Hello,

I have a 60 litre tank that i've been running for 6 weeks using the berlin method of two nano powerheads moving the water through live rock. 2 weeks ago I put in the CUC crew and based on advice of the LFS a Midas Blenny. The past 2 weeks have been fine with weekly 10% water changes. Yesterday I did a water change in the morning and then acclimatised and put in some Zoa frags and by the evening could tell that the Blenny was stressed. This morning he's close to dying and the cleaner shrimp is also behaving oddly by hiding out of sight. My water tests are ok (although Nirates are a little high) so I wonder if I've stressed the tank with my messing yesterday.

I think it might be too late to save the Blenny but with the shrimp in mind, should I do a 10% water change today or leave the tank alone and try and let things settle down on their own?

Really appreciate any advice.

TT.

In my honest opinion, if your nitrates are high do the change, I would probably do a 20% change. Nitrates are very bad for your fish (you probably know that) and by doing the change you may be able to dilute the Nitrates. I am not the most experienced reefer, but I can tell you from what you have told me, nitrates are the problem.

Thanks. I've followed your suggestion. Hope it works out.

If everything was fine before the last change, the water change might have caused the stress. What type of water are you using? What are the ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, pH, and SG values?

With the WC did u match the parameters? Temp and sg? Now that its getting cold I heat up my water b4 I up it in. Sometimes that can stress them out. Also 6 weeks isn't that long....did u get nitrates down to zero b4 u added everything in? Getting thru a cycle is one thing, but for me, after cycling my alk dropped down to 5-6 and my cal drop as well. Nitrates are bad but with good para. Ur nitrates can be up to 40 and u should be ok still.

Hope things get better...

NR4Life is dead on that stability is the key - how high are your nitrates? PH/Alk//temps stable? I allowed the alk/ph to drop in a tank recently with lots of macro algae growth and the fish was NOT happy at all - gotta keep the water stable through and by doing WC.




I gotta have you remotely diagnose my problems also with nearly no info - are you a shaman?

Thanks for all your replies. My immediate feeling was that the fish and shrimp were stressed because i'd been doing a lot of messing around in the tank yesterday. Up til that point everything had been fine. I was doing weekly water changes (using de-ionised water), checking that the temp and SG matched that of the tank first. Although I did a 10% water change yesterday my stats this morning had nitrates at 20ppm. Ammonia and Nitrite are consistently 0ppm. My ph is only 7.8 but its always been this and i've been advised that its more important to be stable so i've not been using a buffer. Admittedly, I haven't got tests for KH, mag, and cal but my intention is to take a water sample to my LFS in the morning, get it checked out and pick up the tests for myself.

Although i'm still fairly sure that I stressed the fish out I felt I needed to do something this morning and as I couldn't get to the LFS until Sat and the nitrates shouldn't be that high a day after a water test I thought i'd better do another water change. Master 3930 might not be shamen but he just said what I wanted to hear.

As an update, I haven't seen the Blenny since about 2pm but he didn't look good. The cleaner is still hiding in the same place he's been all day. My other CUC, a peppermint shrimp and 4 hermit crabs are wandering round like there's nothing wrong.

For me this is now more about damage limitation than trying to save the Blenny. If you think there's something else I should do then please shout.

since PH naturally fluctuates throughout the day I would retest to see if 7.8 is your lowest or highest number - 8+ as a low is much better and your weekly water changes should be increasing your DK/ALk and PH up -

Your nitrate is pretty high. I get worried if I see mine creep up between 5 and 10ppm. Also, you may want to grab an Alk and Ca kit. When alk is low, pH drops. This is especially hard on your coral. I had low pH issues and they dissapeared when I started monitering my alk and keeping it high enough.

It sounds like nitrates could be your problem right now

Well yes, it was only 10 last week and 5 the week before that.

The plan is to get the missing test kits tomorrow. Once bitten an' all that.

I can tell you that the Blenny did die. I should probably never have got him in the first place so i'm very annoyed at myself. The cleaner shrimp seems to have perked up a little though.

I wouldn't worry to much about ur nitrates...just add macro algae or more WCs. But def. Invest in a KH tester! All u really need to test is alk and cal. If ur alk is in check so will ur ph....I keep my kh @ 12 so there isn't much of a ph swing. As for mag. U know ur low on mag if u can't keep cal stable. Nitrates shouldn't be a problem as long as u don't overstock and overfeed. If u have zenias and zoas they kinda like some nitrates..but with good parameters

OK. So I went to the LFS and got some tests done. After the 20% water change I did yesterday they thought my nitrates were ok but my ammonia was showing high (possibly the cause of death over the nitrates?) I picked up a Reef Test Kit while I was there and these are my complete stats this evening: (btw, I'm still getting used to the way you conduct these new tests so I can't vouch for their accuracy 100%!)

pH: 7.8
temp: 80.1F
SG: 1.025
Ammonia: 0.25ppm
Nitrites: 0ppm
Nitrates: 20ppm
KH: 10dkh
Ca: 320ppm
Phosphate: 0.5ppm

I figure that the powerhead/live rock & 10% water changes aren't keeping the quality of the water high enough so on the advice of the guys at the LFS I bought a Fluval Mini filter and have filled it with some 'Polyfilter' brand media and installed it to the top left of the tank - just to help the LR filter the system a little. The guy I spoke to said that a lot of them who don't use protein skimmers use the Polyfilter brand and rate it.

I also got some Tropic Marin 'triple buffer' to help achieve the correct pH and KH in the tank. But rather than add it straight, so I don't shock the tank, I figured I would add this to the water changes so the adjustment is gradual.

What do you think to my plans?

TT.

Like I said originally, *to all other posters*, nitrates cause problems anyway you look at it. High Nitrates can lead to other problems. It may not cause an immediate problem but in the future it WILL cause problems

if u were messing around in the tank and moved rock and sand u may have disturbed the bacteria low in the sand and caused a mini cycle. if u havent gottten the dead blenny out that is also a cause of ur ammonia.

i wouldnt add any buffer for ph. it will also raise ur kh and its at 10 right now which is fine. i would set up some more water changes and do them to get the ammonia/nitrates down.

Yes, the concensus seems to be not to buffer so i'll leave that. I'm not sure that I did that KH test correctly so I might retest.

And my idea of running a mini filter with a Polyfilter media?

What kind of salt are you using? Your calcium and alkalinity levels are extremely unbalanced.

It's Tropic Marin Reef Pro. Like I said in my post, It's the first time i've done those tests and i'm not convinced I did them correctly. I plan to have another stab tomorrow.