In the 4+ years I've been a part of the reef hobby, I've had a lot of crashes. Most because of my stupidity/curiosity and some because bad luck.
First big crash I ever had was due to not adequately dosing magnesium. I dosed two part and that was it. This eventually led to a very low magnesium situation, ~ 1000ppm or less. Corals didn't survive that one. Now I check magnesium levels about once a month and record the dosage needed to replenish the 3ppm/day uptake.
Second one was GFO related. GFO isn't cheap and I am cheap. So I tried to push it for as long as I possibly could. Turns out when GFO saturates, it can actually start feeding bacteria. The bacteria bloom was so great that water was just beige and opaque. Lost some fish and a couple corals. The dying animals only fed the bloom. I took off the GFO reactor and overnight the bloom stopped. Tried GFO again about a week later and bacteria bloom came back. Now I run only a skimmer and a zeolite reactor. The zeolite reactor is more for increased surface area for bacteria growth. Just something to keep in mind if you have a bacteria bloom and run GFO.
Third crash was a complete mystery. I used one of those cheap Chinese acrylic dosing containers, the ones with the orange lid. Not sure if something leached out of the acrylic, but my alk solution became contaminated. Turned a light brown. During this time, my corals all started dying together. Lost a large setosa colony, almost every SPS frag, almost every LPS, and even some zoas. Only things that survived without a scratch were the gorgs. I learned from this event to periodically check the dosing containers. If possible, use the original containers the solutions came in. And if issues start to rise, check all equipment first before chasing parameters. That was a major mistake I made and only compounded the issues.
Several other smaller crashes I've had were due to going too fast. Trying to compensate for alk/calc mismatches. I purchased the Hanna calc checker and made the mistake of trusting it. Don't trust a checker until you have verified its accuracy against your usual test kit. I had calc over 600ppm and I thought it was under 400ppm. Whoops!
As I said above, all were my mistake. I overlooked things and made conclusions without the full picture or ignoring facts. I didn't prepare myself or lacked experience to make the right decision. The main lesson I've learned is take it slow and employ redundancies/checks and balances to reduce the chances for mistakes. I view my setup as a life support system and if it was me in that tank, I'd want to know that even if everything fails, at least the bare minimum will keep functioning and keep me alive.
I probably won't give it up... I'm just in a low spot I think. The tank was growing beautifully. I actually had large SPS colonies (3 years ago I couldn't keep an acro alive). The tank was stable and then the hammer falls... ugh. I guess the only people who really understand this are we who have been through a major crash. And partly why I started this thread
I feel like there's no excuse for someone not to have one unless they didn't have knowledge of its existence. I wish I had known about it before!
