Need help fast please...

[laeelin]

I picked up a package (5 gallon package + 5 extra pounds of sand) on the 25th. This is for my 10 gallon nano.

As recommended, I have not placed the critters in the tank yet, I was going to do it tonight. They have been in the bag from 4:00pm on the 25th.

Yesterday evening I had about .5 ppm ammonia, so I did a 40% water change to bring it down...

This afternoon when I finished work is I found out something was really badly wrong.. I tested the water and the ammonia is off the chart (4+ppm) .. I did a 90% water change, and found what I think was the source of the problem... 2 large sponges were dead. I removed them, and everything else that looked like it was dead.. including a decorator crab that hitchhiked in. =( =(

So right now I'm sitting at ~1.5 ppm ammonia and heading back to town for more water so that I can do more waterchanges tonight.

After I do the changes after getting back from my town run, should I then place the critters in the tank, or wait longer?

Anything else I can do to help?

Thanks
-David

 

[alprazo]

I would add more current to your tank and make sure it is well oxygenated for now. As for you critters, can you put them in something else with an airstone until your spike subsides.

 

[laeelin]

After my second 90% water change i'm now sitting at .5 ppm.. I'll be doing another change in the morning, and see how things go from there.

/sigh so much loss =(

Hopefully the rest will make it.

 

[hdtran]

Laeelin,

I'm not sure I understand--your critters (hermits, snails, sea stars, etc.) have been in a bag for over 2 days??

Did you cycle your first 5 lbs of rocks and sand until all the nitrogen compounds were at safe levels before getting your second half rocks & critters?

Because you're running a nano, did you spend extra time ready to perform a quick water change to prevent runaway death?

Read the older threads in this forum (you can set the forum to show all posts, rather than posts only 2 days or less). There's quite a few folks who've tried to do nanos, with much greater difficulty than larger tanks (say 29 g as the typical dividing line).

Best of luck!

Hy

 

[laeelin]

Hy-

I was in Tampa on vacation, and on the last day picked up a 5 gallon package for my 10 gallon nano reef. It didn't make sense to me to make it 2 shipments when I'm already in town, and the total rock weight is the recommended amount for the first shipment anyway. (I'm going to be adding a couple DIY LR's later.. they are curing out back now.)

*just finished mixing the 2nd packed on the ammonia test, fingers crossed*

I have a 10 gallon tank with the 5 gallon package + 5lbs of live sand, so what I have IS the normal first shipment + critters (I know for sure they can be bagged for 3 days with no problems, it's just going over the 3 days that I was not sure about, and the idea of placing them in a bucket is perfect!)

quite a few folks who've tried to do nanos, with much greater difficulty than larger tanks (say 29 g as the typical dividing line).

I know that the smaller tanks are much less stable, and harder to take care of, but I have 2 major restrictions...

1) Money
2) Room

I don't have the money or room for a nice big tank, even a 29 gallon is MUCH more expensive than a 10 gallon. =( I also don't have much room to work with. I'm in ~10x8 at home office with 3 desks, and a small table.. I share this room with my wife and son (2.5 years old) most of the time.. as you can imagine, even before a tank it almost doesn't fit... =)

*finished test, YAY!!, not christmas green anymore!! ... yellow-green is so much better than Dark Green, even if it's more green than yellow! =) .. still need to do a large water change, but at least I'm at bottom of the "deadly" area, not so far past it that the color chart ends! .. so hopefully i'm past the worse of it*

IF I could do things over, I would have done this in a 40 gallon Rubbermaid container as suggested in another thread.. That would have made a huge difference I think... still, I'm still seeing life, so at least some stuff has made it.. only time will tell how much.

Suggestion to Richard: You might want to place something about that on your site for those of us with small tank.. 10 gallons just cant handle death as well, and as life covered as this stuff is, SOMETHING will die.. but placing the rock in a $4.00 Rubbermaid 40 gallon container from Wal-Mart would have prevented this in the first place. =(

-David

 

[jasonross]

the thing about using a 40 gal rubermaid container is that with the way you have to cycle with tbs it cant be done you have to cycle with the live sand in the container aswell as LR then youll have to move it all over to the tank wich will create a cycle all over again from disturbing the LS .. TBS gaurente will not apply if you cycle this way from what I understand...JMO

 

[laeelin]

Hmm .. could you cycle the LS in the tank and the LR in the contiainer?

At least for a couple days?

I'm not one of the experts for sure.. =)

 

[jasonross]

You can but It will not fully cycle you need the bio load on the LR to do a good cycle.. Nanos are verry hard but the best way with a nano is to be anal about the water changes I find that if you have a nano you should be prepared for massive amounts of water changes and be prepared for at least 3 days off work to test every 4 hours and look at rock and smell anything that is in ?? ..

