Dead fish, missing anemone and nitrate spike
 

Just got back from vacation. Was away a week. The guy who was watching my tank said the water looked milky and foggy on the last day.

I'm thinking my baby lionfish died behind the rocks. Never saw the little guy since the day I got him and think he starved. Couldn't get him to eat silver sides or krill or mysis. Think I lost an anemone as well while I was gone.

Anyways, moving forward, I couldn't find my ammonia test kit but when I checked the nitrates and nitrites it was way off the chart. My chart stops at 110 and I could tell by the bright purple colour it was way higher.

I normally do 6% water changes. I did a 12% water change last night and sucked up water from the bottom of the tank where most of the ammonia resides. Nitrate level went down to 50. Dumped in lots of Prime and Cycle bacteria.

Doing another 12% water change today.

I can't do much more than 12% because I have sponges and clams jammed into the rocks near the top of the tank. Can't move them...ugh.

Picking up more Prime, Cycle, and Instant Ocean Nitrate Reducer today. My PH got thrown for a loop as well after the water change. Dipped down to 7.75. Normally it's 8.2.

Any other suggestions?

Sorry to hear about the loss, that sounds terrible.

Are you running carbon at all? I know after my anemone died it was toxic soup in my tank, i ran heavy carbon and still lost LPS.

Yes two carbon bags and chem elite ultra pure. Think I'll go pick up some new carbon today too.

Woke up this morning to a dead cleaner shrimp. His body parts were all over the tank.

Water is very cloudy and stinks like sewage. Now what?

I think the guy that was watching my tank was over feeding.

You need to do a lot more than a 12% water change. I would be doing 200% over 12 hrs.

Did 25% last night. Doing 25% today.

Nitrates are down to about 40. Water is still cloudy.

Also can't keep the PH up. Dropped to 7.75 last night. Normally sits at 8.2. Using lots of Seachem 8.3 buffer which is also supposed to raise alkinity.

Also noticed the bulb on my UV sterilizer went out. Wonder if that did anything.

I wouldn't advise this as it might be too much of a change too quickly for your system. You could actually cause more stress to the system. As far as the cloudiness goes, 2 questions, do you have any anemone's in your tank?? If so are any missing? Do you use activated carbon in your system?? If not I would set up a carbon reactor and this should help clear your water up and remove some of the toxins that may be in it.

Yes one anenome is missing.

Replaced my activated carbon yesterday with two new bags.

Should I hook up the UV sterilizer again with a new bulb or just keep adding cycle?

Wife just called, tank stinks.

Ok, one of your nems got sucked into an intake and is more than likely gone{that is the milky colour}.. Uv sterilizer probably won't make too much difference one way or the other at this point, keep up the carbon going and if you have access to a hang on back filter, like an aquaclear or something similar you can run filter floss and carbon in that as well. Keep up with the partial water changes 10-15% per day over the next week or so{never asked, how big is your tank?}watch and test your water parameters and be patient. Try to see if there are any remains of the anemone kicking around and do your best to get anything that might be dead out of the tank. Change the carbon every two-three days and you should be ok.

Oh and if you have any more anemone's in tank I would suggest putting some foam or some sort of filter media over the intakes for your pumps. Nem's are notorious for getting sucked into them....I know:cry: Lost a beautiful rbta a few years ago to a nem wandering into a fx5 intake on a previous tank.

I have a 120 gallon with a hang on the back overflow. I'll move the filter media over to the overflow that dumps into the refugium.

Thanks for the advice!

It should be ok in a few days, just remember that any fast changes in your water parameters can be just as harmful imo as when you get a contamination enter the system. If you have access to another hob filter system you could set that up as well for a few days if you have room in tank or sump area. The filters and carbon are the big key to clearing up your water and will eliminate odours as well. The water changes will also help.

K I'll go grab some more carbon and filters. :)

Wife noticed the filter in the media reactor looks awful.

Got my nitrates down to 5. Water is still cloudy. Ammonia is zero. Found out the reason the water is cloudy is because when the anemone died it basically exploded in my tank. Put floss filters on the drain pipes from the tank. Tank looks much better this morning.

Careful with the filter floss in the overflow tubes. The last thing you want right now is a flood. I would advise you to use it in the sump or a HOB filter.

I had a large maxi mini get caught in a return..

I did 75% water changes daily for 4 days.. and everything was fine.

Lost 2 sponges, 3 anemones, 10 snails, 1 cleaner shrimp, 1 torch coral, 1 porcelain crab, and I'm sure a couple of other invertebrates.

Water is almost completely clear. Filter floss really helped.

So it looks like my lionfish is very much alive. Just the anemone was responsible for killing the above in the tank.

+1

I know it sucks but nem's can cause a few issues when the move into area's they shouldn't. Watch the filter floss tough and as soon as the water is clear and your water spec's are where they should be, take it out. Just remember to put some sort of foam filtration over your intakes. Inside the tank power heads like Hydors and Maxi-jets can also give you grief as well. Nem's will always move to where they feel happy,so light and food play a big part in keeping them in one spot more or less, they can also get aggressive with each other, so watch out sometimes when you put them together. If you feed them regularly and they get enough light they probably wont move too much...