Black Phantom hit upon an excellent point and I can say from experience, test kits go bad. Take a sample of your water to the LFS and have them test it, then compare what they say to your readings...
Dumping fish into a tank is one way to deal with fish that have been shipped over long distances and time. The theory is, the water they are shipped in will have massive amounts of ammonia, however the pH will be very low due to lot's of CO2 in the water so the ammonia may actually be in the form of non toxic ammonium. However, as soon as you start adding tank water the buffers, O2 etc will quickly raise the pH and the ammonium will change to toxic ammonia. They figure the change in water chemistry will be less stressful on the fish than dealing with the ammonia.
If you aren't finding bodies I figure something is eating them, any green brittle stars? Keep us posted as you find things out.
Doug
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