help!!!! anyone

grently348

grently348

New Member
help! i just turned my protein skimmer and u.v. sterilizer a few hours ago and left. when i came home my tank was really cloudy. almost milky. what could be causing this, and how do i fix it?
will it harm my fish and invertebrates?
 
beaslbob

beaslbob

Well-Known Member
could be your skimmer and sterilzer.
Actually I don't know because I have use neither.
But a sudden white could sure sounds like a lot of bacteria died off. Other than that I can't help.
 
jedininja

jedininja

Member
BOB, NO!!!

How can a skimmer and UV kill off enough bacteria to make a tank cloudy? A UV may kill of a tiny bit of bacteria, but most bacteria is not free floating. A skimmer only sucks out nutrients from thw ater. The thing that most likely happened is that the extra current from the skimmer and the UV have stirred up the detrius in your tank and maybe some sand too. Everytyhing will settle and if you have a filter, that will speed things up.
 
birdy

birdy

Active Member
If it is not just junk floating around in the tank, then I would suggest that you test your water asap, test for : pH, Alk, Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrate, and if you have it Calcium.
The two things I can think of are a Ammonia spike. or the calcium in your tank is precipitating out.
 
beaslbob

beaslbob

Well-Known Member

Originally posted by jedininja
BOB, NO!!!

How can a skimmer and UV kill off enough bacteria to make a tank cloudy? A UV may kill of a tiny bit of bacteria, but most bacteria is not free floating. A skimmer only sucks out nutrients from thw ater. The thing that most likely happened is that the extra current from the skimmer and the UV have stirred up the detrius in your tank and maybe some sand too. Everytyhing will settle and if you have a filter, that will speed things up.
Just sounded logical to me. turn on skimmer and uv then cloud.
Well if the skimmer sucked stuff outta the water, then maybe there is less bioload for the existing bacteria. then the bacteria dies off especially with the help of the UV. Sounds like a good reason to me.
 
jedininja

jedininja

Member

Originally posted by beaslbob
Well if the skimmer sucked stuff outta the water, then maybe there is less bioload for the existing bacteria. then the bacteria dies off especially with the help of the UV.
Just think about this for a sec. You are the guy that says use plants to suck everythin out of the water. And now you say that when a skimmer sucks things out of the water, that bacteria will die off? Thats a hypocritical way of thinking. If that were true, then the same thing would happen with plants. And as stated before, the UV only kills off things in the water column, where most bacteria is clinging to sand and rocks.
Oh, and can you do us all a favor? When you quote somebody, you do not need to quote the entire post. I know you hit the quote button and the wholw thing is quoted, but how about deleting some of it. We dont all need to read every post twice.
 
grently348

grently348

New Member
thanks all. and birdy, what you said about the calcium maight be the problem as i just added some this morining. will this harm my fish and inverts. From what little i can see, my polyps have turned brown. did it kill them? how can i fix this problem i have?
 
birdy

birdy

Active Member
I keep my skimmer running 24/7, I don't have and don't recommend a UV for a tank with corals in it, it kills too much good stuff.
Do you have a test kit for pH, Alk and Calcium, if so please test and post results. If you don't you really need to have them, you should never dose something in the tank you cannot measure for it can be dangerous. Hard to say about the polyps they may just be upset.
Post test results and we can go from there.
 
grently348

grently348

New Member
ok i did my tests. ammonia is at 0, nitirites at 0 nitrates at 0, alk at 3.5 meq/l, salinity has dropped a little 1.021 i usually keep it at 1.023. calcium is at 330 mg/l. all these readings aside from the salinity are all in the parameters of good water, correct?
 
birdy

birdy

Active Member
Definetly need to get that salinity up, and you didn't post pH, but it all looks good to me, couldn't be calcium because your calcium is a bit on the low side, if it was precipitate then it would be sky high.
Is it still cloudy? If so I would go ahead and do a water change, couldn't hurt, might help.
 
grently348

grently348

New Member
my ph is 8.4 and my calcium is 330 typo. its over 530. it didnt change a color and the test kit said that it was too high. does iodide have anything to do with it? should i turn my skimmer back on? how about my u.v.
 
birdy

birdy

Active Member
Okay if your calcium is over 530, then I would say your calcium is too high and is precipitating out, basically the calcium level is saturated. You need to do a series of water changes and get the calcium level back down to around 400-450. Be sure you are testing these levels before you dose, then you won't have this problems. I don't think your iodide level or your skimmer caused this. Do you dose iodine also, if so be very careful to much iodine is very harmful this also needs to be tested before you dose it. I prefer to run my skimmer 24/7 I don't believe you can over skim.
 
beaslbob

beaslbob

Well-Known Member
Being as it may be a calcium problem perhaps this is moot. But I did feel the need to clarify any of my positions that may have been misunderstood. A maybe you guys can help me better understand the theory of skimmers.
Originally posted by jedininja
... You are the guy that says use plants to suck everythin out of the water.
No plants consume the ammonia, nitrates, pohsphates, and carbon dioxide. And in the process filter out other ions as well.
And now you say that when a skimmer sucks things out of the water, that bacteria will die off?

As I understand skimmer operation, slime and other organic compounds from bubbles which are collected. Emptying these organics removes them before they are completely acted on by the aerobic bacteria. Plants, on the other hand require the aerobic bacteria to produce the plant food.
..And as stated before, the UV only kills off things in the water column, where most bacteria is clinging to sand and rocks.
So the uv was not the prime cause but the reduction in organic compounds could have starved the aerobic bacteria throughout the entire system.
This reminds me of my first sw aquarium. I tried to cycle with a flake of fish food. A week later the tank was totally cloudy. Again what had happened is the bacteria built up. then died off as the flake was reduced. Resulting in the cloud. I hope that is not what has happened here.
 
birdy

birdy

Active Member
Since his levels were perfect except calcium then obviously that was not the problem here.
 
jedininja

jedininja

Member
Bob, Just think about this. Many people have problems with high nitrates. That is because those organics break down and eventually turn into nitrates. A skimmer can not remove 100 percent of the organics in the water. The leftovers are still consumed b the bacteria. There is more than enough organics to break down into ammonia-nitrite-nitrates. With a skimmer, it takes out some of those organics before it can turn into nitrates and therefore reducing the amount of nitrates that enter a system. You can then have a fuge with macro to remove the rest of the nitrates. So both are beneficial so please dont go blaming skimmers or recommending people not to get one. Why dont you go do some research on skimmers before you comment on them any further.
 
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