trouble in paradise!

[cioutlaw]

ok..here we go...I had a 55 gal that had been set up for 6 months or so, perfect parameters, 2 fish, 6-8 corals. This past week I moved fish, water, corals, live sand, 60lbs of live rock to a new 120 gal.

I added 100 gal of RO/DI water to make up the difference (plus fill the new sump)

parameters are still perfect 2 days later(Saturday). then I added 50 lbs of washed base rock & 40lbs of live rock that I had in a container with heater,power head & cannister filter for 2 weeks. Parameters on the container tested good. 6 hrs later I tested & had some ammonia about 1.0, on the 3rd day(sunday) my Xenia was looking bad, tested water:
Ammonia 4.0
Nitrite .50
Nitrate 5.0

by Sunday night Xenia was dead.

This morning (monday)

Ammonia was between 1.0-2.0
Nitrite .50
Nitrate 10.0

ammonia is heading in the right direction but I really hate to lose any other corals or fish..has anyone used Biospira? I almost have no choice other than to take all my live stock to the LFS or something. I have read mixed reveiws on the Biro-spira. if it does not work i am ok with that but dont want it to do MORE damage. Anyone with experience with this product?

[Little Luey]

Sorry to hear that, I would do a large WC to dilute the ammonia. I have never used the Biro-spira, sorry.

[cioutlaw]

Ive done (3) 5 gal water changes so far. making more water now. Frog spawn is puking. Things are not looking good.

[Stevenmi]

I would suggest removing all the "live rock" you had curing. Sounds like moving them may have opened a cavern of stench from within. try smelling each peice. Perhaps you will find the one or more that are nasty still...

Good luck to you...

Steve

[Joe69]

It sounds like you do not have enough bacteria to handle the die-off on the new rock. I would take out all the new LR back out and try adding one new piece a week or every 3 days or so until the bacteria increases in the new tank.

[cioutlaw]

Joe I did remove some live rock & put it back in the tub. Im sure there is much more left but it is mixed in with good live rock & base rock.

I added the Bio-spira out of desperation I searched the web & didnt find anyone that said it was bad stuff, some said it works for new tanks & some says it does nothing. I figured the $40 was worth the chance of saving the rest of the corals.

test results today(Tuesday) are as follows

ammonia 1.50
Nitrite 5.0
nitrate 4.0

So far no more casualties fish look good & are eating (feeding very lightly) & corals dont look exactly happy but dont look like they are on their death bed either. wish us luck!

[BoomerD]

Corals usually don't tolerate ammonia very well. I'm surprised your fish have, as that was a high reading. Most likely, your new rock hadn't finished curing. 2 weeks is pretty short for rock to cure completely.

[mattie]

ditto on the corals not liking the amonia and they do not like the nitrites either.
nitrates at 10 is red light that somthing is wrong and needs to be address seriously
the bio-spira work well but is not what will fix your problem
if your tank is 120 plus 20-30 for the sump doing 3 5 gal water changes is not going to make dent in the toxicty of your reef tank.
you need to do 3 20gal or 1 50 gallon water change if you want to see quicker results. and limit the negative effects of the cycle
something died and is causeinf die-off weather it was a ph thing or just the fact that the other rocks did not cycle as much as you had thought.
but you need to make much larger water changed if you did 50% that would only drop everything by half and you need to drop your levels much lower than that....
its good that you have a heater becouse when doing larger percentage water changes you want to limit the ph, temp and salinty dif's as much as possible.
and do not worry to much about the xenia it can come back from the smallest pieces....but besure to remove any dieing or dead pieces so that the problem does not esculate

[cioutlaw]

Im doing water changes as fast as my ro/di will make it. I removed the Xenia..it basicly fell apart. I am really surprised about the 2 fish as well. they act completly normal. Thanks for the info.

[cioutlaw]

Well thought I would update...Only lost the 1 coral (Xenia)

Ammonia 0
nitrite .50
nitrates 5ppm.

At what point should I back off on water changing? Ive been doing 10% every other day here recently.

[mattie]

stop or go to a more normal schedual when
nitrite=0
nitrates less than 5
so you are close
nitrites are very toxic

[cioutlaw]

Originally Posted by mattie

stop or go to a more normal schedual when
nitrite=0
nitrates less than 5
so you are close
nitrites are very toxic

ok thanks. what is really strange is all my corals look better than they ever have..I have a leather frag that has looked bad for the last 4-5 weeks & he has gotten huge the last few days & polyps are out.

[Woodstock]

..probably due to the water changes...

[cioutlaw]

woo hoo..water params are perfect today!!

[Charlie97L]

generally you need to cure new live rock, like you did, for at least a month, preferably more than that. and while it's curing, sometimes go in and do a swish treatment on it.

glad to hear things settled out and you didn't have any more losses.