Access the mess.

Denimpapi · Dec 17, 2018

Ok so a bit background.
I'm in the army and only get to see my tank on the weekend.
I left my tank with my Girlfriend in her apartment. She has 0 experience with pets or animals or aquariums. She just does what I tell her to do. The thing she is missing is the eye for small details and seeing developing Problems.
Well half my fish population just died and I'm sure more are following. Also all my corals are releasing the zoozhanteli so they are dying too. a few days ago I pulled out the Refugium LED out of the water it was plugged in and all. ofcourse no working anymore also it was full of green and brown stuff. After that the first fish started dying. And a huge algae outbreak came too. I believe that the light fell into the water and has been there for several days releasing heavy metals into the water because the green film on the light looked like corroding copper. I don't know what to do now. I know my tank is doomed and I'm 100% sure it was cause she oversaw the Led in the water for days. So where do I go from here.

Retro Reefer · Dec 17, 2018

large water changes and adding a poly bio marine poly filter would be my first step.

Denimpapi · Dec 17, 2018

Retro Reefer said:
large water changes and adding a poly bio marine poly filter would be my first step.

won't the large water change give the already weekend fish the rest tho ?

Retro Reefer · Dec 17, 2018

Multiple large water changes over a few days is going to be the only way to remove toxins from water.. a poly filter will remove some heavy metals and other contaminants I always have them handy for such emergencies.

Retro Reefer · Dec 17, 2018

Oh... BTW, welcome to R2R

KrisReef · Dec 17, 2018

Denimpapi said:
Ok so a bit background.
I'm in the army and only get to see my tank on the weekend.
I left my tank with my Girlfriend in her apartment. She has 0 experience with pets or animals or aquariums. She just does what I tell her to do. The thing she is missing is the eye for small details and seeing developing Problems.
Well half my fish population just died and I'm sure more are following. Also all my corals are releasing the zoozhanteli so they are dying too. a few days ago I pulled out the Refugium LED out of the water it was plugged in and all. ofcourse no working anymore also it was full of green and brown stuff. After that the first fish started dying. And a huge algae outbreak came too. I believe that the light fell into the water and has been there for several days releasing heavy metals into the water because the green film on the light looked like corroding copper. I don't know what to do now. I know my tank is doomed and I'm 100% sure it was cause she oversaw the Led in the water for days. So where do I go from here.

Welcome to R2R!

Not sure how you can keep a tank under these circumstances?
I had several girlfriends like you have described, Including an ex wife who made my life difficult to say the least. If you want to have children or a little reef tank I think it would be best to wait until either you can be home to watch over the home or until you get a more reliable girlfriend.
Thank you for your service to our country, and welcome again to R2R!

A polyfilter might help remove any toxins in the tank, but it can’t lift a light out if it falls in again? HTH .

Denimpapi · Dec 17, 2018

Thanks for welcoming me guys.
I know and I'm guilty aswell for leaving such a hard task to someone who doesn't have any experience at all. But you know after 4 years in the Army I finally wanted a Tank again and her getting her own apartment seemed like such a great opportunity. Anyway I will try the polyfilter already ordered it on Amazon just now. I won't be home for another month so I'll have to guide her through it. Let's hope the polyfilter can pull out enough. I also put in a bunch of Carbon when I pulled out the light. My Radions I made sure that they wouldn't fall into the water but the Fuge light I totally forgot about it. And I bought all the equipment to make it as low maintenance as possible xD should have bought a better lightfixture for the fuge light.

Metasyntactic · Dec 17, 2018

Denimpapi said:
And I bought all the equipment to make it as low maintenance as possible xD should have bought a better lightfixture for the fuge light.

It doesn't matter how fancy your equipment, Murphy's Law always wins out. I'm with you, I'm always nervous every time I go out to sea that I'm going to come back to a tank crash and a confused bf. Doesn't help he keeps threatening to feed my angelfish to the cat. :mad:

Retro Reefer · Dec 17, 2018

Denimpapi said:
Thanks for welcoming me guys.
I know and I'm guilty aswell for leaving such a hard task to someone who doesn't have any experience at all. But you know after 4 years in the Army I finally wanted a Tank again and her getting her own apartment seemed like such a great opportunity. Anyway I will try the polyfilter already ordered it on Amazon just now. I won't be home for another month so I'll have to guide her through it. Let's hope the polyfilter can pull out enough. I also put in a bunch of Carbon when I pulled out the light. My Radions I made sure that they wouldn't fall into the water but the Fuge light I totally forgot about it. And I bought all the equipment to make it as low maintenance as possible xD should have bought a better lightfixture for the fuge light.

Poly filter alone is probably not going to help your situation very much, an immediate large water change is highly recommend.. are there any petcos near you? They sell boxed ready to use salt water which should make doing water change fairly easy for your GF, to keep it simple she can just dip out water from display tank with a pitcher or something similar and replace same amount with boxed water..