And then there were none...

[Valkyrie]

My husband texted me a msg to call home when I got the chance. I was at work and since he has never, in our 17 years together, ever asked me to call home I called him right away. Without preamble he said, "all the fish are dead in the saltwater tank." (I have freshwater, too.) I was stunned. What? There wasn't much I could say, he knows little to nothing about fish tanks at all, so I didn't ask any questions except, "are you sure?" I had 2 hours of my shift yet and surgeries to tend to so I had no way of leaving early.

The only thing he reported was that it was kinda cloudy in the tank. I was beside myself! I have been so careful to watch my water parameters, kept my feeding to just what they'll eat. I had added a blue devil, a teeny tiny red scooter blenny and 1 1/4 inch diameter orange starfish, just in the last month. Everyone was getting on well, the clowns welcomed them with open fins. I was continuing my water changes and watching everything closely.

When I got home, the first thing I did was put my hand in the water. HOLY CRAAAAAAAP!!!! Seems I have a malfunctioning heater, the water was nearly 100 degrees Fahrenheit!!!! My babies cooked!! Of course, ya'all know what happens when the heat goes up in a tank...the algae & bacteria growth increases exponentially. So the ammonia and nitrites did their damage, too.

I'm devastated. On the one hand I'm relieved that *I* personally didn't screw up, on the other hand I'm so angry ...at no one and nothing in particular. This kind of crap can happen and even if I had an alarm or remote access to the temperature, I was at work, I couldn't have done anything to stop the escalation. So, after I talked myself down off of the "I QUIT!!!" cliff I decided I'll finish my sump, buy a new heater of MY choosing and start over. Do I need to buy new live sand, is this stuff ruined now? I had such a beautiful buffet for my little dragonet, too. It'll be another friggin' 10 months before I get another scooter. :mad:

So this hot water also made these disgusting white worms come out of my live rock. Long skinny suckers. One of them was still alive and wiggling. That's it. I'm done. I didn't buy this live rock, I have been very disappointed in it since I got the tank and I don't want it, as is, in my tank anymore. So, I'm going to kill and dry the rock. Can I? I think I read somewhere that I can soak in bleach, rinse well and leave in the sun for a few weeks. Something like that, I'll read up on it. But if ya'll think I should put it back into the tank, I guess I can but I keep wondering if these worms in my rocks is why I was fighting the nitrites for a while. Maybe a life cycle of them was happening? Being a vet tech, things with worms are bad and I keep telling myself these might be some good guys, but it's hard to overcome my prejudice.

Think I'll go cry for a while.

 

[domination2580]

Hey, sorry for the loss, as far as white worms, do u have pics? Also, you can do the bleach method. I did it nyself along woth muriatic acid bath and fresh rodi water soaked after. As far as heaters go id go for the finnex brand witha controller. It has an alarm and a temp probe

 

[Valkyrie]

Thanks. All I've got is a pic of one in it's short stubby phase. It can elongate. I found that out when I grabbed one end of it and it steeeeetched.

Do you think it's one of those "peanut" worms? I hear they're beneficial, but I'm past the point of caring. I'm a control freak and I tried leaving this tank as I got it from an acquaintance. This event leaves me saying, nope, gonna do it my way now.

 

[Macdaddynick1]

Sorry to hear that, it happens when we least expect it. Personally I would suggest apex as a good insurance for the situations like this. As it will not only notify you but it will even shut off the heater for you. If you personally don't like the worms I think it would be a good idea to dry the rock, and then cycle it again. And the sand can be washed but if it's a small tank, it's probably easier to buy a new bag or two.

 

[Valkyrie]

It's a 29g tank. I like the idea of one that will shut off.
What really gets me, is that my heater over heating my tanks has been a fear I've had for years and years. I should have listened to that and got something that would help ease my mind so I wouldn't have to go through this. Day late and a dollar short.

 

[eliramos]

wow what a tragedy I'm so sorry for your loss!
as far as a the white worms go...they look like peanut worms totally harmless and great detritivores but if you hate the rock you can definitely cook the rock.
best of luck! once again so sorry

 

[Valkyrie]

Ok, so for the last hour the rocks have been out on the porch in a bucket. My other concern is that with all of the bacteria and nitrates going wild and the death of these worms (what if there's more that didn't come out?) and I was only able to pull half of one of the deceased out of the rock cuz it broke, isn't that going to work against me trying to get my tank back to normal? Is it too late to put the rocks back if I decided to do so?

 

[domination2580]

Ok, so for the last hour the rocks have been out on the porch in a bucket. My other concern is that with all of the bacteria and nitrates going wild and the death of these worms (what if there's more that didn't come out?) and I was only able to pull half of one of the deceased out of the rock cuz it broke, isn't that going to work against me trying to get my tank back to normal? Is it too late to put the rocks back if I decided to do so?

How bad is the water? How hot or corks did the get?

 

[Valkyrie]

It got up to 98F.
I honestly haven't checked how bad the water is yet. I opened the top and turned off the heater. I got home later than usual so I haven't ran any checks yet. I figured it didn't matter anyway since everyone is dead, I'd just let the skimmer continue running and clean it out again tomorrow when I get home. Then Friday night I'll run all my checks, do a 75% water change, check again and then go from there. I'm expecting to be fishless for at least 6 months. :mad:

 

[DLHDesign]

Sorry for your loss. Glad that you are not giving up - getting through the tough times will make the good times ahead all the more appreciated.

What really gets me, is that my heater over heating my tanks has been a fear I've had for years and years.

