copper poison

[hangles]

got a call from a lady that had a reef tank crash a couple months ago everything died except the fish and the rock is bleached white. I tested everything and her peramiters are not to bad. had a buddy that runs a lab tested for copper it had .234 ppm in it. this explains the death ! now can copper be taken out of her live/dead rock and sand and brought back to life ? is there something she can put in the tank or filter to remove it ? thanks for any help

 

[RokleM]

You won't find a lot of conclusive evidence on this and many will argue various points. Many say that it gets into the seams of a tank and will never go away. Randy (chemistry) recommends a possible solution for the rock being a muriatic acid dip to rip the surface off of all the rock however it may not remove all copper that was absorbed. Carbon may or may not reduce the levels. Sand should be pitched.

That being said, I don't know if copper would crash a tank per say. It primarily immediately impacts inverts, with longer term impacts on possibly many other things.

In short, it's a risk, a decent amount of work, and may or may not pay off in the end. Not exactly what you were looking for, but you probably won't know the answer until the first few inverts are put back into the system.

 

[jh2pizza]

My fist tank was used for copper treatment before I bought it. I washed it with the acid bath, rinsed real well, filled it with water and run carbon for several days. I was unable to detect it afterwards and Inverts did well. As far as the rock and sand, No idea. with all the tanks being torn down and the market is flooded with Rock these days, not sure it would be worth the risk, time and cost.

 

[okkiedokki]

I'm not sure if it would help removing the copper completely but you can definitely put a polyfilter in the tank. I believe the color it changes for copper is blue. I've never had to deal with copper in a main tank so I wouldn't really know how to get rid of it; maybe someone else can chime in...I'm assuming the tank won't be torn down. If it is torn down I'd probably do what they said above.

 

[CleveYank]

The muriatic should or will work if copper was indeed what caused the invert crash that got the whole system crash started. But in order to toy with this it would have to be alot of money worth of liverock in dry value before I'd even toy with trying to dissolve away the external and internal surfaces that the copper is bound up in the liverock. And tossing the sand is good advice.

If I were attempting reclaim of liverock run in a system with copper? I'd put the rock in a hefty concentration of muriatic like 5 to 10% and I'd lower the rocks in for 5 minutes and yank them and put them immediately into freshwater to dilute the muriatic. The muriatic reaction is literally dissolving the rock like a great big calcium reactor so a short stay is required.

Then I would soak them for a day or two in Kalkwasser solution of 1 tablespoon per gallon to completely drive off the low pH of the acid bath.

Next, I'd take a small sample piece and put it in a quart of straight vinegar. I'd let this sit for 1 to 2 days and I'd take a copper reading. If it's close to an acceptable copper concentration then I'd use the rock in a system for inverts with a long break in period with cuprisorb media until I was certain it was clear or of acceptable copper level.

If not I'd try the whole process over again. If this didn't work on the 2nd go round? I'd put it up for sale as coppered live rock or I'd toss it in the yard to decorate my garden beds.

 

[hangles]

thanks everyone I will break the bad news to her. its time for a rebuild !

 

[hystrix]

Question is how did the copper get into her reef tank? How long was the tank set up before it went down hill? What was she using for make up water? I know some city water supplies have Cu++ readings at or above .2ppm. .15ppm to .2ppm by the way are copper levels reached for treating external parasites when quarantining fish.
I have had large fish only systems that were treated with copper that were torn down and used for invert/coral systems. Muratic acid baths will help remove copper that has plated out on the tank. It may take several treatments. I would replace the sand. The treating of the live rock is questionable. If you acid wash it it will remove the copper on the outer layer as well as dissolve the rock. It will be one big foamy mess.
I forgot to mention there could of been some organism that died that could of crashed the system as well?