adamc1303
Active Member
Ok here goes. I’m gonna tell you about part 1 of my horrible week and then part 2.
Part 1
My wife and I purchased a co-op apartment in Brooklyn, NY a little over a year ago. Since then I have been always renovating. I do all the work on my own, unless it pertains to electricity since I am not confident enough that I know what I am doing and messing with it can be dangerous. The apartment never really had much light so I installed a track when we moved in and just ran the wire down the wall to an outlet and covered it with wire covers. I knew at the time that it was temporary and that eventually we wanted spot lights. So we decided to hire an electrician this week to install the spotlights. I went to Home Depot and purchased the spotlights. If you know anything about this type of lighting there are 2 ways to do it. There are spotlights for a new construction, where the fixture has 2 brackets that get drilled to the beams in the ceiling and later on dry wall gets put over them with a round cut out. There’s also the remodel kit which is meant for a remodel where there is a round housing that is pushed into the ceiling and then just clips in. Well the guy I hired was licensed and experienced for 11 years. I purchased spot light kits that have the housing for a remodel or the brackets for a new construction. I let the guy into the apartment in the morning and expected to return to a nice new look. The Idiot made 14 x 14 square cut outs around each spotlight in the ceiling. He just totally damaged the entire ceiling. He did this because he was lazy and used the new construction kit. So he just made these huge wholes with a hammer so he can get to the beams. To top it all off he didn’t cover anything in the apartment. All he was suppose to do was just make nice round cutouts use the provided housing and all would have been ok. I expected a few small wholes because I knew he needed to run some wires. I could have fixed those my self. Anyway I now needed to hire a contractor who needed to replace my entire ceiling! That’s right the ceiling was un patchable. This work took 1 week and $1,000.00!!!!!
Part 2
My wife and I move all the furniture out of our living room and dining room and cover the floors with plastic I got at Home Depot. I then cover my tank which is in the dining room as well. I try to cover it really well because the dusts from sanding sheet rock is probably the messiest think I have ever deal with. I covered every part of my tank except for the back of the stand which is opened but against the wall (about 6 inches away. After a long week of construction on the last day of not being able to be at home since the entire apartment was a wreck I notice my hippo tang is dead, lying in the corner of the tank! I have had all these fish for 3 years now. They were the original fish I purchased when I converted to a reef. I then look at the tank and notice that my 2 clown fish are all the way at the top of the tank but are alive. They looked like they were gasping for air. I couldn’t uncover the tank because I the construction was still happening for the next few hours. I was hoping it was just the hippo tang and that everything else was fine. I didn’t think much at the time that the clown fish being at the surface meant anything. Anyway 2 hours later one of the clowns was sucked against the power head, the other dead on the sand and so were the other 3 fish in the tank. That’s right 3 years of fish all dead on the same day. Here’s my question. Do you think they died because some dust from the sheetrock made it into the tank? Or did I cut off almost all the oxygen to the tank? Keep in mind the sump is uncovered in the stand and the back of the stand is partially exposed?
What do I do now? I tested my water and its fine.
Parameters
Salinity 1025
Ammonia 0.0
Nitrate 0.0
Nitrite 0.0
Ph 8.4
Calcium 440
I was thinking to wait a bit before restocking (none of my corals were harmed) it’s been so long since I dealt with cycling. Will not having any fish in a tank kill the biological filtration? I was just planning on adding a new fish about every week or 2. Let me know your thoughts and also give me some reef safe fish recommendations for a 90G reef. I wanted to go with smaller fish this time, nothing that can really outgrow the tank so quickly.
Thanks,
Adam
Part 1
My wife and I purchased a co-op apartment in Brooklyn, NY a little over a year ago. Since then I have been always renovating. I do all the work on my own, unless it pertains to electricity since I am not confident enough that I know what I am doing and messing with it can be dangerous. The apartment never really had much light so I installed a track when we moved in and just ran the wire down the wall to an outlet and covered it with wire covers. I knew at the time that it was temporary and that eventually we wanted spot lights. So we decided to hire an electrician this week to install the spotlights. I went to Home Depot and purchased the spotlights. If you know anything about this type of lighting there are 2 ways to do it. There are spotlights for a new construction, where the fixture has 2 brackets that get drilled to the beams in the ceiling and later on dry wall gets put over them with a round cut out. There’s also the remodel kit which is meant for a remodel where there is a round housing that is pushed into the ceiling and then just clips in. Well the guy I hired was licensed and experienced for 11 years. I purchased spot light kits that have the housing for a remodel or the brackets for a new construction. I let the guy into the apartment in the morning and expected to return to a nice new look. The Idiot made 14 x 14 square cut outs around each spotlight in the ceiling. He just totally damaged the entire ceiling. He did this because he was lazy and used the new construction kit. So he just made these huge wholes with a hammer so he can get to the beams. To top it all off he didn’t cover anything in the apartment. All he was suppose to do was just make nice round cutouts use the provided housing and all would have been ok. I expected a few small wholes because I knew he needed to run some wires. I could have fixed those my self. Anyway I now needed to hire a contractor who needed to replace my entire ceiling! That’s right the ceiling was un patchable. This work took 1 week and $1,000.00!!!!!
Part 2
My wife and I move all the furniture out of our living room and dining room and cover the floors with plastic I got at Home Depot. I then cover my tank which is in the dining room as well. I try to cover it really well because the dusts from sanding sheet rock is probably the messiest think I have ever deal with. I covered every part of my tank except for the back of the stand which is opened but against the wall (about 6 inches away. After a long week of construction on the last day of not being able to be at home since the entire apartment was a wreck I notice my hippo tang is dead, lying in the corner of the tank! I have had all these fish for 3 years now. They were the original fish I purchased when I converted to a reef. I then look at the tank and notice that my 2 clown fish are all the way at the top of the tank but are alive. They looked like they were gasping for air. I couldn’t uncover the tank because I the construction was still happening for the next few hours. I was hoping it was just the hippo tang and that everything else was fine. I didn’t think much at the time that the clown fish being at the surface meant anything. Anyway 2 hours later one of the clowns was sucked against the power head, the other dead on the sand and so were the other 3 fish in the tank. That’s right 3 years of fish all dead on the same day. Here’s my question. Do you think they died because some dust from the sheetrock made it into the tank? Or did I cut off almost all the oxygen to the tank? Keep in mind the sump is uncovered in the stand and the back of the stand is partially exposed?
What do I do now? I tested my water and its fine.
Parameters
Salinity 1025
Ammonia 0.0
Nitrate 0.0
Nitrite 0.0
Ph 8.4
Calcium 440
I was thinking to wait a bit before restocking (none of my corals were harmed) it’s been so long since I dealt with cycling. Will not having any fish in a tank kill the biological filtration? I was just planning on adding a new fish about every week or 2. Let me know your thoughts and also give me some reef safe fish recommendations for a 90G reef. I wanted to go with smaller fish this time, nothing that can really outgrow the tank so quickly.
Thanks,
Adam
