[fishytime]

thanks guys for all the responses, kind words and offers for help.....those of you who know me, know that this tank was a part of me and sitting there watching it all die was devastating to say the least....


first off I wanna thank Mikey(El Guappo) big time for helping me with the move(It wasnt easy)......he helped me for 10 hours........I didnt think the move went all that bad.......it took 13 hours to take down the entire system, which sounds like a lot but the system is two separate tanks sharing the same sump.......it was a 24 degree day(not to cool, not too hot) so I put all the coolers/bins out on the front lawn with probably 70% of the containers having a powerhead in them....all the containers with either fish or corals had a powerhead.........the small tank had a 2-3" inch sandbed so I ditched that.....the big tank only had an inch in it so I figured it would be ok to move it.....that was my critical error in judgment(I think)......anyways.....it was 10:00ish when we finally got the tanks to the point where Mikey could go home.....I spent the next couple hours putting all the rock, coral and fish back into their respective tanks with just the basics running(heat and water movement)....the plumbing would have to wait...... the sump ran with a small powerhead with a hose pumping water from the skimmer section to the fuge which kept water moving through the whole sump....I got up later that morning to go to work and my male clown was swimming in that dumb arse clown way right at the front of the tank......I thought things were ok and left for work......I get a call about noon from the new landlord(who needed to get in to my place that day) that house stinks, and he's concerned if the tank smells like that all the time.....I just figured that he was smelling some of the frags that got missed in some of the bins(I noticed a slight smell when I woke up too) and reassured him that the tank doesnt smell......I got home from work and the stench nearly knocked me over......I still just thought it was the bins stinking things up so I quickly gathered them all up, took them outside an rinsed them with the hose......I went back in and as I got close to the tank I could tell that it was the tank that wreaked .....the water was like milk.....I couldnt see two inches into the tank....I could however see two dead fish right at the front of the tank and I knew the worst had happened......I sat there for literally an hour not doing a thing.....just sortta in shock.....thats when I posted the tank had crashed...at that point I seriously was considering shutting the tank down.....I got a couple quick calls with offers(thanks again guys) for 10- 20g of water and another call from a close friend who talked me through things and convinced me to try and save what I could.....I put a call out to Kevin(you know how much I appreciate your help) at the shop and he said he could have 80g(I had 20 ready as well) of water ready for me and he would help me with the water change.....I gathered up my bins and ran up to the shop(it was 8:30pm).....we pumped water from the back of the shop, out the front door and into the bins in the back of my truck.....drove the water back to my place and Kevin pumped the water from the curb, through a window and into the tank(transfusion style) while I drained water out and flushed it.....Kevin then offered to stay and help me get the tank plumbed....it was midnight when he left and I stayed up to get the skimmer up and running, carbon going through a reactor and do an emergency dose of prime......the massive water change had cleared the water some but by morning the tank was still cloudy and stinking......I put the lights on and the scene was apocalyptic.....I could see dozens of dead snails, a couple more dead fish and all my corals were dead(except for some mushrooms a couple zoanthids and a couple lps)..... the attitude then shifted from saving the tank to just starting over again.....I had to work again that day, so when I got home I started the gruesome task of sifting blindly through murky water feeling for every rock(breaking/ cutting/ hacking off dead or dieing coral), fish and snail......the bodies filled a large coleman extreme cooler 5" deep






so the tank is pretty much a complete right off.....one blasto and a handful of hermits is all that survived.....heres couple shots of what my skimmer looked like for a few days(its almost completely choked of air)





I couldnt bring myself to do anything else with the tank.....it sat just with the rock randomly piled from my body search for a few days until Laurie came down for a visit(she was spossed to get a piece of my wrasse...mystery wrasse that is).....I owe a special thanks to her for kicking me in the butt to do something about the state the tank was in.....she sat on the floor for an hour scraping dead stinky zoas off of some of my bigger pieces of rock(while I fished them out) and helped me aquascape the tank(and her skills are up to par).......so that brings the thread up to date.......the tank is re-scaped and cycling.......and Im officially starting over.......there is still a bunch that I need to do with the tank, like put the rest of the powerheads back in the tank, set up the controller/ato/doser......gonna try and get that done tomorrow(er, I mean later today), clean the glass and get some pics of the new scape up