Tragedy plese help!!!

[thetabors]

I posted here when I started my aquarium earlier this year and everything went great. Thanks to all who answered the dozens of questions I asked then. I have a 55 gal Fish only with LiveRock. I had 4 damsels, two turbo snails, 2 crabs, 1 candy anemone and an urchin......now everything has died

within 24 hours. One of my damsels disappeared over a week ago and after searching the whole tank over and over disappeared is all I have. I recently moved the tank and did a 30% water change and everything looked great for like 48 hours then the Nitrates and Nitites are skyrocketed. The PH was off so I added some ph buffer but it was after the fish died. I am running a fluval 305 filter and I was wondering if anyone thinks that the missing fish is somehow got sucked throught it and is in the media on the inside or in some of my live rock (some of it has caves that the fish can get into and I cant)????

Now that everything is dead should I change the substrate, I originally went with aragonite, live sand mix but have never been happy with it? Should I change the media in the filter and just start over?? I have great blues and purples and greens starting to form on my live rock. I just dont want to dump money in the wrong direction especially with the economy like it is money is becoming more and more important in my household...... Sorry for it being so lond Thanks for reading and offering any advice

 

[fau8]

Its hard to advise without water chem tests. Where did the water come from that you used for the change. There was either problem with the water or the PH was drastically altered with the water change.

 

[leopard_babe]

Well perhaps your damsel died and caused an ammonia spike. If there is nothing left in the tank, I would not worry about trying to fix all the levels. Let your tank cycle all over again like you did in the beginning. Then start over again slowly.
I would not worry about changing the substrate, unless you want to. If you started your tank at the beginning of the year, you should already have beneficial bacteria in your tank. So, unfortunately the loss of your fish might have changed the levels damaging the rest of your tank.
The loss of your fish and the recycling of your tank, should not cause you to loose your coraline algea. I had a tank wipe out when I got windex in my tank. I did not loose my coraline algea. The tank recycled and I started over slowly.
Sorry for your loss. This hobby can be frustrating. Don't give up. It is part of learning.

 

[perfectdark]

Unless the damsel was 5" or so I seriously doubt it caused this havoc. I have lost on separate occasions, 3- 2" fish in my small 29gal bio cube with no recovery, and I saw no spikes in any levels including ammonia. Its very difficult to kill a damsel, which is why people use them for cycling (not saying I condone that) but its the main reason. For it to die first something was very wrong to begin with which made the damsel die. Everything after that was a severe snowball down a hill effect. Is the anemone dead? If so when did it die? How big is/was it?

 

[thetabors]

the anemone died early this morning it was the last thing to go. th nitrate's were above 160 the test tube turned completly red cant remember the others i will test again in an hour or so. damsel was less than 2 inches. should i change the filter media to get rid of the high trates or let it stabilize with water conditioner

 

[jeanheckle]

Perhaps when you moved the tank you shook some things up that started a cycle. I agree with Leopard Babe, don't mess with anything and let the tank cycle. If you hate the arogonite, now would be the time to change it. But I would make that decision soon so the tank can complete it's cycle and you can start adding again.
Sorry you had to go through this.

 

[paintballer768]

Originally Posted by thetabors
http:///forum/post/2787468
the anemone died early this morning it was the last thing to go. th nitrate's were above 160 the test tube turned completly red cant remember the others i will test again in an hour or so. damsel was less than 2 inches. should i change the filter media to get rid of the high trates or let it stabilize with water conditioner
160 nitrates? Holy cow, Im guessing you havent done a water change in a very long time, or are overfeeding like mad

 

[ibew41]

when is the last time you really cleaned out your canister filter and replaced the sponge filters?

 

[thetabors]

I do regular water changes. I use distilled water. And I dont over feed I feel like I may not feed enough if anything. And about the canister filter the pet store here said that I should change one level of the media inside it after 1 yr and then another set of the media every 3-4 months so there would always be beneficial bacteria in it and I havent made it to the one year mark yet more like the 6 month mark... I think that could be a problem maybe change the media in the canister and if do how much there is 3 seperate trays on the inside do i change all three or 2 or just 1?????? thanks for the help

 

[alexmir]

if you havent cleaned out the canister filter in months i would say that could definitely trap alot of detrius and gunk which would cause nitrates to go up. But 160 is pretty high.

 

[natclanwy]

1 year is probably okay for the replacement time frame if it is ceramic or glass media but it should be rinsed at least monthly preferably every other week, canister filters will become nitrate factories if they aren't kept clean. What type of media is in your canister? I have an Ehiem that uses two foam pads along with three trays of cintered glass and one tray of ceramic media. I rinse all of the trays and rinse out the filter pads every other week and replace the fine filter pad monthly and the coarse pad every other month.
I agree one damsel should not have been enough to upset the balance of your tank, but moving everything around could have especially if you have a deep sand bed. For future reference a small missing fish usually isn't a big deal if you have a good clean up crew. I have seen my critters get rid of a 3" angel overnight all that was left were bones and then those were gone by the next day. You are better off just checking your parameters and doing water changes accordingly to prevent a high nitrate spike.

 

[socal57che]

Originally Posted by natclanwy
http:///forum/post/2788164
1 year is probably okay for the replacement time frame if it is ceramic or glass media but it should be rinsed at least monthly preferably every other week, canister filters will become nitrate factories if they aren't kept clean. What type of media is in your canister? I have an Ehiem that uses two foam pads along with three trays of cintered glass and one tray of ceramic media. I rinse all of the trays and rinse out the filter pads every other week and replace the fine filter pad monthly and the coarse pad every other month.

Clean canisters every 2 weeks. Rinse media in tankwater from a water change.
Thoroughly clean the media. Don't discard it. This is where your bacteria live. The bacteria are your real filter.