Clean Rip Going South

[KimHalpert]

Good morning, reefers - haven't posted in probably 7 years or so but I need some help.

I have a 75 gallon tank that has been up and running since about Feb 2015. For the first seven years it was doing great and got to the point where I could leave it for a few months and nothing catastrophic would occur. Which is good because I moved across town and had to leave the fish tank in the care of a nice lady staying in my old house who would feed the fish and nothing more.
We decided to move the tank August 18th. Did a TON of research and settled on a CLEAN RIP.

Got new sand, drilled a new tank and added a sump. My fiance and I did the plumbing and leak tested about a 5 days prior to the move. Cleaned brand new non-live sand for about 45 minutes until water ran crystal clear. No cloud going in. Made about 40 gallons of water and got that in the tank.

Sidenote: I decided on the rip clean because I had colonial hydroids that I would maintain by pulling a rock or two every 3 months or so and tweezing hydroids off. I cooked a whole rock once to get rid of them. They're always going to be there- can't get my hands on a fringeback. But I wanted to remove as many as possible in this clean as is the point of a rip. New start, get rid of pests etc.

I pulled half the water and split it up into tubs for my rocks, corals and fish - separately.
Moved across town and had them in the living room one night in tubs.

The first night we scrubbed the rocks and they were out of the water for about 30 minutes each getting tweezed for hydroids. Then I shook them in old tank water and put them in the new tank. These beauties came to me from an established keeper over 7 years ago - they have so much life in them.

Next I acclimated the fish to the new tank water for about 45 minutes. Spent about an hour on snails and corals. Added them into the tank.

The first day everyone is happy running around. Then the chaos started.

Snails and hermits acting sluggish (pardon the pun), mushrooms close up, all corals close up, brittle stars tickkked.

Here is my stock:

Fish:
2 clownfish
1 watchman goby
5 chromis
*1 bi-color blenny that I added foolishly because all the rip clean folks and forms said you should not have a cycle.

Inverts:
2 very large brittle stars
hermits/snails
2 feather dusters
one porcelain crab but I haven't seen him in 7 days
4 peppermint shrimp (one small one has died)

Corals:
Stylophora
GSP
Blue cloves
Tons of Kenya Trees (really multiplied while I was away from the tank)
Waving Xenia
1 small gorg
mushrooms

I don't have a lot in there and wasn't going to add anything for a year prior to the move so it's lightweight as far as bio load.

After the first day of running everybody in the tank I tested params:

Sal: 1.026
Temp: 77-78
Kh: 8
PH: 8.2
NO3: 0ppm
NO2: 0ppm
CA: 500 ppm
Phos. : .4 ppm
AMMONIA: .75

So I'm freaking out because I feel like everything is getting ammonia poisoning, I am going to the forums and they're saying don't trust your APIs for ammonia don't worry about it. But I am because my corals and snails and stars are dying off one-by-one.
Here's what I don't get - the fish are acting like no big deal. Swimming around throughout the whole tank, not staying at the surface indicating ammonia 'poisoning'.

I think since we removed the hydroids, the rocks were out of the water too long and there's some death going on. So I'm thinking okay we're going to cycle, great. So we added API quick start waiting for Dr. Tim's to come in the mail. Turned off skimmer and deciding to turn on reactor running chemi clean. Did a 14 gallon water change before adding the Quick start.

Two days later Ammonia is at 1 ppm on two different tests (strip and chemical) so I did a 20 gallon water change. (Tested my distilled water source and no ammonia freak readings.) Added a bottle of Dr. Tim's to the sump and display.

We have been in this for about 10 days now and the ammonia is still at 1. I stopped feeding Friday to see if that helped and it did not. I rinse mysis and brine for the fishies. I have added a capful of prime to sort of freeze the ammonia and that did nothing.

Don't think stray voltage as my hands are in the tank pulling out dead stuff (I always wash and make sure I have no cleaning solutions on my hands).

Essentially - my question is, am I just starting a cycle and going to have to go through it? Is there anyway to go through the cycle without the die off increasing the ammonia in the tank? I feel like I am going to be stuck in this stage until everything is dead.

My next question - why aren't my fish ticked off? Just inverts and corals?

We have a three chamber sump- ceramic bio filter media/chaeto, then protein skimmer (off for 5 days for the bacteria), then reactor (running chemi clean).

I've removed everything dead that I can see, including ALL kenyas, one brittle star that dropped all of its legs (the other one has not, he comes out but hides for most of the day), turbos, mushrooms that are dead (some still going). Two chromis died in the move but I think that was oxygen in the tub related.

