Majority of Fish Died Overnight

[EliMelly]

A skimmer will help to a degree, but I use a wave maker and power heads for surface agitation.

Yes I have those of course!

 

[MnFish1]

MN

what mechanisms could allow for ammonia noncontrol in a reef display to harm fish first. Im amazed you inquired about ammonia that much given the settings. if it was during QT that would make sense, but a stocked and running reef tank?

why this matters:

knowing what to eliminate from fish loss work threads helps prevent chasing red herrings. Eliminating ammonia early on was where I started, reading the biosecurity article and tying that back to the stocking order here was where I started so was curious where you'd seen ammonia noncontrol in a reef tank before. agreed dead fish left to degrade will spike, I thought he'd been removing each fish vs letting them rot?

My impression is that some fish were left dead in the tank during the night, which could have caused a cascade type event. In the case where both fish and shrimp are quickly dying, a toxin of some sort is high on the list of what could be going on. In this case - people were discussing ammonia as well as low oxygen (and disease). IMHO it was disease in the tank, causing death of fish causing either rise in ammonia or decrease in oxygen (though as I mentioned to decrease oxygen one would expect cloudy water/bacterial bloom - which was not seen)

 

[EliMelly]

I had the same thing happen to me! Never found the problem. Drained the tanks (3 of them 2 salt 1 fresh) and boiled the rock. My fresh is back up and running no problem. My wife's 75 is up but still having some problems. I am putting my 240 back on line today. I hope some on can clue both of us in on what's happening

Sorry to hear that, I hope you’re able to figure out what happened. Why’d you boil the rock?

 

[MnFish1]

Yes I have those of course!

Sorry that this turned out this way. Another poster mentioned boiling rocks. This is not normally recommended in the rare case that a toxin could be released (for example if you had some zoas on the rock).

 

[EliMelly]

From everything I’ve read I still believe you had low 02 levels and that’s what did the damage… you said the flow seemed off and mentioned vortecs and if they’re ran on mobius it’s known to cause problems and they need resetting after awhile.. that on top of Prazipro would be my best guess of what happened! You even mention an airstone brought some fish back so it’s gotta be that! I think the achillies was a seperate problem and ich got the best of him after the 02 levels dropped and it started a chain reaction.. your lfs hit the nail on the head!

This is what Jay believes as well. I think it makes the most sense. Mystery solved.

 

[EliMelly]

oh I see. yes agreed meds can do it under the listed mechanisms.


what brings in the need for the meds that in return dropped the o2 levels, where was the starting loss mechanism here? o2 was not the original loss initiator for sure.

if we can locate the original cause, readers will have a true chance at prevention and Eli's round 2 setup coming will have a much better chance.

if we could reverse engineer this challenge thread, what is the critical step(s) to take oppositely? that's the winning analysis imo.

my vote:
stocking fish first is the key. look how many advocate for the method, it's about 98% of the site:

What goes into the new tank first? Corals or Fish?

I know there are several different theories on this, so I thought this might be an interesting discussion. What do you think should go into the new tank first? Corals or Fish? What's your reasoning for your position?

www.reef2reef.com

ideally we'd build up this tank with corals, cuc and inverts and run it a while.

then fallow the whole system

then add those costly pre-quarantined fish. that upholds the biosecurity article.

any small bits added over the coming years are fallowed first in a separate smaller prep reef tank in the home then added to the display.

if we stock fish first, every repeat new addition to the reef tank over the coming months (hundreds cumulatively) becomes a new disease vector, and I'm seeing about 8 mos on average in the work threads until disease expression that favors highly only fish.

Are you suggesting adding corals and everything before fish? I’ve been holding back on adding corals as I’m attempting to keep the lights of for 6 months to do my bust to avoid unwanted algae.

 

[1112-425XL]

From everything I’ve read I still believe you had low 02 levels and that’s what did the damage… you said the flow seemed off and mentioned vortecs and if they’re ran on mobius it’s known to cause problems and they need resetting after awhile.. that on top of Prazipro would be my best guess of what happened! You even mention an airstone brought some fish back so it’s gotta be that! I think the achillies was a seperate problem and ich got the best of him after the 02 levels dropped and it started a chain reaction.. your lfs hit the nail on the head!

I totally agree.

 

[EliMelly]

Sorry that this turned out this way. Another poster mentioned boiling rocks. This is not normally recommended in the rare case that a toxin could be released (for example if you had some zoas on the rock).

It happens! It’s difficult but I’m happy to learn all that I have from everyone here. I think it will allow me to be a better reef keeper moving forward. The journey continues!

 

[EliMelly]

Thank you so much to everyone on here who patiently and kindly helped me figure out what was going on. This was really tough for me and you all were a game changer. @vetteguy53081 @Jay Hemdal @MnFish1 @Troylee @brandon429

 

[EliMelly]

From everything I’ve read I still believe you had low 02 levels and that’s what did the damage… you said the flow seemed off and mentioned vortecs and if they’re ran on mobius it’s known to cause problems and they need resetting after awhile.. that on top of Prazipro would be my best guess of what happened! You even mention an airstone brought some fish back so it’s gotta be that! I think the achillies was a seperate problem and ich got the best of him after the 02 levels dropped and it started a chain reaction.. your lfs hit the nail on the head!

The only think I’m unsure about is whether the Achilles also had velvet…

 

[MnFish1]

From everything I’ve read I still believe you had low 02 levels and that’s what did the damage… you said the flow seemed off and mentioned vortecs and if they’re ran on mobius it’s known to cause problems and they need resetting after awhile.. that on top of Prazipro would be my best guess of what happened! You even mention an airstone brought some fish back so it’s gotta be that! I think the achillies was a seperate problem and ich got the best of him after the 02 levels dropped and it started a chain reaction.. your lfs hit the nail on the head!

I think you could be right. I will say IMHO that the positive response to an airstone addition does not mitigate that much for low oxygen being the cause - since gill diseases/processes will also respond to higher oxygen lev levels (on the short term)

 

[Freenow54]

Well, I’m currently in pretty much tears. Overnight my Achilles, yellow tang, Wantanabe Angel, flame angel, fire shrimp and others all died.

They were all breathing heavily last night and I sat there knowing there was nothing I could do at 11:00 PM on such short notice and it may be the last time I would see those fish. I’ve had a lot of those fish since I’ve started the hobby and feel heartbroken right now.

Anyone have any suggestions for next steps? My clowns still seem to be ok, hippo tang is hiding, firefish, hawkfish, eel, and my wrasses are hiding so I’m not sure…

Wow what a crappy way to start the day.

Quitting isn’t an option as I just upgraded to a 200 gallon but what a kick in the face.

I understand lost My 6 year old Tang a couple of days ago

 

[benbalter]

Sorry to hear that, I hope you’re able to figure out what happened. Why’d you boil the rock?

Well I figured if it was disease or toxin it would wipe both out. Plus the tank had been running 7 years and the rock was rough looking. Fresh start and all

 

[MnFish1]

Well I figured if it was disease or toxin it would wipe both out. Plus the tank had been running 7 years and the rock was rough looking. Fresh start and all

Just for the future - avoid boiling or putting rock in the oven - though its rare - significant illnesses (whether related or not) have been written about in this forum. FYI - boiling does NOT remove palytoxin. (bleach and other methods do)