Copper?.....death to all corals

V

vickymoore1976

New Member
Its a little complicated but I will try to make since of this so I can get some opinions and advice. I did a 10% water change to my RMS 130D which is about 4 gallons. After adding half of the water I noticed the heater had broke in the container I use to hold the water. Too late since water had already been added. Within 12 hours all of my coral and invertebrates died. Could this be copper poisioning from the element in the heater? And if this is the case, where do I go from here? Will I need to replace my live rock and sand? How do I get the copper out? My clownfish are fine and acting normal and my hermit crabs are staying up on the live rock. Also taking any ideas or thoughts on what what wrong if you think this isnt a copper issue. I have not tested for copper yet as I am going to my LFS to obtain a test kit. All other water tests were normal. Temp 79, salinity 1.025, pH 8.4, alkalinity 2.8, ammonia 0.035, nitrite 0, nitrate 0, calcium 450, phosphate 0.
 
BigAl07

BigAl07

Administrator
RS STAFF
Honestly anything would be a guess until after the Copper test results are in. I would say it's possible. Did you take the heater apart and confirm it's a copper element? It could be from some other contaminant that was inside the heater as well (manufacturing by-products etc).

No matter what it is my first course of action will always be CARBON! Drop large amount of CARBON in your tank to help in case it is some type of contaminant.
 
reefer gladness

reefer gladness

Well-Known Member
If you have the inTank media basket try running Poly-Filter in the first stage. I made the mistake of having a brass fitting in my tank in the early stages, it leached out copper and who knows what else. It's all gone now but I used a lot of Poly-Filter, also Cuprisorb and Chemi-Pure Elite. At this point all invertebrates have been happy and healthy for months and I only run the CPE. Sorry about your loss. Good luck!
 
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