It was this big... Now its this big...

Goaway · Mar 20, 2023

F i s h y said:
Thats all we can do right?

Life in a hand basket. I changed my name from mibu. Don't be alarmed.
I wish I could offer help, but... patience is preservation in this hobby. When it rains it pours and lightning strikes all over. I can't even talk about whats happened.

You got an awesome wife and awesome friends.

F i s h y · Mar 20, 2023

Goaway said:
Life in a hand basket. I changed my name from mibu. Don't be alarmed.
I wish I could offer help, but... patience is preservation in this hobby. When it rains it pours and lightning strikes all over. I can't even talk about whats happened.

You got an awesome wife and awesome friends.

I knew it was you...

i do have an amazing support structure around me. Makes these hits easier to digest. And if you decide you need an ear to bend. Im always available as well.
Appreciate the kind words.

Goaway · Mar 20, 2023

F i s h y said:
I knew it was you...
i do have an amazing support structure around me. Makes these hits easier to digest. And if you decide you need an ear to bend. Im always available as well.
Appreciate the kind words.

You're all a bundle of great friends.

fishguy242 · Mar 20, 2023

trying to think of something to say, sorry, here if you need anything ,anytime J .

tcarstens4 · Mar 20, 2023

That is a crazy amount of loss to have in under a week- so sorry for all that happened

MrsBugmaster · Mar 20, 2023

Wow, so sorry to hear all of this! This hobby can be unforgiving. Sometimes things go wrong even when we do all the right things. I too am always available if you, or anyone for that matter, needs to just vent or have a good cry. Just send me a pm and I’ll send my cell number.

Eagle_Steve · Mar 20, 2023

F i s h y said:
I have been reluctant to post any of the not so fun things that have been happening in my reefing life... But i think truth in reefing is important so here are a few of the not so great things that have happened recently. Im mostly writing this as a reminder to myself that sometimes bad things happen even when everything seems to be going really well. And that it is a reminder to enjoy the best parts of reefing when you can, accept the worst parts when they happen, and remember that is part of the passion. Fixing, balancing, restoring, growing an entire ecosystem in a glass (or plastic) box in our homes. I don't have dates for some of this but.... it is what it is.. This will be long... for some of you TLDR... but thats ok its really just for me.

EEFW's
A few weeks ago while doing some routine maintenance, Mrs. Fishy mentioned to me that some of the torches did not appear to be as happy as they normally were. I thought it was because i was still dialing in the doser and getting the alk and calcium where they needed to be. I had randomly lost a hammer and a frog head, but only a single of each so thought nothing of it.
About a week later while fiddling around i had a torch knocked over. i picked it up and thought that the skin was peeling on it. Turns out upon closer inspection there were Euphyllia eating flat worms all over the neck of the heads. Immediately i went into fix it mode. i took every one of the euphyllia out of the tank. gave them all a dip and a thorough scrub. then i put them all into a 10 gallon QT tank i set up. The intent was to continue to monitor them, dip them once every 3 or 4 days and keep watch over them to make sure there were no eggs or anything.
I dont know how they got in. i dip everything... learned that the hard way once before, inspect everything, etc. it had been almost 4 months since i had added anything.

Busted heater in QT.
Fast forward around 36 hours from the discovery of the EEFW's. I was at work it was about 4pm. i had an hour to go and i get a message from Mrs. Fishy. The QT tank is cloudy and the water smells awful. there was nothing i could do and she was busy with kids from school, getting oldest son to work, cleaning the house, dinner, etc... So it had to wait... I get home and instantly i know that it isnt good. I immediately go into disaster mode for the 2nd time in a week. I take out anything that even looks half alive. rinse everything in fresh clean saltwater, and then with no where else to put them, drop them back in the DT. The heater had stayed on in the tank. 10 gallons of saltwater heated to a nice 95 degrees F.

in those 2 incidents i lost 70% of my personal Euphyllia collection. I am still losing a few things at this time after a few weeks... most recently i lost 2 heads of torch on saturday. i think i still have a few colonies that are not going to push through and im prepared to take those losses.

Flying Fish
i received a beautiful regal yellow belly hippo tang from a reefer that was getting out of the hobby. i placed it in my Nem tank (all the nems were in isolation boxes because they were for sale). This tang had been in the persons tank for 6 years. it was a beautiful specimen. i had it for 48 hours. Lights out on the 2nd day... it spooked, jumped up 2 inches out of the water, and landed in the isolation box with my carpet nems in it. i heard it happen and had it out in less than 30 seconds. but the damage was done... it lasted until the morning.

Coral show disappointment
Stocked up with all kinds of amazing coral... had a great setup, some amazing help on marketing, lots of positive vibes from all my reefing friends... prepared for a long time. My prices are hands down better than anything anyone else was offering... Sold nothing... i sold about $600 bucks in frags that i had glued to plugs because i broke them off my colonies while cleaning my tank. or they were loose zoas, or a few cuts from a gorg. more than 50% of my sales were nems. Everyone wants frags. Everyone wants single or double head Euphyllia.

