CalebWBrink2000
Active Member
- Joined
- May 18, 2017
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This will be short (0r not), but I just wanted to share a recent experience I had with y'all. I've been in the hobby for awhile now; roughly 8 years. I've always used a skimmer; even in my main nano tank, an IM 14 Peninsula, I used a skimmer. That tank has been overhauled a few times as things grow out and I grow bored of the look. Nothing ever dies though; things just get shifted and replaced to keep the hobby fresh. Anyhow, two months ago or so my skimmer died and I decided to try running skim-less, as my tank had 8 years of established bacterial colonies in it and was quite stable.
The routine continued as normal, and everything initially didn't seem to react at all. However, at this time I was preparing to transport my tank to my college dorm; thus, I overhauled it again to simplify it. This time, however, my corals didn't bounce back as quickly as before. My mushrooms struggled and my candycanes refused to fully expand, eventually decided to detach from the skeleton entirely in what was a polyp bail-out. I did a 50% water change later that week to no avail. Okay, whatever. Moving day comes and I break down the tank and move in. All of the coral survived the initial move, but my gold torch kicked the bucket the next day and melted. Okay; one loss out of many in a move isn't bad. Everything else bounced back and a week later I decided to simply move and re-glue two of my acans.
Oh boy. To this day I have no idea what happened, but by moving the rocks around, I unleashed something devastating and suffered from a total ecological crash. The water never cleared up and maintained a milky haze. Day by day all of my corals melted off of their skeletons. At first I waited a few days to let it run its course- it was too quick to stop. At first I thought I incited a bacterial bloom due to the cloudiness, but then I lost a blue-damsel overnight. A damsel, of all fish, died for no apparent cause. The scary thing is that even the bristle-worms were suffering; they all laid outside of the rocks and wouldn't respond to any stimuli. The snails fell and the hermit crabs sat in place. The water was literally toxic.
I woke up to my two clowns struggling to swim and gasping for air, all happening over the course of one night after a few days of my tank crashing. Luckily I had a reservoir of fresh saltwater and transferred the clowns in there, where they were revived in half an hour and are now doing excellent after I rebooted my system.
I speculate that the death of a few corals released stinging cells or some form of toxin into the water column, of which my carbon (even my new carbon) was unable to absorb. It then caused a chain-reaction of death, further intoxicating the water. I've truly never had anything like this; I've had corals die like everyone else, but never like this. My water tests were normal; no parameter was extreme. The only reason I can deduce is that a combination of stresses from the move and the overhauls weakened my corals to a point of which they couldn't handle.
I ended up throwing out all of my dead and dying corals. I ordered a skimmer and a new pump; I did a 100% water change. What was left (a few mushrooms, a small zoa colony, and my big BTA) bounced back a few days after my water change. I waited a few more days and then reintroduced my clowns (Bertha and Gilbert), of whom were very excited to see their anemone still there! A week later (n0w), I've added in a few more bubble-tips, with the idea of creating a little anemone tank. So far so good.
Now, I understand that you don't need a skimmer in a nano. You can run one based purely off of water changes and you will likely have success. But, in the event of a freak accident, a skimmer is like insurance. It's another buffer against catastrophe. I would put money that if I had a skimmer, it would've sucked up a lot of toxin and I wouldn't've lost 90% of my corals. Skimmers also help oxygenate the water and keep the PH stable. It's a buffer; it helps keep things from spiraling out of control; use a skimmer if you can.
The routine continued as normal, and everything initially didn't seem to react at all. However, at this time I was preparing to transport my tank to my college dorm; thus, I overhauled it again to simplify it. This time, however, my corals didn't bounce back as quickly as before. My mushrooms struggled and my candycanes refused to fully expand, eventually decided to detach from the skeleton entirely in what was a polyp bail-out. I did a 50% water change later that week to no avail. Okay, whatever. Moving day comes and I break down the tank and move in. All of the coral survived the initial move, but my gold torch kicked the bucket the next day and melted. Okay; one loss out of many in a move isn't bad. Everything else bounced back and a week later I decided to simply move and re-glue two of my acans.
Oh boy. To this day I have no idea what happened, but by moving the rocks around, I unleashed something devastating and suffered from a total ecological crash. The water never cleared up and maintained a milky haze. Day by day all of my corals melted off of their skeletons. At first I waited a few days to let it run its course- it was too quick to stop. At first I thought I incited a bacterial bloom due to the cloudiness, but then I lost a blue-damsel overnight. A damsel, of all fish, died for no apparent cause. The scary thing is that even the bristle-worms were suffering; they all laid outside of the rocks and wouldn't respond to any stimuli. The snails fell and the hermit crabs sat in place. The water was literally toxic.
I woke up to my two clowns struggling to swim and gasping for air, all happening over the course of one night after a few days of my tank crashing. Luckily I had a reservoir of fresh saltwater and transferred the clowns in there, where they were revived in half an hour and are now doing excellent after I rebooted my system.
I speculate that the death of a few corals released stinging cells or some form of toxin into the water column, of which my carbon (even my new carbon) was unable to absorb. It then caused a chain-reaction of death, further intoxicating the water. I've truly never had anything like this; I've had corals die like everyone else, but never like this. My water tests were normal; no parameter was extreme. The only reason I can deduce is that a combination of stresses from the move and the overhauls weakened my corals to a point of which they couldn't handle.
I ended up throwing out all of my dead and dying corals. I ordered a skimmer and a new pump; I did a 100% water change. What was left (a few mushrooms, a small zoa colony, and my big BTA) bounced back a few days after my water change. I waited a few more days and then reintroduced my clowns (Bertha and Gilbert), of whom were very excited to see their anemone still there! A week later (n0w), I've added in a few more bubble-tips, with the idea of creating a little anemone tank. So far so good.
Now, I understand that you don't need a skimmer in a nano. You can run one based purely off of water changes and you will likely have success. But, in the event of a freak accident, a skimmer is like insurance. It's another buffer against catastrophe. I would put money that if I had a skimmer, it would've sucked up a lot of toxin and I wouldn't've lost 90% of my corals. Skimmers also help oxygenate the water and keep the PH stable. It's a buffer; it helps keep things from spiraling out of control; use a skimmer if you can.
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