WTH is going on? HELP!

[megan]

Friday I topped off with distilled water, and it was quite a bit. I never use distilled, but my evaporation was really bad and the salinity was high. Well, my colt coral went all limp and my clover polyps look awful. I did a medium water change yesterday and now my wrasse is dying. WTH!!! He has been so great, and now he is just lying on the bottom of the tank gasping. HELP!!!

[chaostactics]

Whats your water volume total. You said you did a water change, how much did you replace? Did you heat the water to the temp of your tank before performing the water change... top off? With nano tanks even small swings can be a big deal

[megan]

Its a 24 gal, so maybe 22 gals total. No, I didn't worry about temp on either. My temp is usually @ 81.5 and the waters I added were at room temp, so maybe 76-78. I added less than 1 gal in top off and then my water change was just under 5 gal. I do that much any time someone dies (crab or shrimp). I have never lost a fish b4!

[ninjafish]

That temperature difference is pretty huge. With a nano you should always try and have the salinity and temperature of your water change the same as your display. The best mindset for me has been to remember that any change in water conditions is painful to my livestock. If you have to make changes, do them slowly. It was probably hard on your livestock when the salinity level rose from the evaporation... but that change occurred a lot slower then when you instantly changed it back with with the new water.

 

Look into an auto topoff or adjust your schedule so that the water in you nano is topped off at least once a day. Usually if you see a gasping fish it is because there is not enough oxygen in the water and you need to get more surface agitation - in this case though I wouldn't be surprised if it is just due to the shock that the fish has experienced. Usually fish are a little more hardy and invertibrates are the first ones to succumb to poor conditions. Best of luck,

 

- Chad

[Tomsense76]

If it was a little less than a gallon in fresh water, that was a huge change to the salinity all at once....

[megan]

If it was a little less than a gallon in fresh water, that was a huge change to the salinity all at once....

 

O.K. So I'll get an auto top off. But, wouldn't the fish have reacted that day and not two days later. I did take him and my water in to my lfs and when they tested it for copper, there was a little bit. So, I did another water change and added some carbon. They are keeping my fish and medicating him. I don't know with what, probably just a stress med.

 

Everything else except my colt coral is looking pretty good. We'll see I guess. Thanks for the advise!

[juin21]

Get an ATO if you can't keep up with your water changes. Copper??? How did the copper get in there, maybe just a misread of the test? The temp change mixed with the salinity may have caused stress to your fish. Before I got an ATO, if i had a lot of evap. i did it in 1/2 gallon portions. I'd top off with 1/2 gallon then waited a few hours then filled up another 1/2 gallon. I have a 20 long with a 7 gallon sump. How much flow do you have in your tank?

[megan]

The copper came from the distilled water. I guess you have to read and see if the water was made in a facility that uses copper piping. I had read that here somewhere, and then the fish store confirmed it.

 

My flow was just o.k. until yesterday when I added a little prop. Now its great! I'm thinking that is going to solve alot of my problems: algae, pitiful gorgonian, etc.

 

Do you think that could have stressed the fish out? Adding so much flow?

[juin21]

I don't think flow would have hurt your fish. I was worried you didn't have enough and it slowed the mixing process in your tank when you added the freshwater

[megan]

Talking to my super helpful lfs, I think my ph is low and that there isn't enough oxygenation. I added some baking soda and changed my powerheads and even opened up the house. We'll see. She said that my xenia dying is a really good indication, so we'll see.

[steelerguy]

Really hard to follow your posts. You say everything is doing fine other than a dying wrasse and colt coral. Then your last post says you also have dying xenia. Sound like you have a lot of stuff not doing so well.

 

You are also making a lot of changes very suddenly which will stress animals out. 24 gallon nano with sand, rocks, tubing, pumps, heater, etc. probably has less than 20 gallons of water. Dump a gallon of distilled water in there at a different temp and you are asking for trouble. Do a 25% water change with different salinity or temp can also cause problems. Suddenly dumping baking soda in there and doing more water changes can make things even worse.

 

I think your best bet is to stay on top of maintenance, keep your water changes a little smaller, top off more often, and don't make sudden changes. These things should keep your ph and other parameters more stable and your tank inhabitants happier.

[megan]

Really hard to follow your posts. You say everything is doing fine other than a dying wrasse and colt coral. Then your last post says you also have dying xenia. Sound like you have a lot of stuff not doing so well.

 

You are also making a lot of changes very suddenly which will stress animals out. 24 gallon nano with sand, rocks, tubing, pumps, heater, etc. probably has less than 20 gallons of water. Dump a gallon of distilled water in there at a different temp and you are asking for trouble. Do a 25% water change with different salinity or temp can also cause problems. Suddenly dumping baking soda in there and doing more water changes can make things even worse.

 

I think your best bet is to stay on top of maintenance, keep your water changes a little smaller, top off more often, and don't make sudden changes. These things should keep your ph and other parameters more stable and your tank inhabitants happier.

 

WELL, I guess I just haven't inspected everything closely enough. Here is where the tank stands to date: My fish is back at the store in a hospital tank and doing well. Any of my corals that have a meaty stalk, i.e. xenia, colt and maybe my toadstool, are not doing so well. The toadstool never opens, and the other two seem to be disentigrating. I never can seem to keep xenia. They all shrivel and I'm thinking that it must be a nutrient issue b/c looking at the colt and the xenia both, it seems that the main stalk shrivels and is just decomposing. My lfs thinks that b/c of the stale air here, the tank is suffering from a lack of oxygenation and therefore higher ph. BUT all of my shrooms and zoos, brain and chalice are fine. My gorg looks like crap, but I think that is unrelated. It is getting better since I've been cleaning it.

 

I agree that I should have added the distilled slower. But that is why I did the water change was to try to buffer that a little. And the lfs told me to do the baking soda as a buffer and try to fix the ph. I generally do a 10% change, but once I saw the corals and fish reacting, I did a big water change.

 

Thanks for your input. I am going to really try to follow your advise!