Sudden unexplained fish deaths overnight.

[SeaJay]

Shortly after I started In this hobby two years ago I had Velvet Wipe out most of my fish. I removed the rock work, treated the remaining fish in a qt tank and have followed strict qt protocol using copper power, prazipro and feeding general cure. Since then I have had no losses in DT. This morning I woke to find my powder brown tang and exquisite fairy wrasse dead in the bottom of my tank. Melanarus wrasse, royal gramma and yellow head goby unaccounted for. Foxface, cardinals, clowns, dottyback and blue spot puffer all seem fine. I have only recently begun adding corals and have since been even more careful about water changes and testing. Nitrates have been high, so for the last couple weeks I’ve been doing a lot of water changes and feeding lighter to try to bring that down. I didn’t have time to do a full run of testing this morning as it already made me late for work, but I did quickly check for temp, salinity and ammonia. All good there. I’ll do a full range of tests when I get home. In the meantime, any ideas of what I should look at or check as soon as I can get back to my tank?

Coral stock includes a couple of torches, frogspawn, Goni, gsp, two zoas and a Duncan. Also have one orange bta in there. All of those seem fine, though they’re closed up at night anyway so it would be hard to tell for sure until the lights come up.

Corals were not QT’d, only dipped before adding. I’m hoping I didn’t screw myself there.

Any input would be appreciated. My wife is going to keep an eye on it and let me know if the others emerge when the lights are up or if anyone else looks distressed.

 

[Topekoms]

Might want to check for stray voltage. Are any other fish left in the tank alive? The powder brown seems to have some war wounds on the side also did you have a power outage thru the night?

 

[SeaJay]

Might want to check for stray voltage. Are any other fish left in the tank alive? The powder brown seems to have some war wounds on the side also did you have a power outage thru the night?

No power outage.

I will check for stray voltage. That’s not something that even came to mind.

I have a pair of clowns, a black fin goby, 3 cardinals, a dottyback and a foxface that all seem fine. A melanarus wrasse, yellow head goby and royal gramma unaccounted for, but the lights were just starting to ramp up so they may just be holed up still.

 

[Topekoms]

Also can we get full stats of your tank size filtration etc...

 

[SeaJay]

Also can we get full stats of your tank size filtration etc...

135gal display 6’ long with dual corner overflows,, icecap 36xl sump in the basement simplicity dc240 skimmer, refugium in the sump, dual maxspect gyres, iwaki return pump, t5 hybrid light with noopsyche leds, coral+ x2, blue+ x2.

These pics were yesterday. Just taking pics of how good everything was looking and you can see the deceased tang photo bombed one of them. Absolutely no signs of illness or distress whatsoever before this morning.

Like I said I’ve been battling high nitrates, hence a little extra algae, but all inhabitants seemingly happy and healthy.

 

[SeaJay]

My wife just sent this. The 3 unaccounted for all came out when the lights came on.

I’m starting to suspect murder. Or maybe I just really don’t want to believe I have a deadly illness in my tank that Kills quickly with no warning. Uronema would be my suspicion. Definitely no signs of other parasite.

 

[AC1211]

My wife just sent this. The 3 unaccounted for all came out when the lights came on.

I’m starting to suspect murder. Or maybe I just really don’t want to believe I have a deadly illness in my tank that Kills quickly with no warning. Uronema would be my suspicion. Definitely no signs of other parasite.

I hate to say it but uronema would take out damsels first it will always do so.

 

[SeaJay]

I did notice what appears to be a small wound at the base of the tang’s tail and it appears to be almost symmetrical on both sides as you can see in the pics. What would cause that?

 

[SeaJay]

I hate to say it but uronema would take out damsels first it will always do so.

I was going to say I don’t have any damsels, but I looked it up to be sure and I didn’t realize clowns were in the damsel family. So you’re saying if it was uronema they would be most susceptible?

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

No power outage.

I will check for stray voltage. That’s not something that even came to mind.

I have a pair of clowns, a black fin goby, 3 cardinals, a dottyback and a foxface that all seem fine. A melanarus wrasse, yellow head goby and royal gramma unaccounted for, but the lights were just starting to ramp up so they may just be holed up still.

Sorry to hear this....
Stray voltage won’t cause acute deaths like that. I normally rule out water quality issues if the corals look good. The wrasse does look kind of beat up, can’t see the tang clearly enough, but I’d think he would be top dog in that tank? That leaves fish disease as the possible cause. Trouble is, I can’t see anything Specific in the photo. The typical disease that sneaks up on people is velvet, Amyloodinium. The symptoms are pretty subtle, and it is quick to kill. Uronema is slower and leaves pretty obvious lesions. That all said, if you think one of your fish could have taken out that tang, I’d say that could be it.
Jay

 

[Doglips56]

I’m a newbie so please just take this fwiw. I lost a naso tang overnight that was perfectly healthy when we went to bed. The feedback I got was asking if I had added anything (from a bottle) that could have caused the oxygen level in the tank to drop. Waste Away comes to mind but everyone thought mine had died from oxygen deprivation. He was my biggest fish, all the little ones were fine. I think the oxygen thing affects very active swimmers more than other fish. Sorry I can’t be of more help

 

[AC1211]

I was going to say I don’t have any damsels, but I looked it up to be sure and I didn’t realize clowns were in the damsel family. So you’re saying if it was uronema they would be most susceptible?

