The Kent salt tested out fine.

That's very sad to hear Deb, and at the same time frustrating not knowing what the cause is. Can you explained in details the changes that your tank has gone through so perhaps the many minds on here can poke at some ideas. I hope we can find the cause before another bites the dust.:cry:

OMG thats awful!! :neutral:

Are you running carbon? Do you think it could be residual from removing the sandbed? The fish looked so good after all that messing around we did a couple of weeks ago.

Here's the timeline.

We changed over tanks August 12th. Within the next week we removed the remaining sandbed, some each nite accompanied by a large water change.

Fish fine, eating well, etc.

The weekend Kari broke his wrists...we powerwashed the rock. (Three weeks ago? ) The corals, anemone, etc. remaining in the tank, and the fish fine.

About a week ago, the fish quit eating nori. I have since ditched it. It was cheap, but I had used it before.

Both fish literally dropped dead. I saw Moo. Didn't see Apu, but the fact he was laying on top of the rock, already seriously decomposed, and not disturbed would indicate that to me.

Missing in the picture, two tiger cukes, small. Can't remember where they ended up, and haven't found.

Carbon is in, although I don't have an optimum place to place it.

Thinking Butters may be next.

:cry:

I heard that if a cuke dies in your tank, it can also do a bad number on your tank. I had a friend who bought a large cuke from the LFS, & his crab attacked & cut it up that night. Lost almost everything overnight. Possible culprit?

Deb, glad I had the chance to meet your famous Moo this summer with Chin. So sorry about your loss.

Anthony

I had an incident with a pink Hawaiian cuke before, and lost my anthias, the other fish were unaffected. I guess I went on the fact that the turd cukes aren't that toxic and kept them. Maybe they are to play in this, maybe not. They could very well turn up as they have before, inside holes in the rock.

I moved Butters (the Red Sea Butterfly) to the reef tank tonite. Did another large water change as well.

Here's a stab at it. I think it's a combination of things changing all around the same time.
Eliminating the sand - releasing toxic nitrate and loosing buffering abilities
Blasting rocks (with freshwater I assume) - killing off vast amount of denitrifying bacteria causing a biological imbalance. Also killing whatever'ss living in/on the rocks causing more decay.
Missing cucumbers - dead, possibly releasing toxin
Large water changes - perhaps too large volume, too frequent

If you combine all these changes together, and assuming that's what took place, it becomes a very different environment for these delicate species to cope with. I don't believe changes to the aqauscape or the lack of corals contribute to their rapid decend. Lets hope whatever still swimming can cope in the new setup.

Best of luck Deb. I know what you're feeling. I hope that things pull though.

Probably not ready yet - but Golds had some nice looking Moorish Idols in...

I wouldn't do that anyway. :neutral:

I was just thinking tonite tho, that if it was a water quality issue, wouldn't the starfish and snails be sensitive to that?