I killed my tank...Help!

[phxocean]

Well I decided to go from a wet-to-dry filtration to a refugium with protein skimmer.
The refugium is 55 gal DIY with a bran new ASM G-2 skimmer.

That evening after changing everything over my mushrooms and leather corals where all shriveled up and my fish started acting crazy. I turned off the skimmer because my tank was filled with micro bubbles and thought that might be the culprit. The next morning my fish are REALLY starting to look bad...even losing their color and the water had a white cloudy appearance. I immediately tested my water and it was fine. Not knowing what else to do...I change out a third of the tanks water and hurried to work. All throughout doing water test after water test and my tank is in perfect balance. I get home from work and my whole tank is dead

I’m wondering...could I have poisoned my tank with the silicon I used. I have 4 sections to my refugium all of which I secured with 100% silicon. I did rinse the refugium several times before integrating it into my tank. What did I do wrong? What happened?

[XeniaMania]

Did you check to see if the silicon is aquarium safe? What brand silicon did you use? I'm also assuming you allowed the silicon to cure. Asides from the questions, it appears to me that you yanked out your wet dry and dropped a refugium right in. If that's the case, what you did was remove your tank's biological filtration. The microbubbles from the skimmer indicate there's something in the water that shouldn't be there. What did you add in the refugium?

[PatMayo]

What kind of silicone? Do you have the brand name?

How long did you wait after building the tank before you filled it with water and connected it to the tank?

Carbon may have been a good choice before you went to work. Was the salt water pre-mixed?

I feel for you. Based on the information you gave it sound to me like the silicone did it. If not I am not sure what could have done it.

Unless something got introduced to the tank with your knowledge.

Regards,

Pat

[XeniaMania]

someone just copied my post..

[Me No Nemo]

It's always best to pull the bioballs a handful at a time over several weeks at least, although this doesn't actually sound like the main problem, it could pose more difficulties soon. Is this a new skimmer? Could be a handful of reasons. Silicone should have 24 to 48 hours to cure before adding water. I'd remove the fish to your quarantine if you have one until you figure out what's going on.

[PatMayo]

XeniaMania,

Could be.

phxocean,
You make no mention of live rock. But even without rock and you did the switch I don't know that the "white cloudy" water can be explained. That sounds like a pollutant to me.

Regards,

Pat

[phxocean]

Well…all but one (my favorite perc clown) of the fish were dead when I got home today …that guy was quarantined tonight. I’m almost thankful he was a little weak otherwise I would have never caught him (I have about 90-100 lbs of live rock in the tank which makes it almost impossible to catch fish)

Answer to all the questions:
-Yes, it is a new skimmer
-I integrated the bio balls and drip plate into a portion of the refugium in order to let/help the sand bed mature. I think that if the filtration were too immature for the tank then I would have expected to see high nitrate and nitrite levels. That is why I don’t feel that is the problem. Yet again, I’m new at this so my logic could be completely wrong.
- I let the silicone set for three days and no I did not use aquarium safe silicone…I used just plain Home Depot silicone (I wish I would have known there was such a thing)
- -The salt was pre mixed and the same stuff I had been using for quite sometime (Oceanic).
- The refugium has a 7inch deep sand bed made with live sand, a section for live rock/algae (currently has drip plate and bio balls instead), a section for the sub-pump, and lastly a section for the simmer. The pump is the same pump I ran on the old filtration system.

Thank you for all of your replies. Im wondering do I just ride it out since everything is dead and start over. Do I need to redo the refugium with aquarium safe silicone? Or will the silicone be safe over time?

[ACBlinky]

Do you still have the tube? If what you have is 100% pure silicone, it should be fine - it doesn't have to specifically state that it's safe for aquiarums. OTOH, if it's got any ingredients designed to repel mold and mildew, make it paintable, etc. you could be looking at trouble. Many silicones that aren't safe for aquariums say so, but some don't. If you post with the specific brand and type someone should be able to tell you if it's safe.
Sorry about your tank, I hope things return to normal soon

[XeniaMania]

If this happened to my system, my course of action would be to start all over, including rinsing the rocks and sand.

[foob]

Usual silicone is aquarium safe, just want it to be 100% pure silicone and no added anti-bacterial anti-mildew stuff. I use GE silicone II, no problems there. No need to buy specially packaged aquarium silicone. Probably don't want silicone for bathrooms.

So basically 2 new acrylic products (refugium and skimmer), silicone, and some sand were added and everything got poisoned?

Is the sand just standard dry aquarium sand? Or some live sand you got from dubious sources?

Ammonia, nitrite, or nitrate spike cannot kill fish/corals in 1 day really, and even if you kill all the bacteria it won't spike the levels in a day to kill everything. Anyway you tested nitrite/nitrate and nothing wrong there.

So it really is down to some poison. First thing when something goes drastically wrong, use carbon. Second thing more waterchanges. Third thing salvage everything into another tank.

[Me No Nemo]

You might want to wet skim the tank a bit too. That often helps pull the bad out. Sorry about your losses. Marcye

[sttroyiii]

As far as the silicone goes, I just used regular clear bathroom caulk on my sump/refugium. My live rock had pretty much finished cycling at the time. So I hooked it all up and was proud it was running. I left it for a couple of hours. Came back and the first baffle had busted loose from the silicone, but it was still running. So I decided I would fix it a little later since I had just got it running. So a few more hours pass, and I come back to check on the sump. All of the clear silicone has returned to its original white and liquid form. The baffles were all stacked up on the bottom of the sump like they were never glued. I can laugh at my mistakes now. Anyway, that silicone was neither waterproof, nor aquarium safe. So I go back to HD and try to find waterproof silicone. I refused to pay $7 for a tube of the marine epoxy, so I just bought 'Goop' which is similar and waterproof. I got home and found a small note on the back where it says do not use for aquariums. I was like 'oh great!'. Since I was so frustrated, and I rushed things again, I just said screw it and used it anyway. Well, its a month later and my tank is fine. I have hermits and snails that are doing fine. I just added a mushroom from another tank, and its been fine for a few days now. I cant tell that its hurt anything. Thats all thats in the tank other than live rock. There are plenty of pods too. I dont think its the silicone that killed your tank. Ill let ya know if things go downhill!

[whiteshark]

White, cloudy, milky water sounds like caulerpa going sexual to me. I don't know If you had any in your tank or if you put any in the fuge. Just figured i'd mention what it sounded like to me. The silicone should be OK if it was 100% Si.

[sssage]

sttroyiii often not aquarium safe is placed on products to avoid lawsuits. Hence why Home depot playsand says not aquarium safe, even though many use it anyway. You are absolutely correct that 100% silicone must be used. I do wonder though if the original poster had indeed used silicone with mildew killing properties.

[TOURKID]

bbles can be ruled out. my skimmer was throwing out all microbubbles for about 3 days before it stopped.. so thats normal.

I know pulling a biofilter can put things out of whack

[Mike and Tori]

My bet is the silicon had something else in it.

[Cutiewitbooty]

yeah same here, thats really the only thing that could have done that, unless when he was building it and doing the silicone he had something toxic on his hands?