One piece of advice that I heard is that heaters fail - always. Not "if"; but "when". The average heater seems to run fault free - the advice went (I think this was BRS's 52 Weeks?) - for about a year or so before it either fails completely (with a coin flip on whether it fails "on", such as yours, or fails "off") or else starts to degrade such that it becomes gradually less efficient (which, eventually, is practically the same as an "off" failure). As such, if you don't have redundancy (ex; 2nd heater, usually set 1 or 2 degrees higher) and a fail-safe (ex; apex or secondary temperature probe), then another option is to just replace the heater every year (working or not).

Can't really help with anything else you've got going on, sorry. Keep at it - it'll get better.

(And thanks for all that you do to help animals. Great job!)

 

[mcarroll]

One thing I can add about selecting heaters is to select appropriately sized heaters for each tank on the system you are heating.

This gives you a degree (or more) of redundancy while reducing the capacity of any one heater failure to cook the whole system.

I also agree that a controller makes for good insurance. A Reefkeeper Lite ($120) will do it nicely, and doesn't cost any more than a complete set of power strips, timers and extension cables for wall-warts, et al.

I've pretty much always used Marineland Visitherm heaters....glass, lifetime warranty. I've sent two back for free replacement in 20 or so years...both simply stopped working. I've still got a couple of old ones on active heating duty (one in each of my display tanks) from my first freshwater tanks years ago.

Last, and this goes against a fair amount of conventional wisdom these days, use more power-hungry equipment when possible. That way the whole heating load isn't on your heaters. For example, when I upgraded my skimmer a few years ago, the watts of my skimmer pump dropped from around 70 to around 15. I ended up having to add two extra heaters in the dead of winter that year to keep the tank warm...the old skimmer pump was making a significant contribution to heat – and not in a bad way.

 

[njtiger aquariums]

sorry for your lost. Heater can be that equipment you set and forget about until something bad happens (either during turn on/off or something else). When I first started out in saltwater I had a high/low temp alarm on my system (no controller just a cheap alarm). Now one day my wife told me she heard an odd noise coming from my tank. I went and looked, saw nothing wrong, heard nothing wrong. In the middle of the night I got a low temp alarm. Now the alarm has acted up on me before so I just silent it and went back to bed. In the morning as I was driving to work I remember the alarm and what my wife told me so I turned around just to really give me tank a look over. I got home and saw a yellow light on my heater (normal red or green) so I looked up what the light meant. Turned out my heater was recalled for electrical issues. Lucky I was in the middle of getting my 54 ready so I robbed the heater from the 54, put it in my current tank, and ordered a new heater for the 54.

Another story - I am building my own controller. I added a temp sensor and text alert. I ran into some bugs, which are worked out, where I would get alerts that my tank was 32F or 190F. The time I got the 190F I called my wife, I was at work, and asked her to check my tank. She said everything was fine and it was. That alert got me to thinking that as I build more options in my controller I am going to add an option that if my temp does go over a set limit my controller will kill power to the heater. I am using the Finnex Titanium heaters now and they seem to be working well for me. But as others have mentions heater do fail.

 

[ReeferBob]

Very sad news. I 2nd the Reefkeeper light. Out of the box it will provide you with a heater controller (and light controller, etc). The cheapest on the market at under $120 and expandable.

 

[revhtree Verified Admin]

So sorry...

 

[Brew12]

As such, if you don't have redundancy (ex; 2nd heater, usually set 1 or 2 degrees higher) and a fail-safe (ex; apex or secondary temperature probe), then another option is to just replace the heater every year (working or not).

I saw a great piece of advice related to this. Put 1 heater in your tank that maintains temp where you want it. Put a backup heater in your tank at a setting colder than what you want but still high enough to protect your tank. The idea with this is that your backup heater should almost never come on if it isn't an emergency. Every year throw away your running heater, switch your backup heater to become your running heater, and buy a new heater for backup.
And of course, use the backup controller (like an apex) to provide over temp protection with both. Wouldn't be a bad idea to put them both on separate GFCI circuits, either, but that is a topic for another day.

 

[Clarksski]

So sorry for the loss of your fish friends. Makes me so sad too.

 

[jd371]

So sorry. I have a Ranco controller on my heater. You must have some type of control for the heater, eventually it will fail and 99% of the time on the on position.

https://www.amazon.com/RANCO-ETC-11...?ie=UTF8&qid=1472146762&sr=8-2&keywords=ranco

 

[StrangeReef]

Sorry for your loss, it sucks to start from scratch with dead rock.. I boiled all of my rock and sand last summer after fighting a loosing battle against Aptasia for a whole year, broke my heart to see my mature liverock bare again.

But at the same time going from dead rock and seeding the system again with a few select pieces of good LR and watching all the pods, worms, micro brittle stars, chitons etc repopulate is interesting...

I'm expecting to be fishless for at least 6 months. :mad:

Its not so bad lol.. I've been fishless for 10 months now and i have to say I'm a fan of it, low feeding and care requirements and now i have so many mysis shrimp and pods I watch them swim around instead lol

 

[beaslbob]

Sorry for your loss.

No reason to be fishless for months and month. Wait a week or two and then see if you can get a male molly to live. When it does live for a few weeks then the tank has recovered.

I would also add macro algae (in an in tank or other refugium). that will make the tank more forgiving of bumps in the night.

no need to cure the rocks in any way.

IMHO you lost stuff because of the heater failure. The tankwill recover in a week or two on it's own. You might also consider not running a heater as long as the environment is comfortable to humans.

But that's all just my .02
(and you get what you pay for. LOL)

 

[drernesto Verified Sponsor]

Sorry for that!