kleake
New Member
I a 75 gallon with a 20 gallon sump, skimmer, ~75lbs live rock, some coral, and 5 fish. All has been running fine for 3 years, and the last two without any changes in fish or corals. Everything has been very healthy. Torch coral growing huge, Anemone split twice and is now 3. Coral banded shrimp molted several times. Everything doing good.
About 1 month ago I noticed alot of hair algae starting, and my sand was starting to grow a layer on it faster than my hermits could clean it. I figured my RO system was due for filters so I planned to change them out but hadn't done it yet. 2 days ago I noticed the anemone and the corals were not opening like normal and the algae had really taken off to the point it was trying to plug my overflow box.
Thinking my phosphates were probably high, and I had some water already mixed in my QT tank, i did my normal water change. (consists of mixing 10 gallons of RO saltwater in my QT tank with nothing in it. Let it circulate for a week or so, then drain 10 gallons out of the main, put this back in and all is good.)
The exception this time is the water had been circulating in the QT for 3 weeks. Nothing else in it, just water, salt, and a hob filter to circulate it. When I shut my system down to do the water change, the main pump didn't restart like normal, but it had done this once before and did restart about an hour later. This time it went all night without restarting. By morning I had lost one clown and the rest were looking stressed. I did a quick check of water temp and tried to get the pump going, but had to get to work.
When I got home, the other two clowns were at the top of the tank and not looking good. The tang and the angel looked stressed, but was acting fine. I checked my water parameters and all was at or near 0 and well within range. I did another 10 gallon water change to try and minimize anything I was not seeing, got the pump working correctly and tried to clean some of the algae from the sand bed and sides. Thinking with all of this, it would help things out.
I got up this morning, and 3 more fish were gone. I don't understand what went wrong with this water change as I have done plenty of changes this same way. The ONLY thing I know that was different was that my mixed water was circulating in the QT for 3 weeks instead of my normal 1 week. Would this cause my issues, or was it more the hair algae and phosphates getting out of control more of the issue?
I don't check my water parameters often as I do not add any chemicals. I monitor appearance, and check parameters occaisionally if something looks off. Every time I do check them, everything is right where I want it, so I don't disturb anything by adding stuff. Everything normally looks great, is clean, healthy and growing. I do slack on my water changes and have went several months without any, but within the last year I have been doing better with one every 4-6 weeks. Still, all looked good until a month ago when the hair algae started growing, and within the last week or two was beginning to get out of control. Its a 3 year old tank, with no changes in the last year at all.
Sorry about the long post, but thank in advance for any help.
About 1 month ago I noticed alot of hair algae starting, and my sand was starting to grow a layer on it faster than my hermits could clean it. I figured my RO system was due for filters so I planned to change them out but hadn't done it yet. 2 days ago I noticed the anemone and the corals were not opening like normal and the algae had really taken off to the point it was trying to plug my overflow box.
Thinking my phosphates were probably high, and I had some water already mixed in my QT tank, i did my normal water change. (consists of mixing 10 gallons of RO saltwater in my QT tank with nothing in it. Let it circulate for a week or so, then drain 10 gallons out of the main, put this back in and all is good.)
The exception this time is the water had been circulating in the QT for 3 weeks. Nothing else in it, just water, salt, and a hob filter to circulate it. When I shut my system down to do the water change, the main pump didn't restart like normal, but it had done this once before and did restart about an hour later. This time it went all night without restarting. By morning I had lost one clown and the rest were looking stressed. I did a quick check of water temp and tried to get the pump going, but had to get to work.
When I got home, the other two clowns were at the top of the tank and not looking good. The tang and the angel looked stressed, but was acting fine. I checked my water parameters and all was at or near 0 and well within range. I did another 10 gallon water change to try and minimize anything I was not seeing, got the pump working correctly and tried to clean some of the algae from the sand bed and sides. Thinking with all of this, it would help things out.
I got up this morning, and 3 more fish were gone. I don't understand what went wrong with this water change as I have done plenty of changes this same way. The ONLY thing I know that was different was that my mixed water was circulating in the QT for 3 weeks instead of my normal 1 week. Would this cause my issues, or was it more the hair algae and phosphates getting out of control more of the issue?
I don't check my water parameters often as I do not add any chemicals. I monitor appearance, and check parameters occaisionally if something looks off. Every time I do check them, everything is right where I want it, so I don't disturb anything by adding stuff. Everything normally looks great, is clean, healthy and growing. I do slack on my water changes and have went several months without any, but within the last year I have been doing better with one every 4-6 weeks. Still, all looked good until a month ago when the hair algae started growing, and within the last week or two was beginning to get out of control. Its a 3 year old tank, with no changes in the last year at all.
Sorry about the long post, but thank in advance for any help.