Paradise on the Prairie

[flatlandreefer]

[vlangel]

Great photos!

[flatlandreefer]

I mounted my setosa and pink acan today, hopefully they are both happy with their new placement. 

[flatlandreefer]

I went ahead and took advantage of cyber monday yesterday and ordered all new filters and ro membrane for my ro/di as well as a box of live aquaria's new salt, I think a 200 gallon box was $38 so it was a very good deal. I have been debating on LA salt, fritz and Red Sea blue top. I was sold on fritz but you can't get it anywhere online for what it should cost. I'm excited to try Live Aquaria's salt as it is very close to fritz(maybe higher alk). 

 

I also purchased another brute trash can the other day to mix salt water in. I am excited about doing this as I think it will be easier to match new salt water to tank parameters since I can test everything and it will remain consistent until I mix up another batch in the trash can. This shouldn't matter as much with the new salt, because it has elevated mag and calcium levels, but it was kind of a PITA with instant ocean because I had to dose levels up to the desired level every time I mixed up a batch of salt. Having larger quantities of heated and mixed salt water will also make water changes easier to do between this tank and my pico as I won't be limited to 5 gal of salt at a time. 

 

Any way these things are kind of boring purchases but I'm still excited about them!

[flatlandreefer]

I went ahead and ripped off the rock that most of my green zoas are attached to. It has a bad case of hair algae in between the polyps that has been getting worse for a while. I decided to try a peroxide dip, I used roughly a 50/50 mix of salt water and 3% peroxide and dipped for about 5 min. Hopefully this helps. 

[flatlandreefer]

Picked up a hammer and a small elegance yesterday, both are open and looking good. I have been looking for a small Aussie elegance for a while and I was excited when I saw one in stock at the LFS. 

[flatlandreefer]

We I'm really frustrated with myself. I tried to remove the hammer from the plug it was on and I ended up putting too much pressure on the base and the whole head snapped into little pieces! I'm glad it was only $10 but I was excited about the purchase. I'm just surprised how easily it broke. Definitely should have left it on the plug, stupid! 

[flatlandreefer]

I spent a little time today breaking my zoanthids up into multiple frags and rearranging a few things. I cut the green zoa rock that I removed to peroxide dip into a smaller piece and glued it back into place. I didn't like how the original rock stuck out from the rockwork, once the smaller piece grows back with the rest of the zoas I think it will look a lot more natural. I also broke up my orange zoas, glued on frag of the orange zoas on the rock work and made a few frags to potentially put in my pico jar. I mixed green and orange on one frag which I think will look neat when it grows out. 

 

I took the lepto frag off of the sand bed and epoxied it into the rock work. I was presently surprised by the new growth that had been hidden by the sand! Hopefully this piece takes off in the coming months and encrusts my rock work. 

 

I broke off  a piece of of the monti cap and glued it below the mp10 by my acans. I'm hoping placing it in lower light will help it color back up and hopefully kick start some growth! We shall see. 

 

The conch has spent most of the day on the sand bed instead of buried beneath it so i snapped a pic of him, he is neat to watch. 

[flatlandreefer]

Here's a top down pic of my frag rack that I took after doing a water change today, all the zoas are opened up after fragging them yesterday. 

[flatlandreefer]

A quick top down look of the tank. 

[flatlandreefer]

SHIT JUST HIT THE FAN!!!!  Severe ALK overdose! I noticed my dosing pump was running, which it shouldn't have been since i turned them off yesterday to bring my parameters down a little bit.  I went over to the tank and the water was white and I could hardly see anything.  I sprung into action, thank god I made fresh salt water yesterday, not enough but more than I had.  I removed my fish except for the tail spot and put them in a bucket.  I removed all of the water and put as much back into the tank as possible.  I removed almost all of the coral and put it in a 5 gallon bucket.  I put my fish and a few prized pieces of coral into my pico which is stable and same parameters.  5 gallon bucket with corals has an airstone running currently and a heater.   I just checked main display and my alk is around 9.  The mp 10 is running and there is a heater in the tank.  The water isn't high enough use the back part of the tank yet.  Anything I need to be aware of, doing???

[flatlandreefer]

I have more salt water mixing and heating up right now, only 6 gallons because that's all the RO/DI I had on hand.  I have my RO/DI system on as well slowly making water.  Thank god for the pico tank contest, otherwise I wouldn't have had much for back up heaters and I wouldn't have purchased a brute trash can to mix salt water in.  My rock nem is still fully open in my main tank and my cleaner shrimp is acting normal.  I would guess half a cup of BRS alk solution got dumped in the tank, Around 6-7 ml is my normal dose.

[metrokat]

I had the same thing happen to me a few months back. I'm not sure this will be helpful right now but leaving the livestock in there and then changing out the water on the display is a better solution. The shock of high alk to sudden lower alk is not the best situation for the livestock. I made that mistake myself. I should have killed the pumps so that the display volume was all that i needed to do water changes on. Heater, pump for circulation and water change to bring the alk down should have been my game plan. 

