Dipan Desai
Active Member
- Joined
- Dec 3, 2017
- Messages
- 174
- Reaction score
- 191
- What state or country do you live in
- California
I had to go through fumigation with my reef tank and searching high and low there just was not that much info out there. Dana Riddle had a good one and one other person (Singlefin). Pretty much everything else I saw out there was stating to remove all live stock. Having a 187g system with 75g sump stocked seemed stressful and not ideal.
They used Vikane and tear gas in my house. Fumigators showed up first thing on Monday morning at 7am. We were out by 8am house sealed and pumped full of gas. We were back in on Wed by 12pm. So roughly 2 nights 3 days for Drywood Termite Fumigation. There some wins, losses and lessons learned. My fault on losses. So lets get into it.
I needed to keep positive pressure in the system so if there was a leak gas would not be allowed in and would be pushed out. for that I bought a air pump.
Next I didn't just want to throw the pump outside and risk any gas getting in when they vented the house. So I got a bucket from home depot and put a bunch of holes at the bottom.
Then put a piece of paper towel on the inside to cover the holes but still vent.
Next step filled with Carbon
Final step before pump goes in was putting a heater filter pad I got from home depot over the carbon and sealing it up.
Next I put a hole for the air pump and connected the pump.
I added a ball valve to regulate the air coming out of the pump to ensure the seal did not pop. Here is how I tested everything. I had 1 line split into two. 1 for the display and 1 for the sump to make sure both kept positive pressure.
3/8 airline in with 1/4in out.
Sealing the tank I had the fumigation company give me lots of Nylofume bags for the first seal. I taped enough bags to cover the display and also made one big enough for the sump. I Used 0 residue duct tape for all of this.
Lets seal this bad boy up.
Yay positive pressure! Things are working great. Sealing the display wasn't to bad as there was not too much to work around. The sump on the other hand was a total pain in the butt as I had to work around all the plumbing to seal it up.
Being super paranoid I added a 2nd seal just to be safe to the display and sump. I bought a roll of 6 mil plastic sheeting to go over everything once again for an extra seal.
Sealed the top and bottom twice. Then I used the leftover 6 mil sheet to seal the whole bottom shut one more time (Yeah I was paranoid) if you cant tell.
Ran the pump and all airlines outside about 10ft away from the tenting. Sealed the top of the bucket shut.
3 day waiting game now. I kept sump pump running and also gyre in display, along with still dosing alk, only as my ca, and mag was high. I did stop my ATO. I also kept my lights on as well. I had a camera set up to watch everything while away. Yeah pure torture. I could have watched my entire system die right in front of my eyes without being able to do anything.
But guess what? This was a 100% survival. No losses at all. All sps are fine and thriving along with about 15 fish.
Now for the bad. I did have a frag tank connected to this set up with 4 snails and tons of pods. I took most of frags out minus a few zoas i didnt care for. I sealed it up with a heater, but didn't add any flow or positive air pressure. Everything in there died except for 1 snail. This was def my fault and avoidable.
Happy Tank
They used Vikane and tear gas in my house. Fumigators showed up first thing on Monday morning at 7am. We were out by 8am house sealed and pumped full of gas. We were back in on Wed by 12pm. So roughly 2 nights 3 days for Drywood Termite Fumigation. There some wins, losses and lessons learned. My fault on losses. So lets get into it.
I needed to keep positive pressure in the system so if there was a leak gas would not be allowed in and would be pushed out. for that I bought a air pump.
Next I didn't just want to throw the pump outside and risk any gas getting in when they vented the house. So I got a bucket from home depot and put a bunch of holes at the bottom.
Then put a piece of paper towel on the inside to cover the holes but still vent.
Next step filled with Carbon
Final step before pump goes in was putting a heater filter pad I got from home depot over the carbon and sealing it up.
Next I put a hole for the air pump and connected the pump.
I added a ball valve to regulate the air coming out of the pump to ensure the seal did not pop. Here is how I tested everything. I had 1 line split into two. 1 for the display and 1 for the sump to make sure both kept positive pressure.
3/8 airline in with 1/4in out.
Sealing the tank I had the fumigation company give me lots of Nylofume bags for the first seal. I taped enough bags to cover the display and also made one big enough for the sump. I Used 0 residue duct tape for all of this.
Lets seal this bad boy up.
Yay positive pressure! Things are working great. Sealing the display wasn't to bad as there was not too much to work around. The sump on the other hand was a total pain in the butt as I had to work around all the plumbing to seal it up.
Being super paranoid I added a 2nd seal just to be safe to the display and sump. I bought a roll of 6 mil plastic sheeting to go over everything once again for an extra seal.
Sealed the top and bottom twice. Then I used the leftover 6 mil sheet to seal the whole bottom shut one more time (Yeah I was paranoid) if you cant tell.
Ran the pump and all airlines outside about 10ft away from the tenting. Sealed the top of the bucket shut.
3 day waiting game now. I kept sump pump running and also gyre in display, along with still dosing alk, only as my ca, and mag was high. I did stop my ATO. I also kept my lights on as well. I had a camera set up to watch everything while away. Yeah pure torture. I could have watched my entire system die right in front of my eyes without being able to do anything.
But guess what? This was a 100% survival. No losses at all. All sps are fine and thriving along with about 15 fish.
Now for the bad. I did have a frag tank connected to this set up with 4 snails and tons of pods. I took most of frags out minus a few zoas i didnt care for. I sealed it up with a heater, but didn't add any flow or positive air pressure. Everything in there died except for 1 snail. This was def my fault and avoidable.
Happy Tank
Last edited:
