Problems with clowns in quarantine

[DeniseAndy]

Those look like almost lesion type around the mouth and the fin. Maybe brook. Poor babies. If they passed that fast, probably nothing you could do.
I am so sorry for your loss. They were pretty.

 

[BamaCoastPyrat]

Sorry for your loss. I know how frustrating this is.

Concerning the QT, did you have a cycled filtration system in place? Since both died so quickly and without obvious signs of parasites, I'm concerned that something was amiss in the QT. As others have suggested, ammonia may be the culprit. Water stability can be difficult to maintain in an uncycled QT.

I use the Salifert kit Vetteguy53081 recommended for ammonia.

Thank you.

I have had an aquaclear 70 running in my display tank for the last 8 weeks. I used API quickstart and dosed with ammonia for the first two weeks, after that I added snails and hermit crabs. I took the sponge filter from the aquaclear 70 and placed it in the QT. I also dosed the QT with API quickstart.

Later last night I tested the ammonia in my display tank which has been running with 32 pounds of live rock and 1+" of fine sand, several doses of quickstart, and only 8 small snails and 6 small hermit crabs and found that the DT was reading the same color on the ammonia chart as the QT. I have not had any problems at all in the DT and I do not believe that it should be showing any ammonia level. I have done a lot of reading on the API ammonia test over the last 12 hours and it seems that a lot of people say it doesn't clearly show a baseline of 0. I saved a sample of water from the QT and I am going to find someone with better testing kits to check the ammonia.

Now there are plenty of things that I have done incorrectly and I believe the stress from all of these items is primarily what did the fish in. Maybe combined with whatever was on the lip of the one fish and an elevation in ammonia. I am going to start a build thread tonight and will write everything up.

In the mean time, I am confused on the Salifert tests as to which one I should buy. It looks like some measure just NH3 and others are labled as NH4 but have a picture of a bottle of NH3. Can you please provide a link to the exact kit you use?

 

[gbroadbridge]

Thank you.

I have had an aquaclear 70 running in my display tank for the last 8 weeks. I used API quickstart and dosed with ammonia for the first two weeks, after that I added snails and hermit crabs. I took the sponge filter from the aquaclear 70 and placed it in the QT. I also dosed the QT with API quickstart.

Later last night I tested the ammonia in my display tank which has been running with 32 pounds of live rock and 1+" of fine sand, several doses of quickstart, and only 8 small snails and 6 small hermit crabs and found that the DT was reading the same color on the ammonia chart as the QT. I have not had any problems at all in the DT and I do not believe that it should be showing any ammonia level. I have done a lot of reading on the API ammonia test over the last 12 hours and it seems that a lot of people say it doesn't clearly show a baseline of 0. I saved a sample of water from the QT and I am going to find someone with better testing kits to check the ammonia.

Now there are plenty of things that I have done incorrectly and I believe the stress from all of these items is primarily what did the fish in. Maybe combined with whatever was on the lip of the one fish and an elevation in ammonia. I am going to start a build thread tonight and will write everything up.

In the mean time, I am confused on the Salifert tests as to which one I should buy. It looks like some measure just NH3 and others are labled as NH4 but have a picture of a bottle of NH3. Can you please provide a link to the exact kit you use?

Salifert is based on Nessler reagent and is difficult to read so I don't use it.
The Red Sea is salicylate based which is easier to read.
Both measure Total ammonia . The RS has a conversion table from Total Ammonia to Free/Toxic Ammonia.

For QT I use a Seachem Ammonia Alert badge, which directly shows free/toxic ammonia.

 

[BamaCoastPyrat]

I appreciate it. I have one of those seachem alerts in my shopping cart right now. Hopefully this next round of QT goes better. Eventually a fish will make it into my DT.