kennerd Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 OK, I added a large rock from a well-established tank to my 10 gal that has been running for 3 years now. Pic before adding new rock: Tank looked clear within about 2 hours, and all of my corals opened right up and all seemed happy with the world. That was on Friday 1:00PM Saturday, everthing looked fantastic, and I wish I had snapped a pic. I had a bachelor party to go to, came home about 1:30AM that night to find the following string up gunk floating around, and attached to the end of a hydno frag (keep in mind the hydno was recovering in this tank from tissue recession prior to this): [image=http://home.earthlink.net/~obrienken/_uimages/spawn5.JPG]width=550[/image] Needless to say, something happened that my corals and fish DID NOT TAKE WELL TO. I fished the gunk out with a net, started a batch of salt water and planned to get up early and do a water change. Well, come morning, I fished out the following nuked corals: hammer frogspawn trumpet monti cap monti dig 2 hydnos 6-7 dead stomatella snails 2 astrea snails 1 Tiger Trochus My cinnamon clown had scratched an eye that puffed way out. Was able to catch him and put in another tank, lost the yellow damsel later that night, but the neon dottyback is doing fine. Zoos, leather, sinularia, anthelia and GSP looked awful but after WC's look fine. NOW, the reason I think it had to do with something like a spawn: params seem fine with the exception of ph & dKH and tests were taken @ 6: 30AM, prior to two 5 gal water changes: Amm 0 Trites 0 Trates 0 (2 seperate tests) Phos 0 Calcium 350 pH 7.8 dKH 6 O2 5ml/l Yes, those are dead mini stars stuck in the goo, which leads me to believe that this stuff originated, or was emitted from the sandbed I purchased a few rocks from the same guy/same tank. Only two ended up in this tank, and more in another tank. Other tank is fine, no indications of a cycle/curing and no other problems. Here's a picture of the tank just before water change #1 and after removing toasted corals. Any clue? Link to comment
FlyGTI Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 Okay, something is seriously ####ed off inside your tank. Have you sprinkled any holy water on the front glass? Might help. Sorry I don't have any decent advice. Never seen anything like this. Link to comment
kennerd Posted June 10, 2003 Author Share Posted June 10, 2003 Pretty screwy, eh? Glad it happened in the 10 and not in the 65..... Link to comment
FlyGTI Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 You ain't kiddin'! How much did you end up losing? Save anything, coralwise? Link to comment
kennerd Posted June 10, 2003 Author Share Posted June 10, 2003 Yellow Leather is opening up again, the zoos, shrooms and a green sinularia. cinnamon clown is doing well in another tank and the neon dottyback is fine.. Thank GOD this happened over the weekend. I was supposed to have my rose BTA overnighted for Tues delivery. That would have seriously thrown me over the edge if I got it in there and watched it melt. Really sux when you have your bases pretty well covered and something like this happens....nature really is out of our control, no matter what. Link to comment
SeaMountain Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 Dude... You're scaring me!!! Whatever the catalyst was I hope you find out and share it with the rrest of us! I damn sure don't want to roll home after a Bachelor Party and find what you did. Have you considered it was a torqued off woman getting even for you even GOING to the Bachelor Party?!?! Link to comment
Crakeur Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 did you try following th stringy stuff to a source? I would imagine one end might point you to the culprit. Sorry to hear about the crash ken. Now I have someone to split orders with. Link to comment
kennerd Posted June 10, 2003 Author Share Posted June 10, 2003 Originally posted by Crakeur did you try following th stringy stuff to a source? I would imagine one end might point you to the culprit. Ironically, is was attached, as shown in the pic, (get this) to your Hydno, Crak! It was 3/4 of the way up in the tank, on a jutting piece of rock blowing in the breeze, not touching anything. I assumed it blew there and got caught on the edge of the hydno. Made it seem bizarre in that the mini stars were all gunked up in it. For them to get caught in there, they would have had to jump into the net of this stuff. SeaMountain: believe it or not, she called me to let me know about it. In fact, she told me yesterday that "your girlfriend's card is on top of the washing machine: hope you have it somewhere else." Stupid ladies stuffed cards into everyone's jackets, sweatshirts, flannels (hehe) that were @ the bar....she's cool, and was just as concerned about everything. Party was a real classy operation: American Legion with a keg and 6-foot hoagie. My cousin's brother is a biker/fireman up this way. I won't even get into the entertainment........ :x Link to comment
Crakeur Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 man she's cool. my wife saw the box of sand from cajastan and had to watch me open it to ensure that I wasn't receiving some kind of porn or some gifts from a girlfriend. Link to comment
kennerd Posted June 10, 2003 Author Share Posted June 10, 2003 Oh, she's just filed that one away for future public humility for sure. Link to comment
