Tank Crash. Lost all my corals :(

[OCDP]

Originally Posted by christyf5

Yeah, doing 2 gallon water changes won't really get you far. Imagine having pitcher full of koolaid, take out a glassful and add a glassful of water, its still got tons of koolaid in it right (and tastes like it too )? Larger water changes are really warranted here. As well you have some (albeit small) mixing of water that is infused into your rock and sandbed, so you'd want to still maintain the larger water changes to get that out as well.

I don't really know what the foam insert will do for your tank unless there are large particulates you need to get out of the water, besides it will just trap gunk which will break down even further causing more problems for your tank. Definitely try to get some carbon in there to help break down and remove some of the water impurities.

I agree with Bev and Muck, definitely a good time to be cooking that rock. You don't want that crap leaching out later causing you all sort of problems down the line.

I am doing 8g water changes, not 2g . I do 4g at a time (I only have 2 - 2g buckets) Just so that's cleared up

I fully understand that I need to be doing larger water changes right now, as I am.. 8g at a time is a decent amount on a 20g . I plan on doing at least 10g tonight.

I guess the foam insert would be used when I baste my rocks and sand, all the gunk comes up and is collected in the foam. I never run the foam for more than a day. Then it's rinsed and stored away. I know they collect crap easily. Carbon would help me out quite a bit right now so I'll definitely try to get some. '

So again, how is rock cooking done and exactly how long does it take? I still have fish alive, and a few good corals alive as well.. so I dunno what I'd do about them, or the fish anyhow.

[christyf5]

Yeah I knew you were doing the 8g water changes, I was just agreeing with you that a 2G would be a waste of time unless it were a really small tank.

So rock cooking is easy and doesn't involve any actual "cooking"
.
Basically you'd remove the rock from the tank, scrub it and rinse it in saltwater, then place it in a rubbermaid container with new saltwater, a heater and a powerhead and put the lid on. Then every once in awhile (say weekly/biweekly) siphon out all the crud from the bottom and whatever has settled on the rock. Swish the rocks around in the water (and scrub if needed), remove the rocks, dump out the water and add new saltwater with the rocks. This continues on for a few months. I only cooked mine for about a few weeks but man I couldn't believe the amount of crap that came off my rock.

[OCDP]

Originally Posted by christyf5

Yeah I knew you were doing the 8g water changes, I was just agreeing with you that a 2G would be a waste of time unless it were a really small tank.

So rock cooking is easy and doesn't involve any actual "cooking"
.
Basically you'd remove the rock from the tank, scrub it and rinse it in saltwater, then place it in a rubbermaid container with new saltwater, a heater and a powerhead and put the lid on. Then every once in awhile (say weekly/biweekly) siphon out all the crud from the bottom and whatever has settled on the rock. Swish the rocks around in the water (and scrub if needed), remove the rocks, dump out the water and add new saltwater with the rocks. This continues on for a few months. I only cooked mine for about a few weeks but man I couldn't believe the amount of crap that came off my rock.

Ahh okay gotcha.

I guess the rock cooking idea doesn't sound too bad.. does the algae slowly start to diminsh on it's own after a couple weeks? Seems easy and simple enough... but a few months is a little too long for my liking. Can it be done successfully for a shorter period of time?? I don't have that much rock, would that make a difference?

Ahh.. at the same time, getting new rock sounds just as easy But I can't really afford that.. I will cook the rock if the algae is definitely going to go away. Otherwise, I mine as well save future headaches and try new rock or something.

What do you use to scrub your rocks with ??

[christyf5]

Basically you're letting the algae run out of nutrients as well as giving them no light to thrive. Its mostly the no light thing that gets rid of it, I found putting a handful of hermits in there as well got the job done as they had nothing else to eat but the algae.

Yeah it is a pain in the arse doing it for more than couple of months, I found that it depends on how much algae you have and the type of algae, browns seem to die off more quickly than say, green hair algae. For GHA it took a minimum of 6-8 weeks (this was on another batch of rock I "cooked" mostly I just didn't want to use it and was going to take it back to the store but never got around to it. It lived in a rubbermaid tote for about 8 months). At the time I cooked my rock I really really hated my tank and never spent more than a few minutes topping up the FW and feeding the fish. So really not looking so critically at the tank helped in my case

It certainly can't hurt just doing it short term although you won't see the full benefits. If nothing else it will at least leach out any gack into a different water source other than your tank. I doubt the algae will diminish much though, it can live for quite awhile without any light before it finally kicks off.

[OCDP]

Originally Posted by christyf5

Basically you're letting the algae run out of nutrients as well as giving them no light to thrive. Its mostly the no light thing that gets rid of it, I found putting a handful of hermits in there as well got the job done as they had nothing else to eat but the algae.

