Urgent, Beth or BangGuy please read and help.

thamobster

thamobster

Member
I know this is long but please read and help me. Something is wrong with my 50 gal tank. All parameters are perfect, nitrite at 0, ammonia at 0, nitrate a little high at 10, pH at 7.8 (a little low for what I need right now) and salinity at 1.021 (also alittle low). I have a 1200 Cascade canister filter, an Emperor 400, Prizm Protein Skimmer, and a Coral Life light with the 10 ,000k, atinic, and lunar lights. I have about 60 lbs of LR in the tank, and the tank has been established for 8 weeks or so. I have in it about 6 turbo snails, 6 blue legged hermits, a big snail about 3 inches, and a cleaner shrimp (new). The fish I started with were a green mandarin( yes I know the tank isn't "big" enough, but he's doing great and I have him eating frozen food) a yellow tang (yes I know again but he was still tiny and happy with his surroundings, and 2 ocellaris clowns. I recently purchased three anemones, a pink tip, green bubble, and white sebae and an Clarki clown which is about 2 1/2 inches. Problem is after acclimating my new items and adding them the tank, not all of the items went in right away, the tang went right for the clown, even thought the clown was bigger than the tang. I know yellow tang are territorial but he was being a big bully. He was being real mean and trying to protect the other little clowns which are about 1 inch. I tried scaring the tang away from the clown for a little while so he could find his anemone. Then about 15 mintues the tang was laying on his side and breathing real hard. The three clowns do not fight, they get along well actually, the little ones follow the big Clarki. Another problem being I came home from the store and the one ocellaris clown was on her side. All three clowns are piling into the little corner in the front of the tank together. Also the mandarin isn't his active self like usual, he is staying put in one corner of the tank and it seems as if he is breathing a little heavier than usual. Am I experiencing a bioload? I need to know why my tang died, and why my other fish act as like they are dying. I did a water change today about 5 gallons. It must be either a bioload or are the anemones letting out toxins since there are three? They are not close to each other at all, one is all the way to the left, one in the middle, and another all the way to the right. Also the two anemones, white sebae and pink tip, shrunk around 8 p.m and still are not back to their full size like they had been and it has been about an hour. What is happening? Please help me ASAP
 
bang guy

bang guy

Moderator
It's common and expected for fish to determine dominance after a new arrival.
IMO you are going way too fast and going against most of the advice given on this board. My suggestion is to start asking detailed questions about your animals before purchasing them. We would have advised you not to buy any Anemone yet and definately not to buy a bleached Sebae.
We also would have advised you not to mix clown species and no more than two Clownfish for a 50 gallon.
Your Tang died of stress.
Just slow down and things can work out. One thing at a time.
 
beth

beth

Administrator
Staff member
I have to agree. The fish species list just is not going to make it in your size tank.
Also, your water conditions are less than ideal. Try bringing the pH up gradually, say over a week, as well as the salinity.
You should immediately find new homes for your anemones. Your lighting is totally insufficient. The white Sebae has lost its zooanthelle [algae that lives and grows with the anemone supplying it with food]. Without zooanthelle, the Sebae will die, its only a matter of time. In order to grow zooanthelle in anemones, generally high lighting is needed, such as medal halides.
I would suggest, keeping the original clowns and finding new homes for other fish and the anemones. Perhaps returning them to the LFS for credit.
Stick around on the forum and ask questions. Also, invest in a good hobby book such as Robert Fenner's, "The Conscientious Marine Aquarist". An excellent read, that is very informative as well as entertaining.
 
thamobster

thamobster

Member
Here is what is going on with the clowns, and the anemones, sorry they aren't too clear, but the white sebae I believe has an inverted mouth, which I heard is very bad, I didn't see it when I purchased him but I think that may be causing something. As you can tell by the pics I am dealing with a bad outbreak of brown algae. Anything to help would be good.
 