 

[laeelin]

That makes sense... I was ready for massive water changes, but I had to work when this happened.

I didn't realize that I needed to test the water all that often, I was expecting 2 times a day to be enough (morning and night) but yesterday morning I didn't have the time to do it (I do web work, and client needed some emergency work done.. when I finished in the evening and checked the water that's when it was so bad.)

Just coming back from vacation didn't leave the option open for taking another vacation! =P

 

[jasonross]

I hear that normally 2 time a day is fine just that nanos go south so fast you have to keep a real good eye on everything..

 

[laeelin]

/sigh

Every day I'm doing 2-3 80% water changes to keep it below 1ppm ammonia, and every morning it's still back at almost 2ppm. (my wife is getting tired of me going to bed at 3am for some reason =) ... hehe)

I've remove all the dead stuff I can see, so I expect it's a lot of small things dead now.

from reading other older threads I'm gathering that once TBS rock crashes, there is almost no way to recover it. because there is SO much life on it. There is no question in my mind that this is head and shoulders better than any other LR I have saw. I guess that life is a blessing and a curse! =)

Any suggestions?

 

[laeelin]

Opps, Double post

 

[Melbourne]

Hi,

I would go out and buy a 32 gallon Rubbermaid trashcan from Home Depot, cost about $9.00. Cycle your liverock in that, don't cycle the LS with your LR since you're bound to take out even more stuff with the big spikes. Its hard to control the ammonia spikes in such a small volume of water.

You may want to scrap off any of the sponges that are suspect right now, and probably the bivalves also. I wouldn't worry there will probably be some stuff that survives and you can always seed your tank with new inverts. One thing you may want to do is consider adding a sump to your tank, it will increase your water volume and allow you a little more flexibility.

Good luck,
-Mike

 

[jasonross]

the only bad thing is if your rock is or becomes toast like you said you read in prev threads if you put it in a rubbermaid container you will have no replacment warrnty from richard.. you might want to consider that since your amn has been up therein deadly range more than once.. just my .02

 

[laeelin]

The Good:
The packages critters are happily chewing on a smaller piece of LR in a Rubbermaid container.

Some of the hard corals are extending ~1/4 an inch (some others are closed).

Some feather dusters, a couple crabs, a few small starfish, a couple snails, 2 oysters, a few small anemomies, and a few worms are fine.. or at least alive anyway..

The Bad:
Many things have died, and I'm still trying to keep the ammonia down. It's just not possible to keep it below 1ppm. My tank has spent most of the last 3 days at ~1ppm

I am keeping it below 2ppm, but I can not keep it below 1ppm. After a water change it's back at ~1ppm in just an hour or two, and even with if I change it again right away it's back at ~1ppm in the next hour or two again. After a couple more days of this I'll have spent more money on salt/RO water than on the Live Rock.(not counting the hours and hours and hours of time, and trips to town for water) =/

I wouldn't mind it so much if I felt like I was making a difference.

I'm not sure if I'm doing more harm than good with my 80%-90%water changes..

Should I keep them up, or cut back to a couple 50% water changes a day?

Nitrates are almost undetectable, but that's probably because of all the water changes I'm doing.. I think.. I hope..

Thoughts?

Comments?

Advice?

And most of all... Suggestions??

-Thanks
David

 

[dja1980]

I had the same experience you had with you nano. I posted identical threads both here and at nano-reef.com when I had my disaster. You can read the Reef Central one here and my Nano-Reef one here if you want to see the different responses I've gotten. They helped me out a ton and everyone was real helpful. Richard at TBS even offered to give me a new package if I wanted to try again. Anyway, I hope this helps.

 

[laeelin]

update: Ammonia at ~.5 after 48 hours without a water change... I'm so happy =)

Considering I'm still cycling that's great to see!

Just wish I hadn't lost so much.. Thankfully there is still a lot of life =)

 

[dja1980]

That's awesome. You were fortunate that you still have life left. If you read the threads I started (linked to above), you know that everything in my nano died. I'm still in the process of cycling since my big crash. I was told that after a big crash like had, it will take a while to get the bacteria population back up. It's been two weeks now, and I'm still reading ammonia at 1.5 with 0 nitrite. I keep thinking that I need to add bacteria, but everyone keeps telling me to be patient. That's great news for you though. It sounds like you're on your way.

 

[laeelin]

Thank you!

I did read your thread =( .. Very sorry about what happened to you =( .. Hopefully your big tank will workout better =)

 

[snooter1]

For the smaller tanks I wonder why Richard does not reconmend using a large trash can as a sump durring the cycle. It would increase the water volume and make these cycles manageable. Eith so much life and such a small water volume it is near impossible to make this a smooth process. 1 month with a trash can in the living room while one cycles does not seem that bad.