How Could You Have Avoided Disaster?

[SoloChromis]

Probably the most frustrating, devastating, and discouraging event that can take place in this hobby is when you are meticulous about your tank, measuring every parameter, dosing where needed, supplementing your fish's diet, spending hours perfecting your "homemade ecosystem" and researching heavily into every problem you think you could ever come across and then BOOM the power goes out, or your heater explodes, or your ATO fails. I myself have dealt with my share of disasters, and I'm sure you guys here at RC have gotten your share as well. I thought for the sake of others, especially newcomers, why don't we all dig out those nasty memories and give some advice on how to dodge these disasters, and keep your life as stress free as possible. Here's my story...

I ordered my dream fish at the time, a purple tang from Liveaquaria for merely $100 to go into my old 75g. He had been in the tank for about 2 weeks before he passed away and dragged almost the whole community of fish with him. I came to discover that he had brought in what is known as Marine Velvet, probably the most lethal and infectious disease known to us hobbyists. I lost my purple tang, tomini tang, spotbreast angel, pyramid butterfly, royal gramma and pair of ocellaris clowns in that outbreak, leaving me with my 2 least favorite fish - an evil Hoeven's wrasse and a pajama cardinal my sister picked out. In hindsight I should have been diligent about quarantining all new fish, and that fishy holocaust could have been easily avoided. What can you take from this? QUARANTINE!

 

[pktech]

Adding to your thread : RESEARCH THE FISH YOU WANT BEFORE YOU BUY IT!!!!
same with me. I bought a very small Porc puffer, thinking I'd be ok in a FOWLR & sure enough, I stupidly added it to my main w/ my Scribbled, Multibar angel & rock beauty. Everyone was eating & getting along & 2 weeks later, Porky is sulking in the corner (salted) & my other beauties are salted (ich) as well. Next day everyone's on their sides breathing very HEAVY ... Dead later that night. Of course I READ after the fact that Porc puffers are the fish that MUST BE QT'd all the time & everytime. Still kicking myself for this screwup - I had all 4 eating like champs & were excellent specimens!

 

[SoloChromis]

Adding to your thread : RESEARCH THE FISH YOU WANT BEFORE YOU BUY IT!!!!
same with me. I bought a very small Porc puffer, thinking I'd be ok in a FOWLR & sure enough, I stupidly added it to my main w/ my Scribbled, Multibar angel & rock beauty. Everyone was eating & getting along & 2 weeks later, Porky is sulking in the corner (salted) & my other beauties are salted (ich) as well. Next day everyone's on their sides breathing very HEAVY ... Dead later that night. Of course I READ after the fact that Porc puffers are the fish that MUST BE QT'd all the time & everytime. Still kicking myself for this screwup - I had all 4 eating like champs & were excellent specimens!

Man, sorry to hear that happened to you (and your fish). Porcupines are just so darn tempting though, still on my dream list, just gotta get my reef where I like it before I even consider setting up a whole other FOWLR system, and you can bet that when I *do* end up setting that tank up around a porc, he'll be getting the full, all inclusive stay at the Quarantine Inn.

 

[sanchoy]

I think the key word is QUARANTINE. Both fish and corals. Everyone is tempted to just dump and watch. Deadly diseases like velvet can cause hobby changes quickly. My bro in law lost close to 1k worth of livestock to velvet. He had 5-6 large show angels along with tangs.

 

[metanis]

Quarantine!!!

Quarantine!!!

I am just getting over my first disaster. My recent posts touched on what I initially thought to be an ich outbreak but was likely marine velvet in hindsight. I had a black and orange ocellaris clown with a royal gramma. Everyone doing well, eating varied diet like little pigs, tank parameters rock solid until I went to the LFS and brought home a longnose butterfly. Gorgeous fish with an interesting personality. Pretty soon, I saw what looked like ich and I scrambled to set up a QT tank. I began hyposalinity treatment and things seemed to be going ok until I came home to find the longnose dead. Within days, all 3 other fish had died despite seeming well 24 hours prior to their demise. I will NEVER make this mistake again. I have now set up a 29g frag tank and will be QTing all my fish and corals from now on.:headwallblue:

 

[eatbreakfast]

Bought a Generator. Had everything going great. Whenever I lost power it wasnt long enough to cause problems. Kept saying I would get a generator, then lost power for a week and lost everything. Got a generator as my next big purchase..

 

[alprazo]

One of the best things about this board, is learning from the mistakes of others.

I have lost fish and had complete wipe outs the following ways.

QT with treatment is a must. Some fish can carry disease and look great through an untreated QT period only to infect in the DT. I rec copper or chloroquine and praziquantel. Tank transfer is ineffective against velvet.

Have duplication of your heaters and circulation pumps.

As mentioned before a generator can be a lifesaver. Even when I had battery powered pumps, the fish died when the water temped dropped into the 50s. Heated water in pots in the fireplace couldn't save them. A bottle of 100% oxygen is an alternative cheaper option than a generator if you live in the tropics.

Water alarm for the floor.

A lid or netting for open tanks

Division of intake pipes with secure screens

Screens covering overflows

Securing live rock.

 

[d-man]

How could I have avoided disaster.....?
By not getting into this money pit hobby! But then again, where would I have spent 100k, countless sleepless nights planning, watching, researching, agonizing over the past 15yrs.

Oh well. It's living art. Plan, plan and plan for Murphy's law.
I'm a KISS method person. No outside of sump filters, no automatic anything other than lights. The more I do it, the more I trust it.

 

[Jim Z.]

The last time we lost power, lost most of my fish, acro crabs, and the substrate went anaerobic. Oddly enough, my 10 year old yellow watchman goby and its pistol shrimp appeared 2 weeks after unscathed. Since then, I have my DC return pump plugged into a battery backup and now use a generator. Power went out for 24 hours before thanksgiving and the generator kept the tank going without a hitch. I like d-man's KISS method and use it extensively. Automation breaks down too often...............Jim