First casualty in new reef tank

I have been cycling my tank for about 3-4 weeks now, about 2 weeks ago I added 3 yellow tailed damsels to add some bio load to the system. And added a small clean up crew 2 days ago.

So, today when I came home and was feeding the fish and only saw 2 damsels. After first searching the bottom of the tank and under rocks for a dead fish, I finally looked up towards the Koralia 3 power head that I have in the tank. The poor damsel was crushed up against the inlet slots to the PH. I turned off the PH and the fish twitched a couple times as it sank to the bottom.

I have the crushed damsel in a little quarantine bucket at the moment to keep it away from anything that might eat it, to give it a chance to recover, but so far it is not moving, so my guess is it won't pull through.

Any suggestions on how to keep this from happening again?

Sucks that it happened, but I really would be upset if this were to happen to more expensive fish in the future.

Also if the damsel is dead would it screw up my levels too much if I were to feed it to the clean up crew? (86 gal + 20 gal sump, 40lbs rock so far, 40lbs sand)

 

my guess is the fish was either down and out or dead when it got sucked up against the powerhead and nothing you can do will prevent this.

as for throwing it back in the tank as a meal for the cleaners it may raise some levels for a bit however there will come a time when one of your fish will die and you will not be able to get it out and nature will take its course. that said the way i do it is if i can remove it without much effort i do and if not it stays.

i am by no means an expert so maybe someone will tell you better but this is what i do

 

I wouldn't. I'd feed it to the porcelain god first......Flush!!!!!!!!

 

Dont let that discourage you, but i think you added to many fish too fast.......

 

Consider that you may have not done anything wrong. Sometimes the fish from the store just aren't healthy and adding stress like moving them is all it takes. I had a similar experience with my tanks when cycling, put in 3 chromis and only 2 made it.

Don't know if you LFS puts dates that they received the fish, but I always look for ones that have been in the store tanks for a couple of weeks. By looking for this I have a better chance they are healthy.

 

same happend to me Rkemp, had 3 chromis, 2 made a pair, and stressed 3rd to death.....

 

Little fish and powerheads don't mix.

Unfortunately starting out with juveniles is best choice.

Yep, don't get in too big a hurry to add more fish. Couple is fine for first couple of months.


Sorry about loss.

 

The new Koralia's have a guard on them to reduce the chances of something like this happening. It disperses the strong suction over a greater surface area to reduce the chances of this happening or getting sucked into the impeller!
Sorry to hear about that however!
Fish may have been sick as mentioned above!

 

That's what I'm thinking (as well as too many fish added too quickly).

 

To many fish at once I never understand why guys want to add more then one fish to start the cycling process to much load at once and as for the dead one LOL all who would tell you to get it out ASAP and do massive water changes would also tell you to just toss a large dead shrimp in there to start the cycle Toss it or leave it at this point matters not and if another of the fish dies it will be a favor to you.. With two you can and will get a pair and a pair of anything is not good in a community reef tank. With just one fish you won't have that to worry about. I'd just leave it alone and give it the needed time at this point it will sort its self out..