Inverts Won’t Survive

[ethanbear111]

Copper is also the first thing that came to my mind. Please do measure the copper,

should you find any traces of copper, check the sandbed for lost bits of metal, or it could be that your rocks are leeching trace elements into your water - did you get used rocks?

I got Indonesia ocean cultured live rock. They had crabs and sea stars on them, which promptly died in the tank.

 

[lmm1967]

Was your tank and equipment new or used?

 

[ethanbear111]

Was your tank and equipment new or used?

All new.

 

[Averhoeven]

This screams copper to me. Get a Hannah test kit (good for when you quarantine anyway). Gotta make sure you let the samples mix well and really wipe the tubes clean or you will get falsely high levels though.

 

[cmcoker]

I'm thinking metals from your tap water also, I'd run some metasorb and do weekly water changes with your new rodi water, try a couple hermits again in a few weeks.

 

[lapin]

+1 on metal. copper, arsenic or something out of the tap

 

[Rover]

I'm adding to the pile of people saying its probably something in your water.

Even once you get RODI water and mix pure saltwater out of it, you will be experiencing this problem until you've diluted whats in the tank down to a point the levels of whatever is causing the deaths is low enough to not be lethal. Depending on what percentage of water changes you do, this could take months. Hopefully you find the source of it! I'd try to see if you could locally get a copper test kit, or even just borrow one from somebody to try. That would be my first thought as its only the inverts dying straight off.

 

[NewGoby]

I got Indonesia ocean cultured live rock. They had crabs and sea stars on them, which promptly died in the tank.

Atleast your rock was (might still be) clean (it could be that your rocks have absorbed some of the copper to, so a full water-change isn't a guaranteed fix), I'd say it's definetly copper from your tap, or some kind of rusty bolt somewhere in the tank

 

[Reefinmike]

What are you testing with? Your results posted seem indicative of poor quality kits. If you are using test strips, tetra tests, api tests or a swing arm hydrometer- throw those away and buy quality, reliable tests.

 

[MTBake]

Another thing I would check is stray current in the tank.

I strongly recommend investing in a ro/di unit asap. Once you start making pure water, start mixing up batches of seawater for water changes. I would change out 5 gallons every other day for a couple weeks to purge the tap water contaminants out of the system. After that, I would try again.

 

[ethanbear111]

+1 on metal. copper, arsenic or something out of the tap

It isn’t copper, just tested the tank.

 

[ethanbear111]

Another thing I would check is stray current in the tank.

I strongly recommend investing in a ro/di unit asap. Once you start making pure water, start mixing up batches of seawater for water changes. I would change out 5 gallons every other day for a couple weeks to purge the tap water contaminants out of the system. After that, I would try again.

How would a snail be affected by stray current?

 

[cmcoker]

It isn’t copper, just tested the tank.

You would need an ICP test to detect low levels of copper. The copper reagent kit's are only good for testing when you are using a copper treatment for ich etc. They dont have a low enough resolution.

A low level of copper or other metals could still be the issue since inverts are more sensitive to it than fish

I'd run metasorb do weekly water changes of 10 to 15% for about a month. Then either icp test or try a couple hermits again.

 

[Jlyons]

Were you ever able to figure out the cause? I had an issue with copper in one of my tanks from a rusting magnet on a ring float feeder and used Detox. After a few days and treatment all was well and the tank was happy again.

 

[Erica-Renee]

What is the condition of the tank as far as nutrients,Algae growth and so on. Are you sure they are NOT Starving to death. I have had and seen some 5 month old tanks pristine clean with nothing for inverts to eat, and then tanks that could 100s of them.
If you are conservative on feeding ,Water changes and have little to no algae issues you Might just not need the number of inverts in your tank. There numbers will reduce on there own if they are not getting enough food..

Another Question,Well more like something to look at or consider.. Do you have other nutrient consumption life, Such as pods micro worms and so on. You could use them as a gauge to determine the need of inverts suck as snails and Crabs ..

My Thought is everyone is looking at chemistry as the issue , Maybe the issue is there is no issue at all. If this is case you will just have to feed more I recommend sinking wafers and hand feeding some of the inverts .

Again this is just another Theory as to what could the issue.. well non issue..

Thanks for Reading and good luck..

 

[MnFish1]

It isn’t copper, just tested the tank.

What is the lowest level of copper that your test detects? Most or at least some do not test anywhere near the level of copper that is toxic to invertebrates. So it will read zero but there is still enough to cause a problem. Not to mention all the other things ie metals you can’t measure. I would add sooner than later a polyfilter and cupriaorb and consider an icp test as you gradually change your water. The problem is that rocks etc in your tank may have assorted copper etc. and the leve in the water may be zero but it’s all over the rocks. The one sticky I would put up on the front page or r2r is if you want a reef tank with corals or inverts invest in an RODI system. Before anything else

 

[Jlyons]

Pretty sure the heavy metals in my system came from a float ring cube defroster that the magnet just became a mess. Overcame it all with no loss of coral or inverts with DETOX. That stuff was beyond a life saver!

 

[Jlyons]

This caused me so many headaches. I did run cuprisorb for a while as well.

 

[MnFish1]

How would a snail be affected by stray current?

Agree this seems to be a common fallback and though it can irritate things I think it’s a rare problem

Edit btw way the reason I say this is that I have had problems with pumps etc causing problems when I stick my hand in the water so there is certainly stray voltage. And I immediately removed them. However my fish and inverts have looked fine. But lots of equipment induces stray voltage in an aquarium at low levels and people measure it and think wow I found the problem. In reality they found an issue which is likely not causing the problem they are trying to solve

 

[MnFish1]

This caused me so many headaches. I did run cuprisorb for a while as well.

Curious. We’re you able to measure copper levels in your tank