Tank crashes: causes, treatment and lessons to learn.
 

I've been reading all over the internet about cases of reefers tanks crashing. Normally due to equipment failure or human error. This is of course, everyone's worst nightmare.

Some things I've learned that are common causes:

heater malfunctions
long power outages
top-off malfunctions
deep sand beds purging anaerobic gases
GFI tripping
Going on prolonged vacations with inexperienced sitters
GFO overdosing
Skimmer overflowing detrius back into the tank
rocks falling/breaking the tank
neglect

some interesting ones:

anemone going into the power head
clam spawning
fan falling into tank and electrocuting everything
working with industrial cleaners at work, coming home to do in-water maintenance without washing your hands first
contaminated salt
LFS medicating the tank, bringing a fish home and dumping in LFS water

Curious about other Canreefers, have you experienced a tank crash? What was the cause, what was the outcome, what did you do, and what could you have done differently to prevent it?

My ex bought a tang and put it in my tank without my knowledge. That tang had marine velvet and killed almost all of my fish that I had at the time :sad:

Another one that can cause small tanks to crash is using to much putty to stick down corals with. I'm talking about puttying in several corals at once in 25g or less tanks.

Add to the list: Not using aquarium safe silicone. The anti-mildew silicone will make quick work of a tank.

Bio pellets.

Other things that can cause a tank crash or semi-crash:

Carbon dosing (vodka, sugar, vinager, bioPellets)
ZeoVit
Activated Carbon
Salt
Bad lights (eg, expired halides, cheap eBay lights)
Sodium Carbonate/Bicarbonate
Calcium
Potassium
Magnesium
Strontium
Pretty much any chemical with -ium at the end.
Chemicals without -ium at the end.
Live rock
Dead rock
Marco rock
Polo rock
Someone peeing in your tank
Praying to the wrong god(s)
Murphy.

cont'd...

water
no water
wrong water
cold water
hot water
looking at tank
not looking at tank
touching tank
not touching tank
Murphy (yes, twice)

Good call on this one. I always forget this one. Need to keep reminding myself to not look at the tank for too long or it might crash. It has happened!

oh damn that's what i've been doing wrong this whole time?!? lol


Good idea for a thread Ryan, kind of curious to see if anyone had an anemone get sucked through a powerhead and chopped up

giving a rat's ass.

guaranteed trouble if you do that.

i'd graph rat's ass vs potential for disaster but i'm too tired.

I think anyone that's ever had an anemone had this happen. Mine lasted 2 weeks before it got blended.

Used live rock sporting a nasty bacteria never did find out what it was but 13 fish later and a week of malafix seemed to solve the problem

Garlic
Selcon
Tangs
Copperbands
.
.
.
:mrgreen:

I have several anemones, and I covered the powerheads in a nylon netting, so hopefully that helps.

Even though my bta seems to be liking the bottom of the rocks as of late.. much the the shegrin of the hosting clown.

LOL!!!

very funny and probably true as well.

So far I had quite a few anemones and never got one stucket into a powerhead. I had 2 sebaes, 1 bubbletip, one huge long tentacles, two maximini carpet, and two rock flower anemones. I must have been lucky. My current anemone is a huge 12'' sebae and a 10'' maximini.

*waving over here*

Every anemone I have every had the displeasure of owning, particularly the expensive ones, commits suicide in my powerheads. It's like a silent protest against Koralias.

Good thing I run Tunze's :D

And that sucks, by the way :\

I had a total loss in the early 90's caused by a heater getting stuck in the "ON" position. Now I use two small heaters of which neither has the ability to cook the tank. In the summer, only one of those heaters is plugged in and it only comes on a bit at night (mostly because my fans run 24/7).

Also in the early 90's I bought a Queen Conch for my 20-gallon tank (not knowing any better). A couple weeks later the Conch died and I was naively oblivious. I came home after school to the whole house smelling like putrid gastropod death. There is no smell in the world that is worse than putrid gastropod death.

My most recent partial crash was about 18 months ago when Caulerpa went sexual in a 20-gallon reef that was overrun. The trigger was me forgetting to plug the heater in for a couple days in the winter and the tank dropped to about 70 degrees. As soon as I plugged the heater back in the Caulerpa got frisky. Luckily I caught it early and only lost one fish. Sadly I lost one fish.

I think 99.99% reason for crash is owing a saltwater tank :razz: (0.01% is putting a plastic bag in the ocean which in turn chokes a whale)