Crashed aquarium

[Dave Carothers]

I hear people talk about their aquarium crashing. What does this mean?

 

[BanjoBandito]

"Aquarium Crashes" are when there is a near complete die off of life. It's usually caused by user error (overdosing nutrients or supplements) that causes wild swings in levels like PH, ALK, Ca, Mg, Nitrates, Phosphates, etc. There's also the dreaded "equipment failure", it's pretty common to see someone have a probe or thermometer go bad and the tank hits 90+ degrees and cooks it. There's "infection crashes" too, which means either ich, velvet, dinos, or something undesirable wiped out everything. There's all sorts of variables, but when people say "tank crashed" it means something wiped out the livestock.

 

[Jekyl]

Crashes is a bad word imo. The only "crashes" that happen would be due to heater failure, ato stuck on, or a foreign chemical getting into the system. It's far more likely that people are either doing too much or not enough with their tanks. For example dosing things like crazy that aren't necessary or lack of maintenance.

 

[Dave Carothers]

"Aquarium Crashes" are when there is a near complete die off of life. It's usually caused by user error (overdosing nutrients or supplements) that causes wild swings in levels like PH, ALK, Ca, Mg, Nitrates, Phosphates, etc. There's also the dreaded "equipment failure", it's pretty common to see someone have a probe or thermometer go bad and the tank hits 90+ degrees and cooks it. There's "infection crashes" too, which means either ich, velvet, dinos, or something undesirable wiped out everything. There's all sorts of variables, but when people say "tank crashed" it means something wiped out the livestock.

Thanks for the thread. I hear reefers commenting on their tank crashing, but usually don't see them giving a reason why this happened. It would be useful to know so others can avoid the dreaded "crash".

 

[BanjoBandito]

Thanks for the thread. I hear reefers commenting on their tank crashing, but usually don't see them giving a reason why this happened. It would be useful to know so others can avoid the dreaded "crash".

Most of the time crashes happen due to outside circumstances, like power outages, voltage leakage into aquarium, faulty equipment....or just a general lack of care/maintenance.

But hey, we had that guy that the cat kept pooping in his sump and he couldn't figure out why his corals looked soooooo good. lol. Sometimes there's happy accidents.