Things go wrong very quickly in water...

[Savas]

As a Dive Master and father of three small girls, I preach one simple lesson - things go wrong very quickly in water. Accidents happen and the unexpected can cause life threatening or ending events. Simply put, be smart in water and constantly analyze your situation and what could go wrong. Simple advice to be prepared and do not do anything stupid (above your skills).

Well, I found out this advice also applies to my tank. I had a 12 gallon AP in our bedroom that my wife was very found of. It was more of a frag tank than a show tank, but it had a lot of frags in it and most were growing. Last night, disaster struck – I surmise my feather duster died and skunked the whole tank. The feather duster was an Australian green feather duster and was about the size of my hand with it legs extended. It was a beautiful site that looked like a flower. It had recently lost about 6 – 8 arms and was not looking good. My wife called me while I was at a meeting at 9:15 pm and said “come home quick, everything is dieing in the tank.�

She looked at the tank before putting the girls to bed at around 7:00 pm and all was well, but the tank was a little cloudy she said. By 9:15 pm the fish were dead and the tank was littered with floating mini sea stars, worms, and pods. She ran to the garage and found 5 gallons of saltwater and proceeded to save what she could – a couple zoos and polyps, a mushroom rock with only two mushrooms left on it, and a hermit crab. The water was a cloudy yellow color and stunk. Every snail, brittle star, worm and pod was dead. Corals had just dissolved into a mess of slime. This tank had run without a single casualty for over a year and was a happy tank. Now I am starting over…

I changed the water – all of it – twice, but it continues to be cloudy. I plan on doing a complete washing of the crushed coral, removing all the live rock in the rear chamber and cleaning it, and replacing all the water again tonight. I am going to add a carbon filter and phosban to the first chamber for the next week also. Is there anything else I can do?

[kzickovich]

yes, while your tank is down you should go with live sand instead of CC, you clean up crew would like it alot more.

[HumanIMDB]

Sorry to hear about your loss.

[Savas]

Thank you. I am just shocked how quickly things went downhill. If my wife had not been looking at the tank, things would have been worse. This also reinforced that she must learn to make saltwater and do a change. This hobby is definately easier with two people working a tank.

[joeychitwood]

I have twice lost an entire tank in less than 36 hours over the years. We walk on the edge of the cliff keeping reef creatures in tanks in our homes. That's part of what makes this hobby more fun than keeping freshwater creatures or other pets.

I concur with changing the crushed coral to sand. Run carbon vigorously. You might want to consider a skimmer, although many people pass on this because of the ease of doing large percentage water changes.

[SSpiro]

Wonder what happened?

One feather duster dying could cause the entire tank to die?

[Savas]

I do not know the root cause of the crash, all I know is that the feather duster was not good over the weekend. I do root cause analysis for a living, but there is just not enough data from the tank to get anything meaningful, so I am going by observation.

I cannot understand what happened either, but my guess is the feather duster died and this caused a chain reaction in the substrate critters which then killed the majority of coral, then the fish. The fish were the last to die as my wife pulled two out of the tank that were alive, but gasping for air. They died shortly after being placed in new saltwater.

Joey - I am changing to a 50/50 blend of sand and crushed coral. Any issues with this? I like the look and most reefs have a similar substrate to this.

Is there an easy way to buy some pods, bristle worms (I like them), and mini brittle stars to start the tank?

[Savas]

I am not using a skimmer as I like the all-in-one look with my hood. I tried the Current nano skimmer and it was ineffective. I do water changes every two weeks and have not had any problems with the tank prior to this.

[joeychitwood]

Originally posted by Savas
Joey - I am changing to a 50/50 blend of sand and crushed coral. Any issues with this? I like the look and most reefs have a similar substrate to this.

I can't think of any reason to mix CC and sand in a home reef tank. Certainly, it's your choice, but I think the tank will be cleaner looking and more stable with sand. Most of the reefs I've dove in the Caymans, Cozumel and Truk have had white sand bottoms.

[Savas]

OK, I'll go 90/10 sand to crushed coral. I just like the look.

My diving experience has been in St. Thomas and most reefs have some coral, rubble, shells in the substrate.

[Savas]

I switched to a sugar sand and now have a sand storm in the tank. Any thoughts?

[Savas]

I turned off the pumps in the tank and it still hasn't settled after 12 hours.

[Young Frankenstein]

Savas it will take a week or so for the sand to be populated by bacterial, and stop the sand storm, for now just point the powerheads to the top.

[dyvaeh]

A while ago we switched from Seaflor Special Grade Reef Sand to sugar-fine sand in our 120 gallon tank. Talk about a sand storm! We kept the pumps and skimmer running and made sure that the powerheads weren't disturbing the sand. The extra flow helped clear out the debris and within 18 hours the tank was clear and we had a beautiful new sea floor.

Good Luck!