Crakeur Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 ken, there is a hole in the rock behind my (sniff sniff) now dead hydno. Is it possible some critter within the rock spewed forth that mess? Have you thought of cracking the rock open and findinf the culprit? If find it hard to believe that all that goo came from an animal in the sand. it looks like you moved the sand around when you put the big rock in and, if there was a beast of some sort in there, odds are you would have found it. I'm thinking something came out of the rock and released the goo, either as a result of natural spawning or possibly it was frightened/shocked etc. from the move and new water conditions. Also, I have seen my micro stars on the rock a few times and, if there is food there, they might start climbing so don't rule out the rock. Actually, that is your primary suspect, in my opinion. Link to comment
kennerd Posted June 10, 2003 Author Share Posted June 10, 2003 Haven't craked the rock open. Tank seems to have stabilized, but who knows. Seems to have cleared up a bunch, so maybe I'll root around in there. Hoping one of the scientific nerdy-types over @ RC will pick up on the type of crap this is, since they can tell snail ID's etc from algae scraping patterns, egg casings, etc. Feller I got the rock from actually emailed me yesterday to "see how the rock made it home" Waiting for a return email from him. I'll ask him if anything like this has ever happened before. HEy, how do you like the red nightlight? I figured I'd try snapping a shot with the 13w red PC fixture I have pressed up against the tank first: in case this was some weird angler-type creature that would pull back into the rock, etc. when I snapped on the lights. Link to comment
Crakeur Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 more important question is how do the tank inhabitants like the red light. Clearly one of them thought "cool, red light district" and whipped it out and made a huge mess of the tank. I like the red light. I was thinking of fitting a couple of led's into the new hood when it comes for a night effect but I have decided to let things be for now and stop messing with the equipment until things are running as planned. Link to comment
tinyreef Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 i'd tend to agree with you that it was a spawn, peanut worm maybe? that's still in the rock somewhere. probably didn't like the switch, probably from the temp change of the transfer prompted it to spew. :x that's sucks big time. a big hunk of rock like that is bound to have some surprises. Link to comment
kennerd Posted June 10, 2003 Author Share Posted June 10, 2003 Crak: It's actually a 13w hellolights red bulb in a Jalli fixture: it's not on the tank. I just have it plugged in and set aside to use for night viewing in a spotlight fashion. Tres cool, but I think the spectrum is a little light more pink than in the picture. Let's me check out polyp extension, my harlequins foraging at night, and Kim & I caught our emerald crabs spawning, too. DEfinitely wasn't the light. tiny: I'd agree except the rock water was 75 deg in the guys rubbermaid, never went below that (uncomfy truck ride) and was in the tank for 30 hours or so before anything happened. Ah, I'll have to take a midnight hunt tonight. Link to comment
Crakeur Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 ok, I am putting my money on an invert (slug, worm, cuke or some other gooey critter) that lives in the rock. It's the only thing that makes any sense. It might be dead, thus the spewing of it's guts. I have one of those jalli 13 watters but it's on the fuge so I have the regular white bulb going. Link to comment
kennerd Posted June 10, 2003 Author Share Posted June 10, 2003 If & when we ever get together, I'll bring th eother red bulb I have for you to check it out. I'll be honest, dealing with the tank on Sunday morning f'ing killed me to the point that I almost couldn't handle it with everything going on at once.....I sprinted less during tax season. Needless to say, I'll check it out when I get thome. There was no additional smell or parameter spike either. I think this is a direct consequence of smaller water volume. Period. Larger volume, I have to believe, would have diminished the effect. Link to comment
tinyreef Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 actually, i think the higher temp (transferring into your tank from the ride, did you acclimate the rock?) would've triggered the spawn. i'm equating clams to worms tho so that could be total crap. X) the time lag is puzzling but it could have been hiding out and then waiting for the appropriate photoperiod to spew. Link to comment
kennerd Posted June 10, 2003 Author Share Posted June 10, 2003 Yep: acclimated it, since I also got the shroom rock that is in the front left in the pic above, a gorgeous open brain for my 65, and two other rocks that went into the 12 gal tank. I'm not arguing that it isn't a spawn, just amazing how you can really take all the "textbook" right steps, get through the first day and a half with everything really grooving along, only to take one right smack in the nutz. Link to comment
deacon hemp Posted June 11, 2003 Share Posted June 11, 2003 I'm with crakuer,common sense would lead to cukecumber in your sandbed dying or something toxic but if you have no cuke? Would a spawn of anything do this?I've never heard of that? Link to comment
kennerd Posted June 11, 2003 Author Share Posted June 11, 2003 No cuke in my tanks...ever. (In order to avoid crap like this), and I just got an email back from the guy I got the rock from, and he's never had one either.......funky stuff. Man, no bites from the reefnerds @ RC in the advanced forum either....have to bump it up. K Link to comment
kennerd Posted July 2, 2003 Author Share Posted July 2, 2003 Well, update: tank is back up and functional, parameters perfect, never re-cycled. I'm 99% sure that the "spawning" depleted the oxygen levels completely, but after water changes I got it back quickly. Believe me when I say this: don't take your cleanup crew for granted until you lose it....whew. Link to comment
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