Tank crashing

[apexifd]

Originally Posted by abcha0s

Did you smell anything like rotten eggs - even a faint smell?

that I have no idea, I only spotted it using iphone facetime(video call) while wife was feeding the fish. She doesn't know how long ago the line was clogged.

on the interesting side note. it appears that I have more death during the day than night.

[ScubaSteve]

Originally Posted by apexifd

on the interesting side note. it appears that I have more death during the day than night.

Hmmmm... Bacterial bloom maybe. I had an issue once (and still time to time) where I get big bacteria blooms that leave films on the glass and kind of stringt, bubble things coming off the rocks (not dinos), and they seem to flourish during daylight hours. When this happens really bad I find everything looks unhappy. My theory is that the blooms drop the O2 levels in the tank (this has been scientifically proven for many bacterial blooms) and everything suffers. I think this is ultimately what caused my cantaloupe sized birdsnest to crash. Took me forever to figure it our but once I got the bloom under control everything bounced back and stopped dying.

[Renegade]

I had a similar tank crash last summer. The route cause ended up being my calcium reactor that had gone offline. It caused all my parameters to go crazy to the point were i didn't understand how they were related but in truth, it was simply a chain reaction of evens caused by system adapting to the lack of balance in the calc. and alk.

I ended up losing almost everything of importance. Only lost 1 or 2 fish though which kept me going.

All in all, i would suggest patience, try not to over react as hard as that is. Toss some Rowaphos, Some Carbon and and just 10gal water changes ever other day.

And ride it out.

[apexifd]

Originally Posted by ScubaSteve

Hmmmm... Bacterial bloom maybe.

the birds nest and green monti cap I got from you before are gone. it's actually the monti cap went first, then I was slowly losing acro and such. then last week, I started to suffer heavy loses. Looks like my elegance is on it's way out as well.

Originally Posted by Renegade

The route cause ended up being my calcium reactor that had gone offline. how they were related but in truth, it was simply a chain reaction of evens caused by system adapting to the lack of balance in the calc. and alk.

I ended up losing almost everything of importance. Only lost 1 or 2 fish though which kept me going.

that's what might trigger the heavy loses, that I had in the last 2 weeks. with my effulux line clog up and not knowing how long it was clog up. when it opened up again, it probably cause major alk swing.

luckily I haven't lose any fish yet.


Hopefully by the time everything stabilize, I will have some corals left even though I already lost way more than half of them.

[Renegade]

i would also suggest, if you sense something else going, move it to a quarantine or cut your loses. Corals dieing can't be good for the ones around them....

[abcha0s]

What's your salinty at? When's the last time you calibrated your refractometer?

Take a water sample to a LFS and get them to read the salinity. Refractometers can drift and your salinity might not be what you think it is?

What abou stray voltages? Is a powerhead on in the day and off at night?

[apexifd]

Originally Posted by abcha0s

What's your salinty at? When's the last time you calibrated your refractometer?

Take a water sample to a LFS and get them to read the salinity. Refractometers can drift and your salinity might not be what you think it is?

What abou stray voltages? Is a powerhead on in the day and off at night?

no stray voltage.

SG is currently 1.026, but I usually have it at 1.024. Must have use too much salt on one of the water change. Will try to lower it to to 1.024 again.

refractormeter is less than year old, and calibration is good.

MP40 is set to night mode, and korlia 750gph is on at all time.

Dying is slowing done. at least I don't loose a colony/frag every day.

I am crossing my finger right now, hoping whatever left will survive

[asylumdown]

You should get a test kit that can isolate carbonate alkalinity from borate alkalinity. I went through a mini SPS crash that I simply could not explain a couple of months ago because my total alkalinity kept testing in 'normal' ranges.

For a variety of reasons my borate alkalinty was actually making up too much of that percentage and my carbonate concentration was dangerously low. As soon as I realized it and I corrected the carbonate alkalinity specifically (even though it made the total alk higher than I normally like), the 'crash' completely stopped and has now reversed.

I only mention it because you said that part of your calcium reactor was clogged for a while. If you use a salt with a lot of borate it can really start to obscure a problem with low carbonate over time.

[apexifd]

I just want to give this thread a quick update.

there hasn't been any RTN or STN for the last 2 weeks. and all the injured sps has been starting to regrow over the dead spots.

What I have done so far.

A 30% water change and another 50% water change 4 days after.
add TLF phoban 150 as carbon reactor.
replaced Vertex In-100 with Skimz SK180 skimmer.
removing dying sps.
boost up kH
increase efflux output from ca reactor.

Now, I have high ph than before. 8.2 during the day and 8.0 at night. versus 8.0(day) 7.8(night)

I have to thank everyone for your input.

Now... who has sps frags?? LOl