What should my next step be? Stop doing water changes and let it cycle? I do not have a QT tank.

Tank photos in reply post.

THANK YOU

 

[KimHalpert]

 

[reefing102]

I didn’t see it mentioned but did you rinse your old sand or use new sand?

Your calcium is a little high but nothing that would concern me.

I would doubt you have much die off from the rock as long as it stayed wet, however if you had any sponges, those could have died off. I have very limited experience with rip cleaning so my advice may be off.

The ammonia should take care of itself provided there’s sufficient nitrifying bacteria in there. @Dr. Reef @HumbleFish any thoughts on how the ammonia may or may not be affecting the fish or what to look out for?

My only other thought might be did your light settings get reset to full blast in the tank move? This could cause coral death, resulting in the ammonia killing off other inverts

 

[KimHalpert]

Just checked with a Hanna Ammonia and we’re sitting at 1.56

 

[KimHalpert]

I didn’t see it mentioned but did you rinse your old sand or use new sand?

Your calcium is a little high but nothing that would concern me.

I would doubt you have much die off from the rock as long as it stayed wet, however if you had any sponges, those could have died off. I have very limited experience with rip cleaning so my advice may be off.

The ammonia should take care of itself provided there’s sufficient nitrifying bacteria in there. @Dr. Reef @HumbleFish any thoughts on how the ammonia may or may not be affecting the fish or what to look out for?

My only other thought might be did your light settings get reset to full blast in the tank move? This could cause coral death, resulting in the ammonia killing off other inverts

We bought new non-live sand and cleaned that until water ran clean.
The lights were on a little less string than before and we replaced one that wasn’t as strong as a newer one. I turned my big lights off this morning and am just running a current on it now as I thought that could be an issue but I wasn’t fully convinced the lights were on high enough to do that much damage.

 

[kharmaguru]

Ammonia value must not be right or fish would be dead. No way they can tolerate 1ppm+. Most corals actually can utilize ammonia and like it. Might be a good plan to run some activated carbon in case of stress chemicals/warfare/hydroid juice (I made that one up). Also run your lights at 50% of what they were for a while. Is that one wave pump creating sufficient flow through the whole tank?

 

[Dr. Reef]

ammonia has 2 components, NH3 and NH4. They are in a fixed ratio according to the pH. If your tank is running pH of 8 and you are seeing 1.56ppm Total ammonia then NH3# is likely about 0.35-0.5 range which is deadly.
Ideally ammonia needs to be 0.
Please check the ammonia again with a different kit or take water sample to LFS and have them check it. Some of these fish like chromis/clowns are hardy and can survive a mini cycle. Heck just a decade ago we used to cycle tanks with them.

 

[KimHalpert]

Ammonia value must not be right or fish would be dead. No way they can tolerate 1ppm+. Most corals actually can utilize ammonia and like it. Might be a good plan to run some activated carbon in case of stress chemicals/warfare/hydroid juice (I made that one up). Also run your lights at 50% of what they were for a while. Is that one wave pump creating sufficient flow through the whole tank?

I have a Hanna Check as of Sunday. Sunday was 1.56 ppm. Tuesday was 1.5 ppm. Fish still going strong. Lost another shrimp and brittle star.
I turned off the box lights and am just running the current for now since all the corals are dead anyway.
Just going to keep testing everyday and see where we're at I guess.
There's a wave maker (left) and return pump (right) - there's pretty strong flow in the tank; I had to move the Gorg in between some rocks and/or the corner because it was getting super strong flow and I wasn't sure it was able to open up at first in that flow. The flow's good - not beating the crud out of anything but it's strong.

 

[KimHalpert]

ammonia has 2 components, NH3 and NH4. They are in a fixed ratio according to the pH. If your tank is running pH of 8 and you are seeing 1.56ppm Total ammonia then NH3# is likely about 0.35-0.5 range which is deadly.
Ideally ammonia needs to be 0.
Please check the ammonia again with a different kit or take water sample to LFS and have them check it. Some of these fish like chromis/clowns are hardy and can survive a mini cycle. Heck just a decade ago we used to cycle tanks with them.

Yes, I've checked the charts - which is why I was confused. I started with API - got the Hanna checker on Sunday and as I mentioned above it is still reading 1.5 (down from1.56 Sunday).

 

[JohnL]

How is your tank doing now?

 

[Big E]

Sea Chem ammonia alert badges are what I go with. They are always reliable.

Watch this on you tube for proper usage---