lost sps frags due to chemiclean

T

TheThirstyWhale

New member
Any one had this problem? I have a jbj nano cube 12 with 150w kessil on top. Tank has been running for around a year and my sps frags have been doing fine for the last 2 months. I went to a local fish store and got 4 gallons of sw and I did two separate water changes @2 gallons each. A few days later I had a algae bloom from the bible. I changed none of my habits and fed once (a swipe of reef pearls ) and Cyano was covering my tank. I got chemiclean on the suggestion of this same store. I added less then half a scoop and shut the lights off. The next day almost all of my drags were rtn. I changed 4 gallons of water and they care getting worse..suggestions? Sorry for bad grammar...I'm typing on a Tiny tablet...
 
I drained my water Level to just below the powerhead and that completely agitated the surface creating oxygen. Also lack of oxygen would have effected my fish which are in perfect health.
 
So you didn't? Funny everyone who crashes there tank with this stuff has a problem with following the directions. The directions don't say to agatate waters surface they say to saturate the water with air.
 
If you had a ton of issues right after using water from a store, reused same water and noticed more issues and then you did a 50% water change with the same water from that store but put in chemiclean in between. Why is the chemiclean the only thing that you feel is the issue?

Did you check the salinity of the water? What about alk? I'd be looking at the water source and what your levels are vs concentrating on the chemiclean.

What are the levels in your tank? If the water had issues all the changes could of easily killed the coral. I'd say you really need to check the tank levels (cal/alk/mag/p04/ammonia/nitrite/trate)and the new water your using something isn't right.
 
I always recommend be a doctor. You have the effect find the cause. I don't trust anything out side of supplements into my tank. Cyno build can mean bad skimmer, bad water lack of flow. Don't just put chemicals in tank. Personal opinion
 
That's too bad sorry for your loss. That's a small tank which does not leave any room for error. With a small tank, chemical parameters can swing wildly when you are doing any manipulations to change water quality. The pump and airstone are essential for this treatment. I would not use any water from that store as it may contain enough phosphate to trigger a bloom. Sudden changes in water quality kill sps. If you can borrow a phosphate meter from a local reefer, test your water to determine the underlying problem. ..........Jim
 
If water is coming out of a powerhead and falling onto waters surface creating bubbles...your telling me that is not increasing oxygen in the water?
I have a very small airstone driven tetra filter in the back that also provides another source of oxygen. I highly doubt lack of oxygen was the issue. As I stated before....my fish are in perfect health. My phosphates levels before were 0.25 and after were zero. My salinty was slightly low @ 1.023 and after were at 1.022. I'm not saying it was not my error but pre chemiclean I had zero issues. My husbandry is pretty solid considering I have been doing this for most of my life.
 
I'd say your mind is pretty made up on what it was then, since your looking for others who think it's the chemiclean and not the obvious (at least to me) various other options to focus on I'll leave you with a good luck.

Hope you get it figured out =).
 
I honestly believe it is the water...but I tested it before I put it into my tank. What I am wondering is if when I did the water change if I sturred something up or something of the sort. When I did the water change my colors were extremely bright, as soon as I did the chemiclean....that was then the RTN started....
 
I am aware this is part of the hobby, Errors and issues do happen. The part that has me mad is one of the corals I lost I have never seen before and I cannot find out what it was. The store who sold it to me had no clue either. Said it was wild caught. I was some sort of acro...Deep red in color almost metallic looking. But the hairs were bright blue in color. I have never seen this combo nor this hue before.
 
You're trying to keep sps with phosphates at .25 and salinity at 1.022. Your sps were all likely half dead and the extra little stress of chemiclean finished them off.
 
My phosphates became that after the water change as well as the salinity. My normal parameters were different. my normal salinty was 1.025. Phosphates at zero.
 
TheThirstyWhale said:
My phosphates became that after the water change as well as the salinity. My normal parameters were different. my normal salinty was 1.025. Phosphates at zero.
Click to expand...

There is your culprit! A fluctuation in salinity from 1.025 to 1.022 in a day will kill sps alone... On top of that you had high p04 level... Might want to get the tank in check with little to no fluctuation in Salinity, temp, ca, alk, and low po4 before thinking about spending more money on sps... Sorry for your losses, we have all been there, expensive learning!
 
Yeah it sucks that it happened but if I were you I would check basically every batch of water you get, not mixing it yourself there is a big unknown going into your tank. Your volume is so small that it doesn't take much to mess up the balance and cause stress, especially when sps come into play.

Matching the tank values when performing water changes should be a routine for you imo(if you don't already as I'm assuming) when keeping acro's in a small tank.
 
What was odd is the phosphates didn't exist pre water change nor did they exist in the water I was adding...salinity was spot on as well. After I added the water and retested the water is when I had the fluctuations. Ideas?
 
I've used Chemiclean in a full blown SPS tank and had no SPS deaths. Most of the SPS were Acropora as well.

Killing off the Cyano IME leaves space for other algae or even Dinos to take over. The Cyano was present because a nutrient imbalance allowed it to exist. I recently looked after an LPS coral for a buddy which had a decent sized patch of Cyanno on it. The Cyanno didnt spread in my tank, nor did it grow any further.

This is IMO why you got the crazy algae.

As for the coral death...any suggestions would be simply predictions.

You could have had a bad batch of Chemiclean?
The water from the LFS could have been bad?
Your Refractometer is out?
???
 
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