help tank crashed!!!!!!

[dailey76]

I have a 45G tall tank and all my levels were checked and looked good before I cleaned my filter on my powerhead and my skimmer. I also replaced 2 of the four filters (sponge filters on my fluval). Then The next day my xenia all died or was in very bad shape. I rechecked all levels and again everything within normal ranges for my tank. This morning I walked in from work and all my fish are dead. Smells very strong in the whole house of xenia. This is the same smell as when you have to pull it from the tank to keep from overgrowth. The water is partially cloudy but nothing else appears to be wrong. Could Xenia release a poison toxin when all this happened?? Also what could I do to save the rest of my corals? A water change will be ongoing this evening but how much should I change. I really would like to at least save my favia and my zooanthids. any help or ideas. This tank has been up and running for 2 yrs with zero issues up until this point.

 

[farslayer]

Xenia can emit toxins, in fact they will fight neighboring colonies with it (coral warfare). I run a lot of activated carbon on my tank to neutralize this stuff. Do you have any AC?

 

[puffer32]

Do a 50% water change. Run carbon.

 

[farslayer]

 

[dailey76]

yeah i do run carbon and it helps but the xenia is all dead now. and is amazing since it grew like weeds in my tank. I lost everything now except for favia and my zoos.

 

[laxplaya]

dude...dont clean everything all at once. you should clean the tank 1 part at a time. It messes up ur tank. Its probly why ur xenia died. I am sorry for your loss.

 

[farslayer]

Cleaning the filters all at once is fine, I do it every month. It's odd though, could something have gotten in such as soap?

 

[1journeyman]

Originally Posted by LAXplaya
dude...dont clean everything all at once. you should clean the tank 1 part at a time. It messes up ur tank. Its probly why ur xenia died. I am sorry for your loss.
This can be the case IF the sponges are where all of your biological filtration is taking place. In this case, however, the poster stated that all of their tests were fine. That implies it was not a lack of bacteria.
How did you clean sponges? Chlorinated water? Soap?

 

[farslayer]

Hopefully his biological filter is on the rocks
I would agree that something during the cleaning process did them in. Did you rinse the new sponges with hot water?

 

[georgev845]

yes best to clean a couple of things at once to let some nitrifying bacteria grow back
also do a 30-50% water change to help restore paramiters

 

[sepulatian]

How did you clean the sponges? Could you please list your actual water parameters for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, ph, sg, and temp? Cleaning all of the sponges at once was not such a great idea, even if that is not your only biological filtration.

 

[davidmwj]

Originally Posted by Farslayer
Xenia can emit toxins, in fact they will fight neighboring colonies with it (coral warfare). I run a lot of activated carbon on my tank to neutralize this stuff. Do you have any AC?
Man, I'm starting to believe this is what's happening to me. I stopped running chemi-pure because I got cheap, so I haven't been running any carbon. Will this coral warfare leave a film or even residue?? I have a rust colored dust all over my rock and sand. I thought I had some kind of Cyano, so I ran chemi-clean which did nothing. My nassarius snails died, so I originally thought that was the cause. After reading this I'm beginning to wonder, because my Xenia are spreading like crazy. All my levels are good as well. I've done multiple water changes and have a strong odor that smells like algae. Could this toxin have killed my snails???