Something Fishy Is Going On Here...

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n3ont3tra

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Okay... so. There's been a few problems with my tank recently, but I don't know what's causing them.

December 28 - I added a pair of flame hawkfish and a rock with green star polyps
December 29 - I moved some of the rocks around in an attempt to stop the other fish from attacking the hawks. It worked.
~ January 4 - male clown dissappeared (still no appearance)
A few turbo snails died in January. They appeared fine until on day they just fell didn't move and died..?
~Jan 19 - I bought a rock with yellow polyps about a week ago and they all either died or were eaten. There was about 15 polyps, by this date there was about 8. By the next week they were gone.
Everything else appeared normal.
I moved the rocks around a little more up until the 5th of February.
Feb 12 both of the skunk cleaner shrimp died. There was no wounds or anything like that...
Today (the 18th) the largest hermit crab died, and so did another turbo snail. I'm kinda upset about the hermit, even if he did always knock over the coral.
The GSP is doing great, and the fish all look fine.

I'm testing the water and looking around for the brittle star now.
 
Sg -- 1.026
ammonia - 0
nitrites - 0
nitrates - ~15, I'm not really worried though, since I only have one coral... I don't think it would affect the shrimp and crabs, though????
ph - 8

And last week when I tested, it was the same except nitrates were 5ppm. But I'm guessing the snails and shrimp dieing might have affected it.

Forgot to add, the tank is 37 gallons, no sump, no skimmer, about 55 pounds of live rock.
2 flame hawkfish
1 firefish
1 midas blenny
1 sebae clownfish
 
To be honest I'm a little mystified by this... it's certainly past the exception stage. Seeing as it's all inverts could it be a predator? Can't believe I just typed that... :lol:
 
I wouldn't discount the hawkfish for the shrimp deaths... And the Turbos, what kind of "Turbo" snail are they? There are plenty of snails sold in the hobby with that moniker that are coldwater specemins and do very poorly in our warmer reef systems.
 
If it was a predator, wouldn't it have ate them? They were all in one piece.
The turbos are supposed to be zebra turbo snails from liveaquaria.
http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Di...cfm?pCatId=2459
And I figured they'd die a little sooner, it's been about 7 months now...

By the way, the shrimp were both right next to each other when I've found them, and they were pretty stiff but they still had all of their legs and antennas.

I'm not sure if me moving the rocks around had anything to do with it or not, but I don't think so. Because I've had the shrimp and snails since the tank has cycled, and have been rearranging it a LOT since then. They probably would've died sooner if they couldn't take it.

Also, I used some windex around the house the day before the shrimp died. But I've always used windex, and it's not like I sprayed it right in the tank or anything.

:(
 
Hummm, quite the nefarious problem you've got there. Just for giggles, have you tested the TDS of your RO water recently? Changed or bought a new bucket of salt lately?
 
No and no. Same bucket of IO.

Actually, I haven't tested the TDS ever... which is kinda bad. But there isn't really any algae problems.
 
Doesn't mean you don't have copper problems... Might be grasping at straws, but checking that TDS would be a good idea ;). Malfunctioning membranes COULD lead to or contribute to the problems you're seeing here.
 
I'm still trying to convince my mom to let me get a tds meter...
found the starfish... not too good. uploading a pic now.
an astrea snail isn't looking too good right now either.

I bought some fw fish from liveaquaria, also bought a toadstool mushroom and feather duster.
Feather duster died in a few hours. :(
toadstool looks okay, I guess. Hasn't opened, but I only got it Friday.

It might not have been the best thing to get inverts right now, but I don't think I'll be buying any other livestock for few months.
 
100_3098.jpg
 
Things have really gone downhill in the past six hours...

