as to remove the Chelators in the I/O (or almost every other brand too) new salt mix. Since you do not have a deep sand bed, mass macro algae beds or deep rock substrate in there, O2 depletion is not as likely to happen at night from microbiol activity. It may go down, but, depletion is another thing.
I am assuming that you are still running an over flow into something. If not, with all that coral in there feeding at night, oh man, you gotta have an overflow going to a sump.
Don't go wild with water changes since it looks like the buffer system is messed up. A little at a time, a couple times a day to equal not more than 10% per day! Do 10% per day for 10 days and then see where you are. The corals may go shocky on you. Run the carbon and don't sweat it. They'll close up till all is stable again.
Hope something here is helpful.

[Jimnorris]

Good news now is all well! Larry somewhere in your respond I think you hit on it (the problem) It took me afew days to hook up another overflow and start skimmimg the water surface.
Thanks all for caring!
Jim

[beareef19]

I hope everthing will get back to normal, aloss like that is some times hard to deal with :cry:

[Instar]

Jim, I am really sorry for all that mess. I don't believe it was the O2/CO2 and lack of an overflow alone that did the fish in though. Those wrasses and blennies shut down thier respirations at night and the demand for O2 is very low with them. They, and the angels do have something in common though, that separates them from the tangs. The tangs are obligate herbivores and the others are omnivors. Their metabolism of protien is different. O2 saturation went down the first night, yet all the fish survived. Since all of the ones that passed metabolized protein to a greater extend, they would have a higher urea and creatin production than the tangs. With the dKh so elevated as to keep the pH above 8.2 without the overflow, and depress the Calcium to 425, the balance is a bit off. In that lies the reason I said blood poisoning because kidney function is related to the buffer-acid-base balance and the tangs don't have as much of that to get rid of. Blood poisoning takes longer to show up. I thought you had a calcium reactor; don't you? The sump and refugium is only part of the picture, I think. I hate to loose even a small thing let alone all you lost. Ugh! A domino effect of things. If you need help, I'd try to be useful if I could.