 

Instead I moved all my corals that fit into a bucket and a 10G tank. They slimed really bad. I am hoping for the best for you. @flatlandreefer

[metrokat]

I lost a lot of livestock, but luckily just one fish, even if it was a super male wrasse.

 

Fingers crossed for you.

[flatlandreefer]

14 minutes ago, metrokat said:

I had the same thing happen to me a few months back. I'm not sure this will be helpful right now but leaving the livestock in there and then changing out the water on the display is a better solution. The shock of high alk to sudden lower alk is not the best situation for the livestock. I made that mistake myself. I should have killed the pumps so that the display volume was all that i needed to do water changes on. Heater, pump for circulation and water change to bring the alk down should have been my game plan. 

 

Instead I moved all my corals that fit into a bucket and a 10G tank. They slimed really bad. I am hoping for the best for you. @flatlandreefer

 

 

After doing a little research after the fact it seems like the better thing to do would have been to keep everything in there and do some water changes or take steps to bring the ph down.  With the water looking the way it did I couldn't help but panic and take everything out as fast as possible.  I have the tank filled back up with water and more salt mixing and heating right now so I think I will wait until the am to do anything else.  I'm hoping at least my lps and softies pull through...but I was really excited about my new setosa and my digitata too

 

Did you see an immediate decline in your corals or did they slowly die off after the event?

[flatlandreefer]

I'm slowly adding corals back to the tank.  Everything that spent the night in the tank looks good this morning.  There is a little bit of a temp difference between the tank and my 5 gallon bucket so I'm letting that equalize before I throw everything back in.  I didn't realize it for some reason, but I think my tank has been running a little low temp wise...the ink bird's thermometer must be off even though I thought I checked it when it was installed.

[Christopher Marks]

11 hours ago, flatlandreefer said:

After doing a little research after the fact it seems like the better thing to do would have been to keep everything in there and do some water changes or take steps to bring the ph down.  With the water looking the way it did I couldn't help but panic and take everything out as fast as possible.

Totally understandable!

 

I'm glad to hear of some positive progress this morning. Hopefully the corals and fish didn't mind the overnight adventure too much in the end, and hopefully the alk overdose wasn't as severe as it looked. How were the corals outside of the tank looking in the morning?

[ninjamyst]

hope things bounce back quickly!  your SPS may suffer but other corals should pull through

[flatlandreefer]

8 minutes ago, Christopher Marks said:

Totally understandable!

 

I'm glad to hear of some positive progress this morning. Hopefully the corals and fish didn't mind the overnight adventure too much in the end, and hopefully the alk overdose wasn't as severe as it looked. How were the corals outside of the tank looking in the morning?

 

Everything is back in the tank as of 5 min ago.  Most of the corals actually look pretty good...so far.  I would say the only one that is really looking a little rough is my orange/red digitata.   I have glued everything back on the rock work and most things are at least partially open if not fully open.  The hardest part of the whole ordeal was catching the two clowns out of my pico, I ended up using a rubber spatula and a slotted spoon.  Hopefully everything continues to improve. 

 

5 minutes ago, ninjamyst said:

hope things bounce back quickly!  your SPS may suffer but other corals should pull through

 

Thanks, I hope so too!

[flatlandreefer]

A few photos about 16 hours after the incident. 

[flatlandreefer]

This isn't my tank but this is what the water looked like last night when the dosing pump was running. 

[metrokat]

Yup, mine was milky white as well.

[flatlandreefer]

Man I can't catch a break. My inkbird controller went haywire today and started reading 15 f too high so it thought it should be in the cool mode and not heat the tank. I took the inkbird off and I am currently running on my heater thermostats. The tank got down to 72 f. 

 

I also had a calcium overdose, same thing that happened with the alk. I left the dosers off while gone for Christmas. Levels dropped off so I wanted to slowly dose things up before doing a water change. Somehow, a button must have accidentally been bumped when plugging the timer back in. I'm not too concerned about negative effects from the cal solution. 

 

As a result I ordered a reef keeper lite so I can control temp and my dosing pumps through that unit. Although I didn't want to spend the money I am excited to get rid of timers and have a temp probe that is designed for salt water. 

[kimberbee]

Ugh... heaters... 

 

I am have had about 3 heater issues so far these last few months. 

 

I put a couple of towels around my tank to help hold in the heat. The current heater just can't keep up this winter!

[flatlandreefer]

1 hour ago, kimberbee said:

Ugh... heaters... 

 

I am have had about 3 heater issues so far these last few months. 

 

I put a couple of towels around my tank to help hold in the heat. The current heater just can't keep up this winter!

 

Definatly the one piece of equipment that I just can't get excited about spending money on!