I just checked the tank with a flashlight, the starfish looked HORRIBLe. So I took it out, I didn't think it would live. It was barely moving, and it's legs were all curled up, I'll upload the pic in a minute. Weird thing happened, when I took it out. I flipped it over when it was still underwater to see how bad it was, and there was a small hole in it, about 1/8 of an inch thick. I took it out of the water and the hole immediately got a lot bigger, to about 1/4 of an inch. So I took it out and tested the ammonia and pH.
ammonia is 0.25ppm
ph is ~7.7...

I'm glad I saw the starfish, because I don't even want to thing of what would have happened if I didn't take it out....

I still don't know why it died though. It's really starting to worry me especially with .25ppm ammonia.

:(

I'm afraid to do a water change, because if the RO unit isn't working right then it won't help.
 
100_3104.jpg

100_3103.jpg



After I took it out:
100_3105.jpg

100_3107.jpg

100_3108.jpg


Was it the air that caused it to do that? It had only been out of the water for about a minute and a half. :(
 
Could have been... Many echinoderms are very sensitive to air. Sorry bout the loss :(
 
Assuming the hydrometer is correct and not giving you false readings we can assume the salinity is correct. Maybe get your LFS to check a sample and you test it with your hydrometer as well. If the results are similar it isn't the salinity.

The ammonia, nitrite & nitrates are fine and not a problem. However when something dies in a marine tank it produces ammonia and in the high PH of seawater it becomes quite lethal. Inverts, shrimp, starfish, etc are more sensitive to ammonia than fish and even a minute trace of ammonia could cause problems to them.

The PH is a bit low for a marine tank. Most coral reefs have a PH around 8.4. A PH of 8.0 isn't going to kill its inhabitants tho unless they are new and have been in water with a higher PH.

I noticed your PH has dropped to 7.7 when you took the starfish out. That could be an issue. Fluctuating PH values will stress the animals living in the tank. Marine fish come from a very large and stable environment where the PH doesn't change at all. It could be you don't have enough carbonates in the water to stabilise the PH and prevent it from fluctuating. Try adding a small amount of sodium bicarb (baking soda) to the tank each day and see if it helps stop the PH from dropping. (NB: You don't want to change the PH by more than 0.2 per day). Eg: 7.7 to 7.9 one day. The next day take it up to 8.1. the next day take it up to 8.3
Also check the PH in the morning before the lights come on. And in the evening before the lights go out. If the PH is low in the morning and goes up during the day then you have definite PH problems. The sodium bicarb will help to limit these PH swings.

The hole and damage to the back of the starfish looks like it might have been squished by a rock or hit by a mantis shrimp. Damaged animals should always be removed to prevent them dieing and creating ammonia. Well done for taking it out when you did.

When did you last do a water change on the tank and how much do you change?

A 50% water would dilute any toxins in the water and would add depleted elements (calcium, carbonates, etc) to the water making the environment more stabile.
Perhaps even do a couple of water changes per week for a couple of weeks. This should get the water into perfect condition and remove water quality problems from the issue.

I noticed you use Windex, window and glass cleaner around the house. If you use algae cleaning magnets and there is Windex residue on the aquarium glass, when you have finished with the magnets and put them together in the fish bucket (or wherever you keep them), there is a possibility the Windex that has gotten onto the outside magnet from the glass, will rub off on the inside magnet. Then when you use the magnets next time you put the contaminated magnet cleaner inside the tank and the Windex residue washes off into the tank and poisons things. It might only be a small amount but could be killing the inverts.

Make sure you don't have any soap, grease, moisturising cream, etc on your hands when working on or in the tank, or when feeding the fish.
Make sure there are no paint fumes, perfumes, deodorants, smoke, etc in the room.

Perhaps add some activated carbon to the filter to help remove any chemical contaminants that may be in there. Remove the carbon after a couple of weeks and throw it away. See how the fish do after that.

Monitor the ammonia levels shortly after feeding the fish and make sure the filters are removing it all within an hour (30 minutes is a better time). The longer ammonia is in the water them more damage it does to the inhabitants.
 

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