Reef45 Posted December 24, 2019 Share Posted December 24, 2019 So I slowly messed up my tank due to no funds and time. I was using fish store water. But stopped and ended lights or/and time and stopped adding fresh saltwater. Now trying to bring back it. Should I start over or bring it back? I don’t wanna lose any good I have left. Before and after pictures. Take it easy on me I know what time and money I wasted 1 Quote Link to comment
Reef45 Posted December 24, 2019 Author Share Posted December 24, 2019 Just now, Reef45 said: So I slowly messed up my tank due to no funds and time. I was using fish store water. But stopped and ended lights or/and time and stopped adding fresh saltwater. Now trying to bring back it. Should I start over or bring it back? I don’t wanna lose any good I have left. Before and after pictures. Take it easy on me I know what time and money I wasted This is now sea of death Quote Link to comment
Reef45 Posted December 24, 2019 Author Share Posted December 24, 2019 Before and after pictures. Posted most recently 1st Quote Link to comment
Reef45 Posted December 24, 2019 Author Share Posted December 24, 2019 High salt levels poisoned everything due to evaporate water line in tank and the cold weather. Quote Link to comment
Seadragon Posted December 24, 2019 Share Posted December 24, 2019 1 hour ago, Reef45 said: Should I start over or bring it back? I would just continue where you’re at now and make a slow recovery. 1 hour ago, Reef45 said: High salt levels poisoned everything due to evaporate water line in tank and the cold weather. Make gradual changes in the right direction. Slowly get your salinity back to where it should be. Get your water temperatures stable at an appropriate number. Make sure you have good lighting with an appropriate photoperiod. Test your water parameters and adjust your calcium and alkalinity levels if needed. It’s never too late until the moment you give up. 1 Quote Link to comment
Clown79 Posted December 24, 2019 Share Posted December 24, 2019 What exactly happened and where are all your parameters at now? More detail on the situation will help us determine the steps that you can take to recover your tank. Quote Link to comment
Reef45 Posted December 24, 2019 Author Share Posted December 24, 2019 Thank you everyone! I know what I did wrong. It all started with the Hob refugium started getting really nasty then after cleaning that things started going down hill. I was using live rock and just letting the tank clean itself. Then I added a new powerful hob filter. Then the tank was way to clean and not having any gravel or sand base for the tank given that it’s a bare bottom tank. I think I basically I removed all the good stuff in the tank and changed things too quickly. Corals started to slowly die making it worse in a small tank. Added turbo snails which ended up starving at that point. Plus summer heat and a/c didn’t help. The other thing that happened was the evaporation was messing with the water levels very quickly. Needing top offs everyday by hand caused spikes in temperature and salt levels. I am now bringing salt levels back to normal then I will slowly add light and fresh saltwater changes to bring parameters back to normal. I haven’t tested yet. 1 Quote Link to comment
mcarroll Posted December 24, 2019 Share Posted December 24, 2019 Looks like not everything is dead. Hard to imagine it's worth totally starting from scratch....but then we still don't have a lot of data to go on. Can you test your specific gravity and post what your reading is now? And what is the highest level you saw it at? It might be helpful if we knew what the rest of your levels are currently like as well: Ca, Alk, Mg, NO3 and PO4 Quote Link to comment
Reef45 Posted December 24, 2019 Author Share Posted December 24, 2019 specific gravity is now at 1.024 took 3gal of fresh water to get there. It was reading so high it didn’t read on hydrometer. Yes there is life. Rocks are fine. Baby star fish are alive. One coral lived. It’s duncan coral. I do apologize for not having a test at this time. Slowly bringing temp up. Quote Link to comment
Clown79 Posted December 24, 2019 Share Posted December 24, 2019 1 hour ago, Reef45 said: specific gravity is now at 1.024 took 3gal of fresh water to get there. It was reading so high it didn’t read on hydrometer. Yes there is life. Rocks are fine. Baby star fish are alive. One coral lived. It’s duncan coral. I do apologize for not having a test at this time. Slowly bringing temp up. It sounds mostly like salinity issues, temp issues, and possibly nutrient issues were at play. I would just start lighting the tank, maybe on a shortened photo period to start. Do some tests, alk, ca, nitrates, and phos(not with api phos kit) Weekly waterchanges are best but if you generally have low to no nutrients, I think every 2 weeks would be better until you need to do them weekly. Your tank just needs to get back into balance. Unfortunately without an ato, you need to top up daily, sometimes twice a day, especially with an open top. I top up every morning and before bed because I manually top up. Quote Link to comment
second_decimal Posted December 26, 2019 Share Posted December 26, 2019 Get an ATO.. it’s really one of the most essential pieces of a reef tank. Apart from eliminating the need to constantly tend the salinity and water level, it stabilizes the entire system. Quote Link to comment
Reef45 Posted December 26, 2019 Author Share Posted December 26, 2019 Yes ATO is on the list. Kind of a must have I think. 1 Quote Link to comment
Reef45 Posted December 26, 2019 Author Share Posted December 26, 2019 Look what I found alive today. Two crabs and the Duncan coral is looking better. 2 Quote Link to comment
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