left town, heater quit, tank crashed

[workman]

hey guys, i came back home from thanksgiving last night to find my tank at 60 degrees and my coral all dead/dying. the tank heater quit while i was gone or before and i didnt notice. i had been gone 3 days and my home heater was set to 58. my fish are alive (thank god).
i am posting to see what i should do next. i have a 4 year old reef tank that was full of corals. it is 37 gallons. i pulled out 12 gallons last night and i am mixing up some more.
i am running carbon and poly filters, i just tested my water
ph 7.8
ammonia .25 ppm
nitrate 10 ppm
nitrite 0
i havent added anything living to the tank in close to a year so i didnt have many snails or crabs if i had any at all left. my cleaner shrimp also had died some time ago and i havent replaced it. i was wondering if i should buy these today to help w clean up or if i should wait to see if my tank cycles. i have also added buffer to bring up the ph and a new heater of course.
any advice would be appriciated, this really sucks.

 

[monalisa]

Originally Posted by workman
hey guys, i came back home from thanksgiving last night to find my tank at 60 degrees and my coral all dead/dying. the tank heater quit while i was gone or before and i didnt notice. i had been gone 3 days and my home heater was set to 58. my fish are alive (thank god).
i am posting to see what i should do next. i have a 4 year old reef tank that was full of corals. it is 37 gallons. i pulled out 12 gallons last night and i am mixing up some more.
i am running carbon and poly filters, i just tested my water
ph 7.8
ammonia .25 ppm
nitrate 10 ppm
nitrite 0
i havent added anything living to the tank in close to a year so i didnt have many snails or crabs if i had any at all left. my cleaner shrimp also had died some time ago and i havent replaced it. i was wondering if i should buy these today to help w clean up or if i should wait to see if my tank cycles. i have also added buffer to bring up the ph and a new heater of course.
any advice would be appriciated, this really sucks.
That does totally suck!! The first thing I would do is a nice 15-20% water change and tank cleaning, ASAP. To be honest with you, I would set up the water and heat it (aerate while heating) and do the change...I've had situations where I don't wait the required 12-24 hour aeration. Mind you, this isn't recommended for all changes, but in situations like this, go for it.
Have all your corals gone to mush? (What kind of corals?) If so, I would remove them. Anything that looks like it might have a chance, just leave...they may bounce back. It's been my understanding that corals with viable looking tissue can have a chance of bouncing back after a disaster.
It's also a good idea to keep 2 heaters going in the tank at once, for just such an emergency...if one goes out, the one will take over (I do that in my seahorse tank).
Hope this helps, and hope more reefers get on to help out. Let us know how you do!!
Lisa

 

[hefner413]

I'm not an expert on recovery situations like this, but I would be careful about how much water you cange at once. You've already done a 30% change. You could add to the inevitable cycle that the tank will go through by changing too much water at once.
the inverts probably won't live through the cycle - so I wouldn't spend too much on adding those.
The thing you want to do is have a gradual cycle - the livestock can usually tolerate this. Thus you do lots of small water changes from here on out - thus minimizing toxic buildup. The tank will re-stabilize and then you can replace livestock.
BTW - I recommend the stealth heater. And if you get 2 smaller heaters, one can keep up if the other poops on you.

 

[monalisa]

Originally Posted by workman
hey guys, i came back home from thanksgiving last night to find my tank at 60 degrees and my coral all dead/dying. the tank heater quit while i was gone or before and i didnt notice. i had been gone 3 days and my home heater was set to 58. my fish are alive (thank god).
i am posting to see what i should do next. i have a 4 year old reef tank that was full of corals. it is 37 gallons. i pulled out 12 gallons last night and i am mixing up some more.
i am running carbon and poly filters, i just tested my water
ph 7.8
ammonia .25 ppm
nitrate 10 ppm
nitrite 0
i havent added anything living to the tank in close to a year so i didnt have many snails or crabs if i had any at all left. my cleaner shrimp also had died some time ago and i havent replaced it. i was wondering if i should buy these today to help w clean up or if i should wait to see if my tank cycles. i have also added buffer to bring up the ph and a new heater of course.
any advice would be appriciated, this really sucks.
Oops, sorry workman, I missed the fact that you already changed out 12 gallons...don't do the change that I posted!!
give your corals the once over at this point to see what is salvagable and what isn't. Sorry...
Lisa

 

[hefner413]

Originally Posted by MonaLisa
Oops, sorry workman, I missed the fact that you already changed out 12 gallons...don't do the change that I posted!!
give your corals the once over at this point to see what is salvagable and what isn't. Sorry...
Lisa
Don't worry Monalisa - I wasn't correcting you - we posted at the same time )
But yeah, like Mona said - don't be hasty to pull everything - you might get lucky and have a few pull through it all.

 

[workman]

my mushrooms have almost all turned to mush or have been sucked into the filters. there are a few still clinging on that look like they may pull through. i am sure they will grow back from the bits still hanging around. my brain looks pretty dead but i will wait to make sure before pulling him out. one of my hammers still looks like there isnt much left but the other one has a few tenticles bunching up in the center of the stone. the star polyps show no signs of life but who knows. the water is very milky, i am a bit surprised by this as i am running so much carbon and a poly filter. i dont have a protein skimmer though. my filtration system is very minimalist, lots of rock, good water flow.

 

[workman]

still cloudy, getting stinky

 

[tiberius]

I am so sorry to read this. My heart goes out to you. I do hope you don't loose everything. Do you frequent the same fish store? Maybe they can take you fish while your tank recoups. Most likely will have to take all the rock out and place in tubs to get the fish. Or, see if you can borrow some canister filters from them to clean up the tank.

 

[mscarpena]

You should have 2 smaller(75-100 watts) heaters when you reset up your reef tank. Also instead of setting back your thermostat to save 10-15 bucks on heating bill it may have cost you a lot more than that. If your house was at 68-70 degrees you may not be in this situation. Next time I would not set back my thermostat. Sorry to hear about your loss just thought I would give you some ideas on how to prevent it from happening again. I am going on vacation in January and I am freaking aout about it. I have 2 large reef tanks and about 15,000 in live stock and equipment. I hope things go good for me.

 

[halamaya]

I have read a book that suggests doing a 1 percent water change everyday. I hope you have good luck.

Feel like crying for you.