Fish deaths - My fault ?

[Kinesthesia]

For Xmas, I received a used complete 120 gallon setup and what amounted to a gift certificate at a LFS. I should have been more thoughtful and patient but I wasn't. Before Xmas, I had a 75 gallon with about 20 lbs of live rock, 40 lbs of live sand, wet/dry and included a Yellow Tang, Maroon Clown, Coral Beauty and a pair of Orange Anthias.

The day after Xmas I bought... 20 more lbs of LR, some ricordia, a Swissguard basslet, Royal Gramma, Rock Beauty Angel, Yellow Anthias and a Juv. Blue Angel. That night, the Swissguard died. New Years Day, I setup the 120 gallon tank which has a better pump, larger wet/dry (I used all of the old media and added new) and a protein skimmer. Between then and now (I haven't kept track of the dates), the Royal Gramma, the Rock Beauty and the Yellow Anthias (yesterday) have died.

I feel just terrible. However, I really think that conditions in my tank are better than ever. For the first time since I started this hobby over a year ago, I have no cyano and no hair. The skimmer is functioning properly (although I have no basis for comparison). I realize that I doubled my bio load, but at the same time I doubled my live rock. And a week later, I tripled my sand bed and increased my water volume by 50% or so.

All of the fish have been eating, and my original fish are in perfect health still. I had never purchased fish from this particular LFS before. I don't know what other parameters to offer. Did I make some sort of tragic mistake ? Or should I be thinking that there may be something wrong with these fish or this LFS ? I bought five fish, and the last survivor isn't looking so good. I honestly haven't tested my water, but it seems to me that if something was wrong with my water, the problem would be more widespread.

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I was sure that anything this expensive and addicting was illegal... I keep waiting for the ATF to kick my door down and grab my protein skimmer...

[Pikaboo]

Well, it could be partly due to that the fish from the LFS isn't healthy. But also, I have to say that you went a bit overboard. You doubled your bioload as well as liverock and sand. You usually should add small amount of LR and sand to an established tank. Also, adding all 5 fish at once is bad because your bacteria can't keep up with the increase.

Did you aclimate the fish well? That might be a cause too.

[TheAquaman]

Hey Mark!

Sorry to hear about the fish deaths! It sounds like the fish you purchased were either not in the best health or perhaps they were not acclimated long enough before adding to your tank. Rock Beauty's are diffucult at best to keep for any length of time! I gave up years ago after 3 losses and decided I didn't have the knowledge yet.

The only thing that stands out is you added to much to fast then changed all the parameters by moving to the 120. Don't beat yourself up to much! we've all made mistakes as long as you learn from them and don't repeat it


PS Jake the snowflake is doing well, He and the other Eel did get into a nasty fight with the Jake on the losing side so now the tank has a Strong divider until I can setup the 125 and move Jake into his own tank. Sorry I don't have any pictures as my digtal camera has bit the dust!

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www.magicnet.net/~jwhite/aquamans.html

You may be capable of great things,
But life consists of small things.

[MRIGUY]

Sorry for your loss. I agree with the other replies with one addition. I would test your water. It is very possible that one of your parameters are off. In a FOWLR (you didn't mention inverts, other than the riccordia), it is very easy for one of your ammonie breakdown products to elevate over time. The fish will tolerate a slow rise and do ok with rather high levels. A new fish added would react much more severely even if the other fish seem ok.

[bmw]

40lbs of rock and 40lbs of sand for a 120 gal full reef won't cut it--not for a complete ecological system. Increase.
Doubling your bioload or so--not enough there to make a smooth transition-chemistry wise.
Given all that--the only fish I have had die on me have been within a week(or long, long ago-2-3 years).Most come in in terrible shape-wether you see it or not.
fwiw
b.

[Kinesthesia]

As I mentioned, when I moved into the 120, I tripled my sandbed to 120 lbs. However, I am still short on LR, as it is rather expensive. But I honestly thought that with a good size Wet/Dry, a Protein Skimmer, and a decent sandbed, I would be alright with fish.

I can see now that I was correct and I got quite a bit ahead of myself. But it still seems strange to me that it's only the new fish. While I understand that a casual buildup of something would be better tolerated by the original fish, I did have my water test about a month before all of this and it was "perfect" according to the LFS. And almost half of the water (56 gallons) in the 120 was "new" seawater (the fish stores around here buy seawater from some government agency that gets it offshore and then they filter the bejesus out of it, but that's another thread).

I honestly thought that with the addition of so much fresh water, the introduction of a protein skimmer (which I never had before), the increase in the sandbed (triple), the increase in live rock (double), and the increase in wet/dry size and media (double) that I would stay ahead of the nitrogen cycle for the most part. And all things considered, it's still strange to me that my original fish seem to be in perfect health.

I suppose maybe the double shock of transport from LFS to my 75 and then a week later from my 75 to the new 120 was greater than I suspected.

What should I do now ? I discovered when I got home last night that the last remaining "new" fish has a bubble over one eye. Should I just give up on adding fish for a while ?

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I was sure that anything this expensive and addicting was illegal... I keep waiting for the ATF to kick my door down and grab my protein skimmer...