Yep usually chromis go first them damsrls and clowns usually ocellaris anf percula cclowns then damsels then the larger clowns.

 

[AC1211]

In stores we lose chromis and blue damsels in hords same with the clownfish groups usually.

 

[AC1211]

In stores we lose chromis and blue damsels in hords same with the clownfish groups

 

[ReefBeta]

Just so you know, not all fish death are explainable. Even for reef master like Sanjay still got unexplainable fish death.

Since the fish died so quick without much symptoms, my best guess is some sort of toxins. Puffer, foxface, bta, all have the possibility. But it's hard to tell which one, or even if it's toxin at all, especially only two fish died. The only change I would make is running activated carbon. If it's indeed toxin incident, maybe it would help to absorb it before it gets to lethal level for fish. Don't rush for conclusion or changes.

 

[SeaJay]

Sorry to hear this....
Stray voltage won’t cause acute deaths like that. I normally rule out water quality issues if the corals look good. The wrasse does look kind of beat up, can’t see the tang clearly enough, but I’d think he would be top dog in that tank? That leaves fish disease as the possible cause. Trouble is, I can’t see anything Specific in the photo. The typical disease that sneaks up on people is velvet, Amyloodinium. The symptoms are pretty subtle, and it is quick to kill. Uronema is slower and leaves pretty obvious lesions. That all said, if you think one of your fish could have taken out that tang, I’d say that could be it.
Jay

They're both kind of small. Tang is maybe 4", wrasse maybe 3". I've never seen a hint of aggression between any of the fish except for the normal clown on clown violence.

I had a bout with velvet when I started & I've seen ich. Since that time, I have followed strict QT protocol. I pulled rockwork and made sure every fish was out, treated the survivors and went fallow for 3 months. That was about 2 years ago. Im 99.99% certain that it was not ich, velvet, brook, flukes, etc. Uronema I know is a little sneaky, but like you said, a little slower to kill. This happened fast. I spend a lot of time watching my fish. I would noticed flashing, swimming into powerheads, lethargy, scratching on rocks, etc. Not a single sign of any problems as of yesterday.

I did add some corals with just a dip recently, so there is a possibility something could have hitched it's way in.

 

[SeaJay]

Just so you know, not all fish death are explainable. Even for reef master like Sanjay still got unexplainable fish death.

Since the fish died so quick without much symptoms, my best guess is some sort of toxins. Puffer, foxface, bta, all have the possibility. But it's hard to tell which one, or even if it's toxin at all, especially only two fish died. The only change I would make is running activated carbon. If it's indeed toxin incident, maybe it would help to absorb it before it gets to lethal level for fish. Don't rush for conclusion or changes.

Thanks. I will run some carbon. That is not part of my normal protocol so I don't have any on hand, but I should be able to pick some up on the way home.

Of course I thought about the foxface and the anemone, but since neither of them are aggressors, it would have to be accidental, right? What are the chances of two accidental encounters in one night? I guess if something startled the foxface bad enough he could have freaked out and hit two of them. At this point I hope that's what it was and not some silent killer of a disease that's soon to take out more fish.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Just to be clear, I can think of no water quality issues that will kill fish suddenly, but leave the nvertebrates alone- rotenone would, but that’s really it.
Jay

 

[SeaJay]

Just got home, other fish seem to be ok, but water is a tad cloudy. Duncan is closed up a little, which he does sometimes after the T5s go off, but my bta is all the way closed up. Everyone else looks fine. I pulled some water for testing and then immediately did a 20 gal water change then adfed
Here are my numbers before the water change.
Salinity 1.025
Temp 78.5
Calcium 520
Phosphates .16
Alk 8.5
Nitrates still high, looks like north of 50 where the Red Sea test maxes out. I’ve pre-ordered a Hanna nitrate tester. All my other tests are done with Hanna testers and I don’t like trying to read color charts. I’ve been dealing with high nitrates for weeks now.

Gonna do a water change tonight and one in the morning.

 

[SeaJay]

Did water changes and running carbon just in case and all livestock seem well. It was cloudy when I got home that day. I’m still not sure if something got in the water or if it was a gnarly fish fight. At this point I’m just going to replace them and move on with trying to get my nitrates down. Just sucks it was two of my favorite fish and so unexpected.