ALL CORAL DEAD AFTER MOVE. WHAT DO I DO NEXT

[Bubba002]

After I moved found all my coral is dead, what do I do with the rock they are attached to?

 

[kittenbritches]

Dead dead? How did you transport them? How long was it before they were back in the tank?

If they're really dead, pop 'em off. But I personally would try to give them a little time if there's any chance they're just traumatized and ticked.

 

[Bubba002]

Packed them in buckets, movers picked up last Monday, unloaded late Tuesday...found in garage Wednesday morning. Some water with the rocks and coral were fine….some NOT. Threw out everything that smelled. Some coral was still alive, some rocks were fine. Set tank up and it spiked ammonia. Throwing away coral daily tomorrow it all goes. fish died coral died but I can still see a rock that is still covered with GHA.

 

[kittenbritches]

Packed them in buckets, movers picked up last Monday, unloaded late Tuesday...found in garage Wednesday morning. Some water with the rocks and coral were fine….some NOT. Threw out everything that smelled. Some coral was still alive, some rocks were fine. Set tank up and it spiked ammonia. Throwing away coral daily tomorrow it all goes. fish died coral died but I can still see a rock that is still covered with GHA.

Oof. Buckets with no oxygen and no flow?

 

[elorablue]

Sorry, this was the house movers that moved your fish, coral and tank?

 

[Bubba002]

It was supposed to be a 5 hour drive, movers decided they needed to go to a motel and let everything sit till the next afternoon

 

[elorablue]

Ok.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

I'm sorry to say it bud, but you'll probably lose more under those conditions. Remove what you can from the rock. a beater chisel will help remove things that are encrusted.

 

[Bubba002]

Sorry, this was the house movers that moved your fish, coral and tank?

No, movers took tank, we had fish and coral but the movers didn’t get there to unload, I am disabled and my 7o year old husband couldn’t do it till they got there to help.

 

[Bubba002]

I'm sorry to say it bud, but you'll probably lose more under those conditions. Remove what you can from the rock. a beater chisel will help remove things that are encrusted.

Re-cook all my rocks?

 

[elorablue]

No, movers took tank, we had fish and coral but the movers didn’t get there to unload, I am disabled and my 7o year old husband couldn’t do it till they got there to help.

Very sad, I hope you can save what you can and start over successfully! Best of luck!

 

[kittenbritches]

There's a lot to unpack here, but ultimately it sounds like this is just an unfortunate and very expensive lesson to have learned. Worst case, with the inability to lift the buckets yourself, it would have helped to run an extension cord and drop a powerhead and heater into each bucket.

If you want to start again, clear the rocks of dead stock, algae, and debris, and start filling the tank. Since the rock stayed wet, hopefully you'll just have to do a quick mini-cycle before you can start restocking.

 

[Bubba002]

This was the 4th tank we have moved with out a loss, one from Georgia with av21 hour drive. This makes me look like a bad reefer. My 125 moved up gram georgia

 

[kittenbritches]

This was the 4th tank we have moved with out a loss, one from Georgia with av21 hour drive. This makes me look like a bad reefer. My 125 moved up gram georgia

Sounds like it was just the perfect mix of crappy circumstances. I'm sorry to hear it. Hope you can get back up and running soon!

 

[jhuntstl]

Truly sorry for all your losses. I hope you recover and come back stronger than ever. Best wishes.

 

[Chrisv.]

So is there coral still alive in the tank? Or are we just talking about rocks at this point? Sorry that this happened.

 

[monti mike]

After I moved found all my coral is dead, what do I do with the rock they are attached to?

Ugh that sucks. Sorry Bubbas. I went through something similar recently with a heater malfunction that killed all my sps. I kept the rocks and used this tool to break off all the dead acro skeletons.

BRS Large Curved Blade SPS Coral Cutter

The ultimate coral cutter for large colonies of branching SPS! Add this to your coral propagation kit for those mature SPS colonies. These are technically called Plastic Nipper Cow Horn Jaws. We've found these to be especially useful for fragging larger colonies of branching SPS like Acropora...

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