Hehehehe on your signature line, look out if you have a sawed off self loading, our one of the assault skimmers
I think it would be a good idea to give the tank about a month to settle down at this point. See if you get a mini cycle and work on increasing the rock, though as the new sand bed becomes more populated it will help. Then again some times fish just dont make it for mystery reason but always add slowly

[Kinesthesia]

Well, yesterday, the Juv. Blue Angel finally died. Now all of the fish that I had purchased that day are dead, and all of my original fish still look great. The day before I took a sample of my water to the LFS (the one I usual go to) and they said there wasn't any ammonia or nitrite. They also sold me something called a polyfilter, in case I had some kind of chemical in the tank like bug spray or cleaner, etc. Apparently, it removes phosphates too so I bought it. I would've tried anything at that point, but nothing worked.
I hope this is the end of my problem.

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I was sure that anything this expensive and addicting was illegal... I keep waiting for the ATF to kick my door down and grab my protein skimmer...

Polypad is a good thing to keep around in emergencies. It can adsorb a lot of nasties and will help along with water changes.
I still think the problem was too many new fish that were never given a chance to calm down coupled with the upseting of the tanks established biosystem. I still recommend giving the tank at least a month to settle in and slowly raise the bioload, one animal at a time. In a reef system I think having one attraction fish that is compatible with a reef and the rest of the fish load smaller gobies, ect that graze or scavenge, in other words fish with jobs. Fish esp several good size fish put a lot of waste load in the water putting a strain on the biofiltration.
This is an example of bigger is better when it comes to skimmers. With your surviving fish in the 120 one of the high performance beckett type skimmers or large capacity downdraft units would not be overskimming this tank. The more organics you can remove before breakdown the lighter the load on the system

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I thought I was me, but we were wrong
email: geeflipr@internetcds.com

[Kinesthesia]

Ok, I bought about 25 lbs of LiveRock in five rocks, one is ten pounds and the other four just about equally make up the remaining 15 pounds. I suspect that it's "Florida" liverock since it is just covered with coraline, feather dusters, a couple little Ricordia polyps, and some bristleworms. It smells like a fish cleaning station, however. So, I stopped on the way home and picked up 14 gallons of saltwater to do a water change. I used the water coming out of the tank to fill a 10 gallon aquarium, I put the rock in, put a 65watt LOA PowerCompact on top of it, and put in a pump from my water fountain for a little circulation. I realize this is not the perfect "curing" station, too little circulation, no filters, no heat, etc. So, do I ... go ahead and put all the rock in ? should I let it sit in this ten gallon a week or so? put one rock in every couple of days, or week, etc ?

I look forward to any input, I really am trying to improve my situation and avoid future mistakes. Thanks in advance.





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I was sure that anything this expensive and addicting was illegal... I keep waiting for the ATF to kick my door down and grab my protein skimmer...

[Kinesthesia]

The water in my 10 gallon tank has gotten really nasty in 48 hours, so I moved one rock into my tank. Should I go ahead and put the rest in, or should I leave the remaining rocks in the 10 gallon to "cure" and will the 10 gallon clear itself ?




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I was sure that anything this expensive and addicting was illegal... I keep waiting for the ATF to kick my door down and grab my protein skimmer...

[Doug1]

Dont put any more of that rock in till it cures or you'll add to the aggrevetion in the tank. Put a heater in the 10 and maybe the skimmer or do a few water changes to save as much life as you can

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I dont advocate holding marine creatures for ransom but......since you asked
Doug, plank owner

[FishDaddy]

Kinesthesia,
A better setup for curing would be a big rubbermaid tub or trashcan...20-30 gallons, with a powerhead for circulation and a heater to maintain temp. Lights aren't necessary, in fact, will only promote algae growth.
Keep this going for a while...a week at least, and don't add the rock until it passes the smell test. It should NOT stink!! Even better, wait until the water has 0 Ammonia. Since these are big rocks, I would add one of them about every 2 or 3 days and monitor Ammonia readings daily, being prepared to do water changes if you get a spike. You shouldn't if the rock fully cures in your holding tank.
This is a very conservative plan but in view of your recent problems, I would be very careful and make changes and additions very slowly.
HTH
Dick

[tdwyatt]

Kine:
I don't know if the other LR you added was from the same source, but if it was, and it hadn't cured, I suspect that it was the source of your fish kill. In cycling new tanks and systems, the use of fish to sacrifice to the cycling Gods is unnecessary, as the rock supplies enough nitrogenous byproducts from dying sponges, worms, bivalves, bacteria, etc that are on the rocks that they will drive the nitrogen cycle by themselves. By the same token, in an established tank, uncured rock, especially if you are adding large quantities, will initiate a new cycling process due to the presence of these same nitrogenous wastes. As live rock cures (hopefully in a seperate rubbermaid container), these nitrogenous by-products are consumed, and the bacterial colonization by mineralizing bacteria and their subsequent population increases will control the production of toxic nitro-compounds (ammonia/ammonium+ and nitrite) that would otherwise kill fish. These substances are of varying toxicity to fishes, and the susceptability of different fishes varies based on species and stress levels. Freshly transfered fish are very susceptable, as well as fishes from microcosms that have been recently disturbed. I am very sorry to hear of your losses, keep in mind the suggestions that the above posts have reviewed. Martin Moe's "Marine Aquarium Reference --Systems and invertebrates" has a good discussion of the biology and biochemestry of marine microcosm filters starting on p 233, just don't pay too much attention to the methods of filtration presented there, (it IS a bit dated, but the biology is sound, although there is much discussion about which bacteria are actually responsible for what processes now...)

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Tom <"{{{{>(
(TDWyatt)
Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something. -Plato