Diaster Recovery help please!

[michika]

I'm having loads of bad luck right now, I think its rubbing off on my tank and everything I touch.

[Chin_Lee]

Catherine
sps for me has always been touchy. I've had 98% of frags survive a transfer into my tanks over the past few years. But when I set up my 300g sps tank and transferred everything over from the 165, I lost no less that 75% of my colonies. Some people have success during transfers and some just have bad luck like you and me. It sounds like you've taken every precaution that most experienced reefer would have so I'm lost for suggestions or advice. Sorry to hear
BTW i re-used all my acro skeletons by putting them into the calcium reactor as a way of making the "best" of a pretty bad situation.

[michika]

Did you break down the skeletons into smaller pieces, or did you just break them off the rocks/plugs and toss them on in? At least if I toss them in my reactor I know they won't be going to waste.

[MitchM]

I think that the only thing that you can do now is to let the cycle run it's course.
If somebody else can house your remaining livestock, PDQ, that would be best.

See if you can obtain some cured live rock (beg, borrow or steal maybe?) to add to your system now.

Mitch

[SeaShell]

Count me in.... I lost every coral except my zoas and a devils hand in my last new tank transfer about a month ago.

[kwirky]

You could be experiencing the toxins of sponges dieing from being exposed to air. They're pretty toxic usually. Do you have adequate actively run carbon for the various toxins of the rock fauna dieing from the move? Carbon's like a protein skimmer I think: it makes things easy.

[michika]

Originally Posted by michika

What I am doing
- running carbon
- running hypersorb
- running nitrate sponge
- running phosphate sponge (but at least all my GHA is gone)
- daily water changes
- ensuring all my fish eat a varied diet to keep their immune systems up
- running lights as normal
- watching the tank and photodocumenting its rise/decline/whatever its doing.

Yes I'm running lots of carbon and removers.

Nothing was out of the water for more then 30 seconds (save the SPS), rock included. How quickly do sponges die?

[kwirky]

Originally Posted by michika

Yes I'm running lots of carbon and removers.

Nothing was out of the water for more then 30 seconds (save the SPS), rock included. How quickly do sponges die?

heard they're a goner with any contact to air, no saving them. They die a slow and agonizing death with a domino effect going over their tissue...

[kaboom]

Sorry to hear about your lost. I recently did a move and lost 75% of my sps colonies, that's about 25 pieces, some were over 12" in diameter. I cried for a few hours but I had prepared myself for such a lost, so it was understandable. I planned the move as best I can, but in the end time was the factor and the stress of the long move (8 hours in transit) caused many casualties. Ammonia build up caused by stressed corals and released toxin/slime was the culprit.

How much sps did you have? I can almost say that your losts was due to reasons similar to mine. Hope it recovers fast for you. My best advise is skim skim skim and you want as much algae to grow as possible to help polish your water.

[Chin_Lee]

Any update today Catharine? How are things looking?