Hi,
I have a new tank that is about 1.5 months old. I have had such a wild ride with this tank and spent so much money, that i really just need to know what to do next. I am going to give a history and specs so you have all of the information and i would really appreciate some advice on what to do!
I set up my 40 gallon Marineland bow front tank on 9/16 with 40 lbs of live sand and 35 lbs of live rock. I filled it with Red Sea water from my LFS (mixed by them, not me). I used the product that they recommended to speed up the cycle called Smart Start to help seed the tank. I
tested the tank and it seemed to cycle after about 5 days The ammonia spike was very low (3.0) but i ti did go back to zero, nitrites , then nitrates spiked and went back down, so naturally, being the newbie that i was i went and got some fish...My LFS sold me 6 fish and a Starfish right after a cycle. Which was wrong, obviously. I didn't know any better (which is my fault for not researching). Long story short, I lost the starfish within a week, and we didn't know he was dead. This and the huge bio load that was just added to the system caused me to go into a REAL, full blown cycle. I lost a damsel fish and a hawkfish (so sad!) before i took all the fish back to my LFS and the graciously decided to give me a store credit and take everything back. i left the cleanup crew and lost a lot of them as well.
My tank cycled for the next three weeks. My ammonia was at 8 then 10 for about 2 weeks total. Then finally it dropped and i got my nitrite spike which lasted 4 days and then nitrates were at 160 fr 3 days. Finally everything normalize. I did a water change to get rid of the nitrates and left the tank for a few days, testing the water. All was well so i carefully chose two fish to get for my first few weeks, i would add more later.
I got another Flame Hawk and a BABY Atlantic Tang (tang police- I KNOW i cant have a tang in my tank. I KNOW i would have had to trade him in once he grew a bit and I was okay with that. I would not keep a fish that was too big for my tank, he was only about 1.5 inches). I acclimated them for over an hour, with a drip into a 5 gallon tank i had. Turned the lights off and did everything i was told. The Tang still got sick and was turning a brown color with a few ich spots. I got a large rock covered in star polyps the day before so i was unable to treat with copper, and he was too fast with way too many hiding places to catch and QT, so i tried to lower salinity (not too low) and a bigt of a higher temp (again, not too high! Just 78.5-79 a few hours a day) and i treated the tank with a weak, but reef-safe ich treatment. I also added Megaplex and fed Anti-Parasitic Caviar to them twice a day. The Flame never got sick. Never even flinched. But the Tang never recovered. I got a UV sterilizer as well and ran it for one day before I went out of town for 3 days. My friend who was watching over the tank called me and said i had a power outage! It was out for 15 hours and basically without the filtration and oxygen flow, the tang did not make it. He was still breathing but on his back when i got home and died shortly after. Let me add that my parameters have been near perfect this whole time. When i got back they were even better than when i left, albeit i did get a green algae bloom from the lights being on too long.
The hawkfish was still fine and it seems that the Ich treatment worked on the Tang because he was cured of the ich. He didn't have any spots when he died. He just turned brown and was not getting enough oxygen i think... :( So sad!
So i was left with a seemingly healthy Flame Hawk and the water was even tested at my LFS to be perfect (aside from having a drop in pH a few times due to the stuff i was adding to the tank, but i used buffer and it worked fine).
So, last Saturday I got a pair of clowns and a new cleanup crew for the algae. The guys at the LFS said that there would always be parasites in my tank, i just need healthy fish to combat them. They did advise me to wait longer before adding more fish, but i chose to get two clowns instead. They actually said since the Flame has been fine the whole time, it probably was just a very sickly tang in the first place and a healthy fish would probably do well in my tank.
The Clowns seemed fine on Day 1. Were eating and claimed a spot in the tank. They were beautiful!
