Tank issues...

Tham121988 · Feb 12, 2018

Hello,

I have had a tank up and running for about 2 years now. When I was recently accepted into med school, I had to move to another state. My wife is still back in our other house that is 7 hours away which is where my tanks are. I can't make it back to the house anytime soon (its been 2 months). And wont be back for at least another month. The system is so complex she has no idea how to take care of it. It has apex, dosing pumps, and the whole shebang. Apparently she is seeing bleaching etc. on corals and algae is going rampant. It is pretty impossible to explain to her how to do any kind of significant maintenance as I'm sure you can imagine. That being said, I had thousands of dollars worth of coral in this tank and with her unable to know what is going on I need to figure out something ASAP to do with the livestock before it all dies. They were doing beautifully when I left. I was hoping that I would be able to keep it running for then next few months until the end of this semester, but I just don't think that is possible. Does the community have any suggestions on the best way to sell my livestock before I lose all of the investments, time, and hard work on my wonderful pets. This is pretty devastating to have to do this

.

Thank you everyone for any suggestions.

TheEngineer · Feb 12, 2018

Are you a member of a local club? Maybe someone could go look at the tank for you.

Is your wife able to run tests for you? We need your parameters to start with.

bigroost · Feb 12, 2018

I heard there was a new store opened in Southhaven, probably not the way to get the most back out of it but they may be interested in taking it all off your hands.

eatbreakfast · Feb 12, 2018

Why not have an aquarium service company take care of it?

Tham121988 · Feb 12, 2018

I am not. The only local fish store shut down a few years back. Not really a robust aquarium hobbyist community.

When she gets off work, I am going to try to run her through some testing on facetime. I was running triton and everything was automatic and dialed in, but something has gotten off since I've been gone. She let the ATO run dry for a few days at one point. There are about 1000 things that could be wrong. I will report back with my findings, I'm just thinking its probably too much to put on her to handle and someone else should be able to enjoy them.

Plus... she told me at the very beginning she wanted nothing to do with them and then I set up 3 tanks and I had to leave her to take care of them haha. She's doing her best, but as you all know... it's a science that takes a good bit of knowledge and time to master the art of reef keeping.

Tham121988 · Feb 12, 2018

bigroost said:
I heard there was a new store opened in Southhaven, probably not the way to get the most back out of it but they may be interested in taking it all off your hands.

I will look into this. Thank you!

Tham121988 · Feb 12, 2018

eatbreakfast said:
Why not have an aquarium service company take care of it?

I am not aware of any aquarium service company near oxford, MS. Are you familiar with any?

Humblefish · Feb 12, 2018

Tham121988 said:
I am not aware of any aquarium service company near oxford, MS. Are you familiar with any?

I've never actually been to it, but a couple of members from my local club have written good reviews about this LFS: http://www.jacksonfishandcoral.com/

I don't know how far they are from you, but it appears they do offer maintenance (according to their website.)

Charterreefer · Feb 12, 2018

Tham121988 said:
Hello,

I have had a tank up and running for about 2 years now. When I was recently accepted into med school, I had to move to another state. My wife is still back in our other house that is 7 hours away which is where my tanks are. I can't make it back to the house anytime soon (its been 2 months). And wont be back for at least another month. The system is so complex she has no idea how to take care of it. It has apex, dosing pumps, and the whole shebang. Apparently she is seeing bleaching etc. on corals and algae is going rampant. It is pretty impossible to explain to her how to do any kind of significant maintenance as I'm sure you can imagine. That being said, I had thousands of dollars worth of coral in this tank and with her unable to know what is going on I need to figure out something ASAP to do with the livestock before it all dies. They were doing beautifully when I left. I was hoping that I would be able to keep it running for then next few months until the end of this semester, but I just don't think that is possible. Does the community have any suggestions on the best way to sell my livestock before I lose all of the investments, time, and hard work on my wonderful pets. This is pretty devastating to have to do this .

Thank you everyone for any suggestions.

Can your wife take some cell phone pictures of your equipment and send to you? Maybe you'll be able to see what's going on.

Humblefish · Feb 12, 2018

After seeing where Oxford, MS is on a map... you aren't too far from Memphis: https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/memphis-area-reef-society-mars.659/

Tham121988 · Feb 12, 2018

Humblefish said:
I've never actually been to it, but a couple of members from my local club have written good reviews about this LFS: http://www.jacksonfishandcoral.com/

I don't know how far they are from you, but it appears they do offer maintenance (according to their website.)

Ridgeland, MS is about 2 1/2 hours from oxford. So that probably wont work.

Tham121988 · Feb 12, 2018

Charterreefer said:
Can your wife take some cell phone pictures of your equipment and send to you? Maybe you'll be able to see what's going on.

I have tried to get her to take pictures of the tank etc before but they were so blurry it was hard to tell. The sump is in a tight area so that is even harder to get pictures of it. I will see if she cant get some better images of the tank.

Tham121988 · Feb 12, 2018

Humblefish said:
After seeing where Oxford, MS is on a map... you aren't too far from Memphis: https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/memphis-area-reef-society-mars.659/

That's correct, we are about an hour and half from Memphis, TN. I will try to look into some options there.

Charterreefer · Feb 12, 2018

Tham121988 said:
I have tried to get her to take pictures of the tank etc before but they were so blurry it was hard to tell. The sump is in a tight area so that is even harder to get pictures of it. I will see if she cant get some better images of the tank.

A pic is worth a thousand words lol

Tham121988 · Feb 12, 2018

Charterreefer said:
A pic is worth a thousand words lol

Very true, I should be getting around to it in about an hour. Just talking to her on the phone, she described bleaching and a lot of coral looking bony

. Not a good sign right there. I will post back in a couple of hours with an update.

Tham121988 · Feb 12, 2018

Alright,

I was able to get her to do a couple of tests and have seen the tank through facetime. The pH for whatever reason was very low. 7.8! The salinity was spot on and no other abnormal parameters. Sump, skimmer, lighting, etc all running good. Almost all of the effected coral were SPS and that makes a lot of sense since they are so sensitive to variations in parameters. Some are still alive, but some I've had for quite awhile are completely gone. Other than the SPS, everything else is fine. She is sending me still shots now and I will upload them. I think getting the pH up will fix the issue and hopefully salvage some of the SPS and then figure out how to sell the coral that survived.

Scorpius · Feb 13, 2018

7.8 ph is not very low. Lots of us run 7.8 no problem.

Tham121988 · Feb 13, 2018

Scorpius said:
7.8 ph is not very low. Lots of us run 7.8 no problem.

Yeah, but for an established aquarium for 2 years that has been steady at 8.3 suddenly dropping to 7.8 could have a drastic effect on the coral I would think. Especially the SPS. Wouldn't you think? Anyway, I haven't gotten around to posting the pictures yet. I will post them when I get a chance. Thanks for all the help.

laverda · Feb 13, 2018

I agree the ph is not that far off, however you know your system better than us. With the ph being lower then normal and the bleaching I would start by looking at ALK and mg levels. You said everything else was ok, but did she check them? I know my dosing containers at 2 liters only last me about a week and a half. My first thought when you said you have been gone for 2 months is that your dosing containers are probably empty by now.
Good luck