Fish Tragedy!

Hey Guys-

I had a horrible discovery this morning; my wife came into the bedroom crying saying all the fish in the reef tank were dead...

I went out to discover all 5 fish were dead as well as all my large skunk cleaner shrimp and peppermint shrimp.

This tank has been up for over a year and most of the livestock was transferred from a smaller tank a year ago. I have had no new introductions since May, not even a snail.

Water parameters have always been constant, no ammonia, nitrite or nitrate. pH is normal and temp is a little high since my chiller took a dump 2 days ago.
I thought at first temp could be an issue but it hasn't risen too much since I have central air in the house. The lights have increased the temperature a little bit but it has been a gradual increase, not something that happened quickly.
I did detect some trace nitrate before I did any water changes; I attribute this to the fact there were so many dead things in the tank at once.

The weird thing is that all the commensal crabs in the stony corals and the hermit crabs are fine.
The soft corals, SPS, and giant clams are business as usual, with full polyp extension and no signs of stress.

I'm stumped; I've been doing marine tanks for 25 years and I've never encountered something that is selective like this.
The only thing I could possibly think of is I have a tiger cucumber in the aquarium and he was actually out from under the rocks this morning. Today was perhaps the 2nd or 3rd sighting of him in several years. I know these guys have toxic innards and have the potential to release them if stressed. It is the only thing I can think of that would do this.

If anyone else has any thoughts, let me know.

RIP: Newton the Clownfish, Pinkish the Orchid Dottyback, Lucius the Blue Damsel, Soleil the Yellow Tang, Pepe the Skunk Cleaner, and Lenny the Lawnmower Blenny

 

++ for your loss,

You could be right on the cucumber, I'd also check my grounds, change my Carbon, and do a water change...

Did you look closely at each of the fish as you pulled them out? ...notice any thing on them?

 

i have no idea but sorry about your loss

 

sorry for your loss darthweezy, its awful when things like this occur

I dont know enough about the potential consequences of toxin releases from cukes to be honest but I do think your probably on to something with that

I do know that dissolved oxygen levels would be lower and that coupled with higher temp, which again reduces dissolved oxygen due to chiller failure may also have been part of the equation and when oxygen is low its often the fish stocks which are the 1st to suffer

once again sorry for you losses

are you running carbon? if not maybe a good idea to do so, just in case the cuke toxins are present in the system

Steve

 

sorry man.

 

It was the cuke bro. I"m 99 percent sure. I had this happen about a year ago. My pink and black cuke made its way into a powerhead and took out everything except the powerhead. All of my corals survived for the most part. The reason that your corals are ok is the cukes toxins deplete the oxygen in the water big time. Your softies will probably look extra big for a while as they are trying to get more light for photosynthesis to creat more oxygen for themselves. When this happened to me, I did a 75 percent water change and ran some carbon and waited a few days, did another 75 percenter and changed the carbon again. I then added fish again with no issues. I'm sorry to hear about this bro. I know how disheartening it is.

 

Am sorry for your loss... I had a Cuke nuke my tank also.... Best thing to do is what Daniel072 said... Lot's bigg water changes... and lot's of carbon...

best of luck...

 

Sorry for the loss Really sucks man.

 

Ive always wanted a cucumber but this thread has turned me away. I would never want wake up to a tank full of dead fish. K+....good luck and keep us posted.

 

K+ friend, so sorry for your loss