I'm about to give up . . .

[h2oengr]

Alright - chemicals have been great for more than a month now since the soap incident.
I got 10 margarita snails today and they're all laying on their shells (backs) with their foot dangling out of their shells. The snails aren't dead, but aren't crawling around. What's up with this? :notsure: The 3 chromis and the damsel are doing just fine!?
I just purchased a killer looking star polyp for the wife (Mom's Day) and I'm worried it's not going to make it if the snails are all belly up?
I checked the chemicals again today and all was well (NH3~0, NO2~0, NO3~20), but salinity a little low (1.023). I've been running a polyfilter also now for more than a month.
Any help would be appreciated. I'm ready to pull out everything, throw out the 100 lbs of rock, and start over. I'm afraid the soap may have gotten "in" the LR.

 

[michelle13]

I hate margarita snails. I recently purchased ten of them and now I only have 2 left. They kept falling off the glass and rocks or just turning over in the sand. I tried to keep up with flipping them over, but I lost the battle so the crabs had a good meal! Hopefully that's all your problem is, I really don't think it would be leftover soap.

 

[h2oengr]

Well, you're right about the snails. They do seem to keep falling off rocks and the glass with their "foot" in the air! :yes:
I hope the polyps live . . . I've also got so much algae that it's not even funny.

 

[infalable]

Hang in there H20. Is it possible to put the live rock in a larga garbage can and put some strong phs in there. Really get the the water moving to flush out the rock. Then move the lr back in the tank and discard the old water. LR has a tendancy to accumulate the bad stuff. This is kind of radical. I helped a friend out who did this and his tank was more stable afterwords. We can only assume this was what helped, but one can never be sure. Good luck.

 

[clarkiiboi]

I never had a problem with my margaritas falling. IMO, its the salinity. As you know 35ppt is the happy medium (aka, about 1.025) . Try raising it over the next few days. The only thing I saw with mine was they were always at the top of the tank and didnt mind that it was "low tide". I am not the best at being ontop of evaporation and replacement. Could also be temp? What is yours?

 

[bang guy]

H2O - Do you know the salinity of the water the snails came from (in the bag)? How did you acclimate the snails?
Another thought - You're using a hydrometer that measures Specific Gravity. If it's a swing-arm type hydrometer have you ever compared the readings with a refractometer? Swing-arm hydrometers are consistant but rarely accurate. They need to be compared to a refractometer to document how far they are off. This should be done about every 6 months.

 

[h2oengr]

Thanks for all the input.
Bang guy - I didn't check the salinity of the water in the bags. I floated them for 15 minutes, added a small amount of my water in 5, another small amount of my water in 5 and lastly in 5 minutes again. I then dumped them into a net to drain the water - I know not to dump the LFS water into my tank.
ClarkiiBoi, I think you're right. I actually began raising the salinity last night and this morning they were doing much better. My queen conch - heard it'll eat cyano - is actually moving around. I thought it was dead yesterday.
Infalable, I'm not ready to try that trick yet with the rocks. Let's wait a little longer and see!
Anyway, I appreciate everyone's help. You guys rock! :happy:

 

[pacopetty]

thats an excellent tip!

 

[bang guy]

No problem.

 

[gonfishin]

My margaritas could never right themselves up but if I flipped them over they were fine (till the next time they fell off the glass/rock) I stopped flipping and I won't get these again. All astreas and nassarius just fine!

 

[imb]

15 MIN IS BARELY ADEQUATE TO ACCLIMATE - i WOULD DO A SLOW DRIP ACCLIMATION OVER 2-3 HOURS!

 

[ty_05_f]

I sorta do the same thing as bang but i place them on the glass right above the water line.:yes: