Non-Tank Related Issues While on Vacation

[Oscaror]

Where's the option for "Issues that cause water to overflow and ruin the wall in my basement"?

 

[smartwater101]

I assume a temp probe could work fine outside of water, so maybe have one outside the tank and stand to measure room temp and alert you if it gets too hot (or cold in winter).

Do we know if this is true or not? Id very much like to use my extra probe for room temperature!

 

[Hermie]

luck didn't have much to do with it, I had an overstocked freshwater tank, my fish died when I went on a 3 day vacation, I would have probably noticed symptoms if I was there and responded with a water change.

 

[McFly]

Best advice pre-vacation is not to start messing with anything.

Tweaking things 3 hours before you are set to leave is always a bad idea. (It is very tempting though.)

Hmm.. my skimmer is running a bit dry, or my overflow is a little high... let me just...

 

[vlangel]

I have a seahorse tank and a reef tank. I have never had an issue with my reef tanks but vacationing with seahorses is a whole other story. They need exceptionally clean water quality plus they eat multiple Xs a day but do not process their food very efficiently. Still I vowed that I would not be a slave to the seahorse tank.

My sister comes once a day and feeds frozen premeasured mysis. When they finish she nets live feeder shrimp. After 3 days she checks the sump height and does an easy WCs. If I do a big WC at the beginning and end of the trip, this arrangement works for a week.

I did have a problem when I had a friend's child take care of the seahorses and the ATO malfunctioned. They did not know and so the sump pump shut down. Luckily I only lost 1 seahorse because it could have been much worse. I guess that is not bad since I have had seahorses for almost 5 years and reef tanks since 2007.

 

[User1]

Unlucky - lost a tank. California rolling brown outs during the Enron window 2000 - 2001. Family reunion, vacation, everyone was gone in which case during the window a series of brown outs hit back to back tripping our AC circuit breaker or something. In any case everyone was with us and I didn't really have a house sitter. Temp rose in the house, water evaporated quicker, used up top off quicker, one thing lead to another and sump ran dry. Pumps froze. More circuit breakers tripped up and that was it.

Came home to a rotten egg smell from a tank that went nuclear. I think it would have all be lost had I a larger top off container due to the excessive temps but had I a backup / house sitter near by...maybe could have caught it and prevented it. More I look back yeah, I could have done more.

At least with the Apex fusion there is a heart beat and I'll know if it at least goes off line for the first round of early warnings. Apex head unit plug, router, and switch to complete the end to end network traffic is on a backup battery. Only left now is to add something to generate limited flow in the tank and I'll be ready for the next vacation now that I have a larger tank again. That and someone stopping by at least once a day maybe is also a good idea

 

[Ebslinger]

Sort of confused here.. Non-Tank issues..? Does that mean issues other than tank related? I worry more about tank issues than non-tank issues.

 

[dbl]

Sort of confused here.. Non-Tank issues..? Does that mean issues other than tank related? I worry more about tank issues than non-tank issues.

The point of the post was in fact non-tank related issues...in my case, the A/C going out. But prepping for vacation as an owner of a reef tank is all encompassing...lol.

 

[MARK M. DAVIS]

I have a generator and multiple ups’ for apex and WiFi /router. I mainly monitor before going on trips. I have dual heaters and a chiller. I monitor my apex. I turn off auto water change dos’. Have sitter feed, only! I can call lfs if I have a tank related issue. No losses!

 

[vetteguy53081]

I have a trusted local club member who stops on the way home each day to check on and feed my tanks. I give him access to all my apex units so he can monitor from work.
I did not tell him about my new tank. waiting to see his reaction when he comes again and sees this beast

 

[Rilo]

I went on a one year anniversary for 3 days.

When I came back I had a dead clownfish. That sparked cyano coating on everything. I then moved and disturbed the sandbed to much killing lots of tiny organisms in the sand. I removed what I could to another tank at the time but most corals died and the remaining clownfish and ywg died as well.

I took out all the sand form the tank prepared 8g of new saltwater and went barebottom. The cyano is gone and I placed the corals back and everything is fine now.

 

[webmanny]

I've been lucky so far, but after reading this, I am thoroughly freaked out.

 

[ScottB]

I now have standby power and 2 APEX systems and dedicated circuits for each system. LFS drops by every other day to feed/check in when we are away.

So, yeah. I have had some issues. More than the four I solved for above. But those issues won't be repeated. There will likely be new and more interesting issues in the future. Murphy is always around, ready to teach me something new.

 

[ca1ore]

You can plan and mitigate for most issues, but not all. Many years ago, while on vacation in January, the house boiler decided to quit. This was before apex, so no alerts to receive. House temperature dropped into the mid 30s. I had enough heating capacity on the tank to keep it 20 degrees above ambient, but not 45. Tank was in the low 50s when I got home. All coral lost, some fish but not all. I do now keep extra backup heat, but even now would be hard pressed to make up for 45 degrees below ambient. Cooling I have covered - even if the house got up to 90 degrees, the chiller will keep the tank at 78-79. Standby generator means never without power.

 

[Jman76]

I actually just got back from a week vacation. I can honestly say I got lucky, no issues other that the expected diatoms. I was totally paranoid how to handle going on vacation. I couldn't find it in me to let someone come to my house while I'm gone. With the help from member AiKkz in the forums, I determined I needed an auto feeder. ATO was already good to go. Gave myself a week before leaving to make sure it worked. Was nervous about dry food and algae issues, but ended up not being terrible. Water was good except nitrates crept up to 30. Crazy thing is, all of my corals were HUGE when I returned. Lots of growth! I also live where it's hot, so completely understand the AC concerns. My AC units were just serviced too ;Nailbiting So Id say I got lucky! Thanks for the help!

 

[xxkenny90xx]

About 5 years ago we went on vacation from WA to FL for 8 days. My sister was gonna stop by and feed the fish each morning (apparently before my leds were set to turn on). So of course she turned them on full blast 100% which is how they stayed the whole week. We lost quite a bit of coral and had some seriously unhappy fish when we got back!

 

[sfin52]

we had a two tornadoes go through our town a few years back. I had only a fresh water with some plants. A few days after the tornadoes we got 11 inches of snow. We were with out power for 7 days. Everything survived.

 

[MombasaLionfish]

I went on vacation for three days and before I left I did not know I had ich in the tank. That was a bit of a disaster.