Crash and burn

[bjledbetter]

Woke up about a week ago to a tank that was milky white and had some type of foam on top. I checked everything and couldn't figure it out. I did a large water change and it was still just as cloudy. I left and went to class, By the end of the day my sps was dead and by the next morning my lps and nems were dead or dieing. The only thing that I have left is some gsp and a clam. I'm stumped as to what caused it. 8 years worth of work all Thur high school and most of college is gone. I'm highly disappointed but I will restart. I think I'm gonna go with a mostly acan and other lps tank this time. Any one have any ideas what could have done this? It has sense cleared up and looks fine, I've done several more water changes and check parameters daily. CA 520 MG 1380 ALK 9.8 Nitrates and phosphate 0 using la Mott test kit. Thanks for letting me vent lol I'll post before and after pic later when I get home.

 

[Dowtish]

What about fish? did they make it? are you running bio pellets? do you dose 2 part?

 

[always reefin]

Hang in there, learn and don't give up! This hobby is worth it

 

[SeahorseKeeper]

Bummer, sorry for the losses. Have you triple checked all the equipment? Could some type of contaminant gotten into the tank?

 

[Rob.D]

That sucks man, good luck with the restart.

 

[bjledbetter]

Strangely the fish snails and shrimp are fine. I do not run Bio pellets but do dose 2 part when needed but not very often bc I do 10 gallon water changes 3 times week on my 90 gallon tank sometimes more than that. I was battling bryopsis but what ever took out the coral got it too so that's one positive. I haven't seen any that's still alive

 

[bjledbetter]

I always thought the fish and clam would be the first to die if something ever went wrong. Oh well its a fresh start with fish included. Anyone know of where to get some good cheap acan or frogspawn frags or brains at to get me restarted? I can't stand not having corals in there. I'm headed home now I'll post pics when I get there

 

[bjledbetter]

I checked all the equipment and its fine but it got a good cleaning while the tank was down. I do have a candle that I light in there quite often could that have affected it?

 

[Dowtish]

with that many water changes, I wonder if you got a bad batch of salt???

 

[bjledbetter]

with that many water changes, I wonder if you got a bad batch of salt???

I've already thought of that and bought more salt. I was down to the bottom of a bucket of seachem reef salt when it happened and have quit using it. Im using reef crystals at the moment till I can get another bucket of something else. When the tank crashed I took the oppurtonity(sp) to remove my sand bed and replace it with black gravel I like the look better. I also took out the rocks and gave them a good cleaning to get all the dead stuff off of them and let them dry out for 2 days and dipped them in h2o2 to make surre they were cleaned. I've put the tank into a small mini cycle I think by doing this. I still have slightly cloudy water but nothing like it was, and I am having a brown thin layer of alage spreading over the rock and glass that I have to keep blowing off.

 

[cbrennan4]

Have you had you clam long? Sometimes the clam will spawn and crash a tank with the conditions you described. Try looking it up

 

[bjledbetter]

I just found what was keeping the water cloudy and it wasnt good!!! Appearantly one of the bta's excaped me and died in the tank. I just removed it and did another 5 gallon water change. and will do another 10 in the morning. I've heard of nems dieing and wipeing out whole tanks maybe all my water changes prevented it from killing the fish and clam, but i dont think its what started it all bc as far as I know all 4 were alive the night before it crashed. I've never heard of a spawn crashing a tank ill have to look into that. Ive had this one a little over a month. He's not doing to well at the moment I hope it makes it it's the first one ive ever had and if it dies I wont know if I did something or if the crash killed it.