Car break in
Last Friday night my vehicle was broken into in front of my home. Some personal items were taken, debit cards that were either not activated or expired, car registration, the amazing painting that my wife had painted that was due to be shipped to a fellow reefer, and a box of lights in the back seat. These were the brand new Noo Psyche lights i had just gotten from another R2R member and one of my Kessils. My intent was to put them over the temporary holding bin for the coral while i worked through the new tank upgrade at the end of the month. People should stay in their own lane...

Temp bin destruction
I had moved all of the livestock and coral to the temp holding Rubbermaid this weekend. Everything went really well, the transition was seamless. And i was able to take my time doing it. Fast forward to today at lunch. i walked in the front door and i could smell the stench of death again. My first thought was the old sump, i had scrubbed it and dried it but i was unable to get all the algae off the acrylic baffles. walked into the fish room and saw the cloudy milky color of the bin. saw the fish at the surface breathing in air... i instantly knew something had happened. Ammonia spike. Turns out i had failures of not 1 but 2 of the power heads that were running to keep the water oxygenated. I dont know how long it had been going and i dont know what other contributing factors there may have been but today i lost nearly all of my fish from my tear down in my temp housing 12 of 17 died. I also lost one of my most beautiful nems, and another full round of coral. SPS and Euphyllia were hit the hardest. I think this was a perfect storm... once things started to perish it snow balled and in the hours between yesterday at 4pm and today at 12pm when i had last checked it imploded. A large water change later, increased flow, and removal of anything that looked like it was not going to last... and ive done everything i can.

Here is the spin...
Stuff happens. My brain is fried today. I am mentally exhausted and physically sick about what has happened in the last month.
EEFW's - i was able to quickly formulate a plan and put it in action. Had it not been for the heater, i think my chances of success were very high. This tells me i am ready should anything else happen that requires emergency action.
Flying Fish - yep these things happen. next time i should keep a lid on the isolation box, or better yet, put the fish somewhere else.
Coral Show disappointment - I think i had a great game plan. i think i was well prepared. This was a great learning experience. i know what to do differently in the future and i believe i will sell lots of coral moving forward. it was worth the experience to be a little disappointed.
Car Break in - yea.... not sure i can spin that one. people suck... did give me a reason to clean out my car again. i wont keep anything in there that i wouldnt be ok with just putting on the curb ever again.
Temp bin destruction - still processing this one. i think if nothing else, it showed that again i can pivot well during an emergency and identify problems and come up with solutions quickly. I gave this my best shot. thats all i can ask.

In the words of one of my favorite movie characters of all times...

Just keep swimming...

Thats all we can do right?

Been through all of the above in the numerous moves, tank swaps etc. Like literally all of it. Even the car thing and we will not get into what car they broke a window in.

If you need to call someone just to cuss and yell just to get it out, I am here for ya man.

Lowell Lemon · Mar 20, 2023

Wow what a rough ride! Sorry for all the loss!

Lost in the Sauce · Mar 20, 2023

We all know you want to be like me, but no need to take it to my extremes of killing everything off before the big tank gets there!

This too shall pass my dude.

MERKEY · Mar 20, 2023

So sorry for all the calamity in such a short time brotha...very good processing and outlook!

The new tank will be amazing!!!

danieyella · Mar 20, 2023

Just catching up on everybody for today, I am so sorry to hear about all of this chaos. Hopefully you've had your share of poor reef juju and good things will be coming next.

F i s h y · Mar 20, 2023

Lost in the Sauce said:
We all know you want to be like me, but no need to take it to my extremes of killing everything off before the big tank gets there!

This too shall pass my dude.

Lol I didn't even think about this... nothing kept to do but burn it with fire right?

Nate Chalk · Mar 20, 2023

New growth already sprouting after massive N.J. wildfire. Why burning can be good.

Drier summers and less rain, resulting from climate change, have made wildfires less predictable, officials said.

www.nj.com

Lost in the Sauce · Mar 20, 2023

F i s h y said:
Lol I didn't even think about this... nothing kept to do but burn it with fire right?

I mean... You could also drop a burning 50k BTU industrial AC unit through the roof into the temp coral tank but I think that may be just showing off at this point.

Lost in the Sauce · Mar 20, 2023

Nate Chalk said:
New growth already sprouting after massive N.J. wildfire. Why burning can be good.

Drier summers and less rain, resulting from climate change, have made wildfires less predictable, officials said.

www.nj.com

Although this article is talking about coniferous forests, we get very much the same thing here.

Everything burns and looks terrible. 3 months later, there is life everywhere.

danieyella · Mar 20, 2023

We actually wish we'd had the fire dept do a controlled burn of our lot before they started building

Didn't think about it in time.

Nate Chalk · Mar 20, 2023

Lost in the Sauce said:
Although this article is talking about coniferous forests, we get very much the same thing here.

Everything burns and looks terrible. 3 months later, there is life everywhere.

A fact ill remember forever. We visited the Redwoods up north. We thought the burning was from the previous years fire. No the lady informed us it was from the 60's or something crazy....

but yes the under forest was amazing and covered and recovering already from the previous years fire.