Then day two i started noticing a ghost-like white fuzz forming around one of their rear fins. Not at all like ich, but a perimeter of white. Very odd. By day two they both had the fuzz all over them and it seemed almost like cotton but very very thin, just like a fuzz on them? It looked like Brooklynella from the research i found online. I tried to catch them to put them in the sick tank and treat with a formalin bath but could not. The aquascaping in my tank is very cool but has a LOT of caves and hiding places, unfortunately. So i went to the same LFS and they gave me Kanaplex. Dosed it with their food and the next morning the orange clown was dead and somehow attached to one of the power heads :( and the larger black/white clown has completely VANISHED. I have no idea where he is. I have looked everywhere. Im assuming dead, obviously, but he has vanished into thin air it seems.
Meanwhile, back at the hawk, he still has NO signs of sickness, bacteria, fungus, parasites....he is losing color every few days then it comes back in the morning after lights out time. Thats the only sign of stress except for the occasional trip to the top of the tank for what seems to be air? But I dont know what would cause this because there is a lot of flow in the surface water and the tank should be oxygenated. Maybe im uneducated on how to properly measure this, so tips would be helpful. But the eats only brine shrimp veraciously and is not a huge fan of the caviar. He spits it out. So, he seems overall healthy.
Water parameters are still perfect. Did a water change after the tang died.
Is it possible the flame ate the clown? I also had a nice cleaner shrimp that i bough for the Tang when he had ich. The shrimp made it 2 days and was found decapitated. I thought the crabs did it but now im thinking it may have been the Flame?
And my biggest question is how do i fix a tank that i don't know the problem?? I got the clowns and the Tang from two different stores. So it may not be the store.
My bf calls my tank "Auschwitz" :( I feel awful that i keep killing these fish and I am NOT going to buy ANY more for a while.
But i want to know if there is any way to test my tank for parasites or bacteria issues?
Also, random fact, after i got my cleanup crew and my clowns, the next morning i woke up to a HUGE pod population. Like a weird amount of pods hanign on the glass and floating around. It has diminished, so something must be beating them?
Sorry for the long story, i just really want to know what im doing wrong?
I have a new tank that is about 1.5 months old. I have had such a wild ride with this tank and spent so much money, that i really just need to know what to do next. I am going to give a history and specs so you have all of the information and i would really appreciate some advice on what to do!
I set up my 40 gallon Marineland bow front tank on 9/16 with 40 lbs of live sand and 35 lbs of live rock. I filled it with Red Sea water from my LFS (mixed by them, not me). I used the product that they recommended to speed up the cycle called Smart Start to help seed the tank. I
tested the tank and it seemed to cycle after about 5 days The ammonia spike was very low (3.0) but i ti did go back to zero, nitrites , then nitrates spiked and went back down, so naturally, being the newbie that i was i went and got some fish...My LFS sold me 6 fish and a Starfish right after a cycle. Which was wrong, obviously. I didn't know any better (which is my fault for not researching). Long story short, I lost the starfish within a week, and we didn't know he was dead. This and the huge bio load that was just added to the system caused me to go into a REAL, full blown cycle. I lost a damsel fish and a hawkfish (so sad!) before i took all the fish back to my LFS and the graciously decided to give me a store credit and take everything back. i left the cleanup crew and lost a lot of them as well.
My tank cycled for the next three weeks. My ammonia was at 8 then 10 for about 2 weeks total. Then finally it dropped and i got my nitrite spike which lasted 4 days and then nitrates were at 160 fr 3 days. Finally everything normalize. I did a water change to get rid of the nitrates and left the tank for a few days, testing the water. All was well so i carefully chose two fish to get for my first few weeks, i would add more later.
