HELP - fish dying

I posted yesterday thinking my Yellow Eye Tank killed my dwarf angel and six line wrasse before dying him self. It appears he got a bad rap. This morning my sailfin tang is near death. I tested water two days ago, and again today .

55 gal tank
30 gal sump w/refugium
protein skimmer
good water movement



two days ago this morning

nitrate 20 20-25
phosphate .025 .00
kh 7 9
calcium 420 didn't test

water temp is 78-80
salinity is .026

Live rock
silver tip xenia
torch coral
ricordia
various mushrooms
colt coral
green star polyps
montipora
yellow polyps
cup coral

various zoos - my common looking zoos are fine - I had two different colonies of pink zoos. One died and was removed, the other is looking pretty bad. It doesn't look like anything is eating them, they are just kind of dissolving? a little mucousy (sp) and getting white space.

Also my umbrella leather covered itself in mucous yesterday, but otherwise is looking ok.

Did 15 gal water change yesterday, after the first 3 died and before the recent one died.

NOTE: When the hubby did the water change we went from .029/.030 salinity to .026. Lost three fish prior to the change and one fish after the change.

We had an ick outbreak about a month ago - treated with "ickattack" and cleaner shrimp. All seemed ok and I see no sign of ick.

So far my clowns and pajama fish seem ok - haven't seen my coris and psychadelic wrasses yet this morning so don't know about them.

I have no idea what else to check and I think I'm going to be a big sissy and cry. I really like my fish!


ANy suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

Nitrate and phosphate don't kill fish - have you tested for ammonia? You have a fair few fish, so im hoping your tank is well established and they aren't being killed by ammonia??
So therefore im gonna ask, how old is your tank?

Reef Aquarium Water Parameters by Randy Holmes-Farley - Reefkeeping.com

Now - as far as unexplained mass fish deaths, if your tank is established!

1. Do you have a ground probe? Stray amps could be shocking
2. Anyone been spraying aerosols around the tank? (pirticularly fly killer, but any really)
3. Do you have one of those plug in things that give your home 24 hour freshness?

 

Hello karcury, I will suggest that when you post and are asking for help or for ideas, please include all basic information. Basic information should include; all water parameters(Calcium,Magnes ium,Alkalinity,Ph and Nitrate and Phosphate levels) along with Temp. of your tank and Sg (specific gravity).Size of tank and complete set up meaning, filter type (sump, canister etc.), if you use a skimmer,lighting (what type and total output)plus what type of lighting are you using and what is your lighting schedule (how long a period are your actinic and daylights on) and if you have fish only with live rock and if you keep
corals. Also how long the tank has been up. I know some of this is in your bio but many bios don't contain this info. How many times has someone posted and then there is this list of postings addressing the above. If you give the most info you can to give us a good profile, it will cut down on response time and mis-diagnosis or answers that don't
fit and we will all benefit. If you can provide these "basics" for us it will speed things up. Also, a pic of the tank will assist us.

 

Hi Phoenix and thanks for your response.

We previously had a 29 gal. tank we bought used and up and running, fish and all. We had that for about 8 months. About 3 months ago we moved up to the 55 gal., which was also a used tank that had been up and running for years. We tranferred everything from our smaller tank to the larger, which still had live sand and lr. We used our existing water supplemented with pre-mixed salt water.

I will pick up an ammonia test after work and check the levels. There is no clouding or excessive algae growth. We did a 15 gal. water change yesterday, and still lost a fish this morning, poor girl. So far it appears that the rest of the fish are ok.

To answer the rest of your questions:

No ground probe. What is it and where do I get one? I do understand the purpose of it, just not the design.

No aerosols being sprayed, and don't clean the exterior of the tank with anything toxic.

No plug in smelly things in the house.

I dont' know if it indicates anything, but the sailfin tang that died this morning was hanging around at the very top of the tank since yesterday which was not common for her.

 

Tank sounds like it should be stable enough then, but do the ammonia test just to make sure.

A ground probe is just a peice of metal in your tank that is then grounded to remove and stray voltage in the tank.
Its possible thats what could be killing your fish, do you have shrimp that have suddenly died too?
If they havent died then its probably nothing to do with that then.

Other then that, and if your sure the water isnt contaminated - i can't explain the deaths, maybe some illness??

And if your

 

I would test for nitrite as well. How does the torch look?
Have you had anything else die in the tank prior to the fish? Are you running carbon?

 

Without proper divulging of entire set up, everyone is just stabbing in the dark. Example, something may be a fowl in the canister. We can't know this because we don't know if Karcury has that or an over flow with sump, etc. etc.

 

Pack leader, I'll pick up a test for nitrite as well tonight. The torch is looking fine for the most part, although it has been a little bit touchy. It is about 6 inches wide when open, and every once in a while about 1 square inch of it will close up for 30 minutes or so. It reopens and appears to be ok. The only thing I have had die other than my fish are the pink zoos. No carbon. We have an ionizer on the tank as well.

 

What exactly do you need to know? In his first post he makes it fairly clear what sort of set up he has.

Given that he hasn't mentioned he has a canister filter, then I presume he probably just runs with a 30gall. sump and refugium.

 

First of all, I'm a she Thank for the comments Rustynuts. I've been admiring your babies! Cute little wigglers.

OK - I'll try to explain more about the set up, although I don't know all the technical terms.

55 gal tank

T-6 lighting. 2 actinic, 2 blue and moonlights 54 watt lamps 48" long. The blue comes on at 7:00 a.m.; the actinic come on at 10:00 a.m.; the actinic go off at 7:30 p.m. and the blue go off at 9:30 a.m.

Tank has an overflow that flows down into a bag, into the sump, then through the Protein Skimmer, back into the sump and is pumped back into the tank. Or something like that
There is no canister.
There is a gray foam filter between the refugium and the sump.
The refugium has a pipe that drips into it, sand in the bottom, some of that green seeweed stuff that looks like easter basket grass, and some live rock rubble.
30 gal sump w/refugium
protein skimmer
good water movement - three blowers in various areas of the tank.

Does that help any? I can take photos of the system when I get home tonight and post them.


water temp is 78-80
salinity is .026

tank has:

Live rock
silver tip xenia
torch coral
ricordia
various mushrooms
colt coral
green star polyps
montipora
yellow polyps
cup coral

various zoos - my common looking zoos are fine - I had two different colonies of pink zoos. One died and was removed, the other is looking pretty bad. It doesn't look like anything is eating them, they are just kind of dissolving? a little mucousy (sp) and getting white space.


Is that helpful? We are still learning here and glad to get the input.

Thanks.