Need to rant/encouragement

[Ricardo Berrios]

I Feel You i am going trough the same. My zoas are dying. My corals are shy and i cant figure out what it is. You at least got answer from people here I tried to make a tread so some one could help me and i havent had no answer.

By reading your tread i felt it was all taken of my brain cause your situation is just like me i spent hours and hours reading watching videos i even have a books and a note book to wrie everything i find important in my reading here or other sources.

I still need help with my zoas i dont know if its my hermits or my emeral crab or what could it be that has them slowly dying or pelling of polyp by polyp and end up floating around... GSP its not coming out neither and my Green Palua Neptha is ok but not streching as it use too

 

[Lowstorm]

I electrocuted myself last week. I know, rather minor. But hey, we all have off-weeks/months/years.. I quit for 2ish years due to a tank failing and the bottom breaking, leaking the whole darn tank onto the floor. Just go slow. Have a zen moment. Let whatever happens, happen.

 

[JamesPettus]

Couple of questions.

How would heavy metals get in the system to begin with?

Second would a skimmer even pull metals out? I thought it only pulled organi waste out.

Metal gets in from the foods. Your tank's water volume is much less than the ocean which means if you add a little bit of metals to the tank every day in a short period of time you can poison your fish - kind of like lead poison to a human. This is why we use protein skimmers. I'll post some pictures to explain how you may be introducing metals, through feeding, to your tank. The pic that says "toxic" is the cobalt.

 

[Tegridy Reef]

Pay for a couple aquarium service from a reliable store u will b on the fast track and they will help u a ton

 

[JamesPettus]

I added a second return pump to get rid of my problems. I built my stand a little high thinking it would look nice when standing infront of it. Well it does, but the head higher for my return pump is close to 6ft, and I had my return line hard piped in. This added resistance due to the two 90s, 2 45s, and the lock line. Well my 1200gph pump went down to 450gph and I was not skimming enough water. When I figured this out I added a second return pump and flex tubing for the two returns and vwala! All my alge and murderous tank problems went away.
Just make sure your skimmer is rated for at least your tank and try to match your return pump plus head loss to the skimmer gph. You should be turning over at least 10 times your tank per hour. So if you have a 100g tank you want your return pump gph (minus your losses due to turns and pipe diameter and head height) to return around 1000gph. Good luck

 

[JonS]

In my first 2 years of Reefing I had pumps that were too powerful and lights that were too strong. So I killed probably a thousand bucks worth of coral without really being able to figure out why it was dying. I had a blenny choke to death swallowing a whole cube of food and didn't find him for almost 2 days. That caused an ammonia spike that killed my maroon clown, my red Mandarin, my powder blue tang, and my yellow tang. Damsel and chromis lived through it, lol. I've fought and defeated bubble algae, and hair, and cyano, and diatoms, and dinos. The best thing I ever did was switching to smaller tunze pumps, and turning my kessils down to 50 percent or less. After that things started to come together for me. I don't have a ton of coral yet, but what I have is healthy. Also, I quit chasing numbers and mostly go by feel, if that makes any sense. I test occasionally just to make sure things are OK, but in general my corals tell me when to do something proactive just

by the way they look/behave

 

[JamesPettus]

Here's some pics of what's in the tank now

 

[reef_junkie]

You know it's pretty awesome that so many R2R members came out for the well wishes that the OP needed. I'm really proud to be a member here.

 

[Mikemccafe]

Have you considered an experienced reef maintenence company, to give you a different set of eyes on your tank for advice. May be money well spent

 

[MoneyMike1987]

Algae scrubber takes care of the algae for good.

If your disappointed in Neptune I feel sorry for you. They are the best controllers on the market if you know what you're doing.

 

[Griff]

Algae scrubber takes care of the algae for good.

If your disappointed in Neptune I feel sorry for you. They are the best controllers on the market if you know what you're doing.

Disappointed in neptunes tactics in releasing the new controller. The value dropped close to 50% before I even set it up. I would have waited for the new one if I'd known they were even working on a new one.

 

[Griff]

Metal gets in from the foods. Your tank's water volume is much less than the ocean which means if you add a little bit of metals to the tank every day in a short period of time you can poison your fish - kind of like lead poison to a human. This is why we use protein skimmers. I'll post some pictures to explain how you may be introducing metals, through feeding, to your tank. The pic that says "toxic" is the cobalt.

Wow that was extremely informative and detailed thanks for the post!

 

[Sharvey103]

After 20 years of being in the hobby it is mostly just patience we need to learn. Add bioload slowly and let the tank stabilize. Adding corals also needs to be done slowly so you can reach a new equalibrium on your parameters. I find it takes about a year using this approach before the tank is stable and healthy enough to handle larger or faster changes. Even if you load the tank somewhat from day 1 you will need to leave it alone and monitor chemistry and water changes regularly until it stablizes. In this day and age of live rock, live sand, Dr. Tim's, etc. we tend to believe we can have instant gratification with no issues. My biggest problem is still keeping my hands out of the tank. Use you eyes and watch your tank closely it will give you signs so you can head things off before they get out of control.