Ammonia spike/ dead snail :(

[NSReefer902]

Last night while cleaning my tank which has been having some troubles. I checked all my CUC for life as I have had a few die recently. I found that one of my Cerith snails had died. From the smell possibly a day ago. I planned on checking parameters and changing the water  this morning first thing. So I simply removed the snail. Currently my parameters are showing on the Red Sea test kit:

Ammonia- 0.4

Nitrite- .05 -hard to tell with this kit :(

Nitrate- 10

salinity-35ppt

temp-26-26.9during the day.

 

I am ready to go with the water change, as I need to export my nitrates. But I am curious your opinions on the ammonia if it was just from the dead snail or if the fact I recently took a bunch of bio balls out of the my HOB I was using for flow before receiving my power heads could of contributed to it? I took the balls out because I read through this thread they are essentially useless and can cause more trouble, plus my plan is to remove it and go with a small AC30 or another power head. 

 

Currently in tank:

2 halloweeen hermits 

3- Ceriths 

Tank age is- 12 weeks. And was started with live rock and live sand. 

 

First photo was 3-4 days ago and the bottom is this morning have some much needed maintence/ cleaning 

 

[Clown79]

In a new tank, a snail or a few snails plus removal of bioballs could lead to a small ammonia spike.

 

 

Your nitrates aren't that high. 5-10 is good.

[NSReefer902]

4 hours ago, Clown79 said:

In a new tank, a snail or a few snails plus removal of bioballs could lead to a small ammonia spike.

 

 

Your nitrates aren't that high. 5-10 is good.

Thanks @Clown79

i have been researching extremely hard the last bit and actively asking in these forums about my tank. I think I’ve figured it out I’ll know %100 tomorrow if I was right but I think I had Cyano. It was a red blanket like algae  and came off in sheets. So I used a tooth brush taped to a Syphon hose and removed  it from the tank. I then cleaned the sand bed because it had clumps of it in it using my net and sifting it. After all this I did a  big water change and the remaining particles out. I am just going to monitor it and  do frequents small  water changes every few days. My wife’s got a 1000x microscope at work so she’s gonna check a sample of the stuff I removed to confirm it tomorrow. nice have a biologist/veterinarian available lol I know you’ve been helping me lots so wanted to keep you updated  on how it’s going.

 

thanks!  Oh also a hermit died too possibly a few days ago he just didn’t smell dead  😞

[mcarroll]

Hermits molt. More likely this than dead.

[NSReefer902]

3 hours ago, mcarroll said:

Hermits molt. More likely this than dead.

That’s what I thought, but something just didn’t feel right  so I took a real big sniff much closer to my nose than I liked and then the smell punched me right in the nostril definitely was dead 😞