UV & LR/LS Question

kaholic

kaholic

Member
Ok, assume I did the change from CC to sand about a month ago and everything was fine except for the mild nitrate spike that was gradually coming down...then decided to run a UV on my tank for about a week straight and may have killed the live sand I added, and/or the copepod population and my live rock. Without calling me a dummy, what would your suggestion be? Should I re-seed the tank? Buy more LR? Or is it too presumptuous to think that I killed off the good bacteria/pods in just a week and they won't slowly come back to life? I just don't see anymore pods at night. I do have a refugium with Cheato, Caleurpa and one piece of LR but don't really spot any in there either. This is all hypothetical of course.
 
dogstar

dogstar

Active Member
Assuming you did do all that, I would not blame it on the UV. I have always ran UV on my reefs 24/7 and my LR. LS, fuge, coarls, fish, are very much alive. Dont have any idea what would kill it all if its trully dead, sorry.
 
fishamajig

fishamajig

Member
i second that, uv are a useful thing in a reef tank, it would not have killed all your sand, rock, ect. it kills suspended organisms like diatoms and nanochloropsis.
 
kaholic

kaholic

Member
Sorry, it's not that it's definitely dead. The rock and sand LOOK fine and the levels are fine as well. My fish and inverts are all ok too. Didn't mean to sound like I killed everything. The problem is the tank is 2 years old, then I did the change to sand. Before I hooked up the uv, there were pods coming out of my ears. Now, I just don't see any and I'm worried I killed them off by overusing the uv. I have a mandarin and I don't want him starving to death. If everything in the tank looks fine and water parameters are good, can I assume the pods will return eventually...and the sand and LR are still ok?
 
kaholic

kaholic

Member
Sweet! Panic dissolved! Thanks!

So, could the uv have been the cause of the dissapearing pods? I just don't understand what else could have happened to them.
 
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