Okay...trying not to panic but I am kinda worried......Just found 2 BIG dead turbo snails.

Tony they do look "spent"....severely deflated! Ya there is abit of a smell, not aweful though just different. So this has happened to you then? Did you have any "crash" after?

Actually I think I might be kinda panicking........:neutral::redface:

Going to do another 30G W/C tomorrow.

Yes, many times. Too many times to count. BTA's a few times but also with my old ritteri whom was 24" diameter (huge monster) and could spew for hours on end.

In actual fact very often within 2 weeks of an equinox as well. And guess what was last weekend? Weird eh.

Anyhow. There's no question it's a kick in the stomach for the tank as far as bioload, but the real kicker is O2 depletion so it's imperative to keep your skimmer on, even if it overflows for now. An air bubbler couldn't hurt, but shouldn't be necessary.

Your tank will pull through.

I'm not sure what's up with the turbos - it *could* be coincidence - snails do have a terrible habit of dropping dead just like that. :(

Thanks Tony! I knew you'd jump in on this one!
I will try not to panic! BREATHE>>>>>>>>>>:wink:

Weird on the Equinox thing. Neat....gonna have to watch for that.:neutral:

Oh, about the 40 nitrate thing. Dollars to donuts it's just interference (ie., the water is cloudy and thus the colour got darker, or something of this nature). It can't have jumped to 40 just like that, so either it's a false reading, or it already was up there or close to it in which case another day of it won't hurt. If it IS 40 though tomorrow, well .. you know. Not to sound like a broken record but there are these lentil like pellet things you might have heard about. ;)

Spawn events are a mixed blessing. On the one hand, it's cool to see because blah blah blah circle miracle of life wonderous times blah blah blah and all that, ... but at the same time IT'S IN YOUR TANK AND IT SMELLS! LOVELY! .... I totally feel for you tonight. But I promise after tomorrow it will be OK again!!!

Okay...broken record! I AM running the pellets!!! They have been in there for 3 days! I hope they are working!!!!!! Started thinking they were the cause because of the irony of having just added them, then this, but they better not be!:twised:

I will retest the nitrates tomorrow, hopefully a false reading.

Oh ok. :) Well there's no way they could really have populated enough bacteria yet in 3 days to affect anything (either positively or negatively), and since they are basically plastic otherwise, they're basically inert in and of themselves, so very likely that is only coincidence.

To me the fact that spring equinox was only 5 days ago is the more striking coincidence. I found that with my anemones very much so and yeah that could also be coincidence but the fact that it happens more often than not is probably telling us there is something to that after all.

Wish I was closer, I'd come over to help. Just make up as much SW as you can for tomorrow (or anytime after you notice them stop spewing, really) and kick off that waterchange. Do another one in another day or two if need be. Waterchanges can't really hurt and "the solution for pollution is dilution" so they definitely help in that way.

Another though. Sorta hesitant to suggest this since you had a bad experience with it, but when I had my mystery cloudiness back in September, I first thought it was a spawn. But then I noticed it wasn't clearing as quickly as other spawns I've had. It was suggested to me to use Coral Snow (the zeovit stuff) to help clear the water and I think it did help clear the water in the end. :neutral: But that was really a strange one for me and I'm not sure it was a spawn in the end since the water usually cleared up in a half day or so for those other spawns.

Good luck!

Thanks again Tony for your help. The tank has survived!!!:mrgreen:
Looks okay, everything appears normal?? A couple corals seem a little off but not too worrisome. Nems look a tad shrunken but overall normal. Smells a little odd. Nitrates are between 20-30 so down from last night. Doing another W/C as we speak and will mix another batch to do another tomorrow if need be.

Funny, I was JUST thinking about this and was about to ask how things were looking today! Glad to hear things survived the night of 'nem passion.

Yeah, that w/c tomorrow couldn't hurt, but after that it should more or less be back to 100% normal. :)

Glad to hear everything is doin good today:mrgreen::mrgreen: ....my urchins did this just last week and they seem to do it on a regular basis but its not as cloudy as your tank was...:smile:

Glad to hear all is well, I was waiting for the all clear post this morning and when nothing was posted I thought "oh **** its not good"