I got another Flame Hawk and a BABY Atlantic Tang (tang police- I KNOW i cant have a tang in my tank. I KNOW i would have had to trade him in once he grew a bit and I was okay with that. I would not keep a fish that was too big for my tank, he was only about 1.5 inches). I acclimated them for over an hour, with a drip into a 5 gallon tank i had. Turned the lights off and did everything i was told. The Tang still got sick and was turning a brown color with a few ich spots. I got a large rock covered in star polyps the day before so i was unable to treat with copper, and he was too fast with way too many hiding places to catch and QT, so i tried to lower salinity (not too low) and a bigt of a higher temp (again, not too high! Just 78.5-79 a few hours a day) and i treated the tank with a weak, but reef-safe ich treatment. I also added Megaplex and fed Anti-Parasitic Caviar to them twice a day. The Flame never got sick. Never even flinched. But the Tang never recovered. I got a UV sterilizer as well and ran it for one day before I went out of town for 3 days. My friend who was watching over the tank called me and said i had a power outage! It was out for 15 hours and basically without the filtration and oxygen flow, the tang did not make it. He was still breathing but on his back when i got home and died shortly after. Let me add that my parameters have been near perfect this whole time. When i got back they were even better than when i left, albeit i did get a green algae bloom from the lights being on too long.
The hawkfish was still fine and it seems that the Ich treatment worked on the Tang because he was cured of the ich. He didn't have any spots when he died. He just turned brown and was not getting enough oxygen i think... :( So sad!
So i was left with a seemingly healthy Flame Hawk and the water was even tested at my LFS to be perfect (aside from having a drop in pH a few times due to the stuff i was adding to the tank, but i used buffer and it worked fine).
So, last Saturday I got a pair of clowns and a new cleanup crew for the algae. The guys at the LFS said that there would always be parasites in my tank, i just need healthy fish to combat them. They did advise me to wait longer before adding more fish, but i chose to get two clowns instead. They actually said since the Flame has been fine the whole time, it probably was just a very sickly tang in the first place and a healthy fish would probably do well in my tank.
The Clowns seemed fine on Day 1. Were eating and claimed a spot in the tank. They were beautiful!
Then day two i started noticing a ghost-like white fuzz forming around one of their rear fins. Not at all like ich, but a perimeter of white. Very odd. By day two they both had the fuzz all over them and it seemed almost like cotton but very very thin, just like a fuzz on them? It looked like Brooklynella from the research i found online. I tried to catch them to put them in the sick tank and treat with a formalin bath but could not. The aquascaping in my tank is very cool but has a LOT of caves and hiding places, unfortunately. So i went to the same LFS and they gave me Kanaplex. Dosed it with their food and the next morning the orange clown was dead and somehow attached to one of the power heads :( and the larger black/white clown has completely VANISHED. I have no idea where he is. I have looked everywhere. Im assuming dead, obviously, but he has vanished into thin air it seems.
Meanwhile, back at the hawk, he still has NO signs of sickness, bacteria, fungus, parasites....he is losing color every few days then it comes back in the morning after lights out time. Thats the only sign of stress except for the occasional trip to the top of the tank for what seems to be air? But I dont know what would cause this because there is a lot of flow in the surface water and the tank should be oxygenated. Maybe im uneducated on how to properly measure this, so tips would be helpful. But the eats only brine shrimp veraciously and is not a huge fan of the caviar. He spits it out. So, he seems overall healthy.
Water parameters are still perfect. Did a water change after the tang died.
Is it possible the flame ate the clown? I also had a nice cleaner shrimp that i bough for the Tang when he had ich. The shrimp made it 2 days and was found decapitated. I thought the crabs did it but now im thinking it may have been the Flame?
And my biggest question is how do i fix a tank that i don't know the problem?? I got the clowns and the Tang from two different stores. So it may not be the store.
My bf calls my tank "Auschwitz" :( I feel awful that i keep killing these fish and I am NOT going to buy ANY more for a while.
But i want to know if there is any way to test my tank for parasites or bacteria issues?
Also, random fact, after i got my cleanup crew and my clowns, the next morning i woke up to a HUGE pod population. Like a weird amount of pods hanign on the glass and floating around. It has diminished, so something must be beating them?
Sorry for the long story, i just really want to know what im doing wrong?
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