Yeah it is a pain in the arse doing it for more than couple of months, I found that it depends on how much algae you have and the type of algae, browns seem to die off more quickly than say, green hair algae. For GHA it took a minimum of 6-8 weeks (this was on another batch of rock I "cooked" mostly I just didn't want to use it and was going to take it back to the store but never got around to it. It lived in a rubbermaid tote for about 8 months). At the time I cooked my rock I really really hated my tank and never spent more than a few minutes topping up the FW and feeding the fish. So really not looking so critically at the tank helped in my case

It certainly can't hurt just doing it short term although you won't see the full benefits. If nothing else it will at least leach out any gack into a different water source other than your tank. I doubt the algae will diminish much though, it can live for quite awhile without any light before it finally kicks off.

Well that all makes sense. I don't have a full blown algae outbreak though, but there's a bit of hair algae that's driving me mad. I was just going to add some snails to take care of it... and perhaps a sea hare. It doesn't even cover all my rocks, just a few of them and there's only a few patches per rock, so I am debating as to whether or not it's worth cooking, or just giving the rocks to someone for super cheap or for free, and just replacing them myself.

I think they do need a good rinse after all this though, so I'll take some of the smaller pieces and rinse them out tonight.

I guess I need to decide if I want to shut the tank down for a couple months (seeing as I do have fish and a few corals alive), and cook the rock.. or if I suck it up, rinse and scrub the rocks, get rid of the worst pieces , get some snails and a sea hare, and start over that way.

I was about to upgrade my tank as well, so if I were to do that.. I could remove my sand bed which would get rid of quite a bit of nutrients, rinse and scrub my rock, and so on...

I dunno what to do ??? Upgrading and scrubbing/rinsing the rocks and removing the bad pieces and replacing them sounds best.. and with the addition of some snails and a sea hare, things might clear up pretty well.

Whatever I decide on I want to act as fast as possible. Upgrading would give me the motivation to clean the rocks up and get a couple new pieces, remove the bad ones.. I'll also be able to get rid of that damn sandbed.

[christyf5]

Originally Posted by OCDP

Well that all makes sense. I don't have a full blown algae outbreak though, but there's a bit of hair algae that's driving me mad. I was just going to add some snails to take care of it... and perhaps a sea hare. It doesn't even cover all my rocks, just a few of them and there's only a few patches per rock, so I am debating as to whether or not it's worth cooking, or just giving the rocks to someone for super cheap or for free, and just replacing them myself.

I think they do need a good rinse after all this though, so I'll take some of the smaller pieces and rinse them out tonight.

I guess I need to decide if I want to shut the tank down for a couple months (seeing as I do have fish and a few corals alive), and cook the rock.. or if I suck it up, rinse and scrub the rocks, get rid of the worst pieces , get some snails and a sea hare, and start over that way.

I was about to upgrade my tank as well, so if I were to do that.. I could remove my sand bed which would get rid of quite a bit of nutrients, rinse and scrub my rock, and so on...

I dunno what to do ??? Upgrading and scrubbing/rinsing the rocks and removing the bad pieces and replacing them sounds best.. and with the addition of some snails and a sea hare, things might clear up pretty well.

Whatever I decide on I want to act as fast as possible. Upgrading would give me the motivation to clean the rocks up and get a couple new pieces, remove the bad ones.. I'll also be able to get rid of that damn sandbed.

Ultimately its up to you about what you want to do, but personally, I would get the rock out of the tank, scrubbed (I use a toothbrush or a "dish" brush, something with fairly stiff bristles) and cooking while you decide. Do your larger water changes and then take a step back and decide where you want to go with this tank. Putting some snails or hermits in with the rock while it cooks might speed up the process as they'll eat what they get and in this case its only the algae on the rock

[OCDP]

Originally Posted by christyf5

Ultimately its up to you about what you want to do, but personally, I would get the rock out of the tank, scrubbed (I use a toothbrush or a "dish" brush, something with fairly stiff bristles) and cooking while you decide. Do your larger water changes and then take a step back and decide where you want to go with this tank. Putting some snails or hermits in with the rock while it cooks might speed up the process as they'll eat what they get and in this case its only the algae on the rock

Yeah, good call.. thanks Christy.. I'll let you all know what happens with the tank. My friend that babysat the tank said he would help me out with replacing stuff, so maybe he'll just help replace the rock, that would be a huge help and would save a lot of hassle. Then I can move on with my upgrade and be DONE with all this... and decide what I want to do with the tank. I think a clown/anemone/zoo tank sounds sweet, with a couple nice sps peices.. but that's baout it.

Anywhoo, I'll update later. Thanks again all

[Jaws]

Sorry to hear about that Scott. This happens to be one of my biggest beefs. I've listened to peoples experiences and it absolutely floors me when I hear about someone loosing all their livestock because of an equipment malfunction. When I started this hobby I decided that I would spend the money and buy the best stuff recommended for the tank size I have. You would think that when you spend that kind of money that the things you buy should stand up but that's hardly the case. I've had a problem with almost every piece of my equipment. In my opinion, when you spend $1000 on something, you shouldn't have to worry about it failing in the first six months. When it's something like a chiller or a heater too, either of these can have catastrophic consequences on your tank. Eventhough it's just a timer that malfunctioned it ended up costing you a fortune and is just another example of bad equipment. I think I'm going to start a thread on this and hear other people's experiences too. Good luck with your tank. I have no doubts you'll be able to turn everything around.