thamobster

thamobster

Member
most recent anemone..just right now my clarki died and then came back to life, what the hells happening. the other clowns are dieing and coming back to life what in the world has gone wrong to cause this, the fish seem as if they are having heart attacks because they are shaking, trying to get out of the water then falling to the bottom...
 
thamobster

thamobster

Member
white sebae...i put the fish in the QT tank....the mandarin is trying to jump out so I know something is wrong but all my parameters are perfect...this anemone has the inverted mouth is he causing all the problems..
 
thamobster

thamobster

Member
The only problem is that all the fish were perfect, nothing wrong with them, and then out of nowhere this happened. I thought, from what I read, that the fish were stressed out they wouldn't eat, would pace back and forth from the tank, and not act normally. All my fish had big appetites and never darted from side to side just were hanging out honestly, no abnormal behavior...
 
snipe

snipe

Active Member
The problem is your populating your tank "interly to "fast"!" Anemones should come at least 6 months or more. And you should only add fish 1 to 2 fish 2 to 3 weeks inbetween and. Your tangs died because of populating to fast and the tank was to small for that many fish. When you put fish in that fast it can cause another cycle and most fish wont live through that.
 
steveoutla

steveoutla

Member
AMEN!! You need to listen to people like Beth and Bang about this. They've been doing this for a long time and know what they are talking about. I made the mistake of going too fast with my setup and some fish died that didn't have to.
The first rule of this hobby is to have patience......because if you don't all you're going to do is kill innocent fish and waste your money.
 
nm reef

nm reef

Active Member
Hmmmm...tank has been established 8 weeks....clean up crew...5 fish...3 anenomes...and sudden problems when 2 clowns and the 3 anenomes were added. All fine before....
Hmmmmm...sounds to me like a combination of stress related issues from the new additions and possibly a sudden shock to the filtration. Do you have current results for ammonia/nitrite? If you do what brand test kit do you use? I'd suspect your water chemistry may have taken a sudden turn for the worse and all of your livestock is suffering because of the load placed on your young system.
At this point all you can do is monitor he water chemistry carefully...remove dead or dieing livestock...water changes on a regualr basis...and allow the system to mature and stabalise before re-stocking.:thinking:
 
sw65galma

sw65galma

Active Member

Originally posted by NM reef
Hmmmm...tank has been established 8 weeks....clean up crew...5 fish...3 anenomes...and sudden problems when 2 clowns and the 3 anenomes were added. All fine before....
Hmmmmm...sounds to me like a combination of stress related issues from the new additions and possibly a sudden shock to the filtration. Do you have current results for ammonia/nitrite? If you do what brand test kit do you use? I'd suspect your water chemistry may have taken a sudden turn for the worse and all of your livestock is suffering because of the load placed on your young system.
At this point all you can do is monitor he water chemistry carefully...remove dead or dieing livestock...water changes on a regualr basis...and allow the system to mature and stabalise before re-stocking.:thinking:
Also what about Temp? Check the temp throughout the day and night make sure it's not going up or down more than a degree or so.
Salinity should be OK for the Fish.
I had this sorta thing happen to me...My thought is bacterial infection.
Or possible Alk problem? I'm not sure how bad Alk affects Fish, but this would explain a lot of "mysterious" fish deaths.
 
devilboy

devilboy

Member
i agree with everyones replies to this post but i would like to add something. how are you acclimating your livestock ?
 
thamobster

thamobster

Member
hey thanks everyone for ur help..i checked the temp and it was the same it has always been..as for the anemone the one was definitely dead so maybe that was adding to the cause of death im not sure..now all of my fish are officially dead though and i have two live anemones and perfect water specifications so i completely stumped..i dont know whether or not to add a fish in a watch him and gradually keep adding fish or what..as for acclimating them i do the drip cycle acclimation
 
thamobster

thamobster

Member
just out of curiosity would the 3 anemones in 2 days bioload a tank or will just fish do that..cuz if they can that might be the problem...3 anemones and 1 fish in 2 days
 
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