choss
New member
Having a terrible day
Having a terrible day
Sometimes you have to share the bad stuff to get it off your chest. I put up a post a while back on losing my first stock (fire shrimp, one acro frag and a birdsnest). Basically, I had turned my lights off for the three day cyano treatment (which worked great) but believe that I lost the stock because my KH was off the charts high. The other issue was that my two clown fish were pooping long white stringy things and getting picky with the food.
I moved the clowns into QT with a blenny and treated with prazi. They immediately started eating again and never developed any symptoms that indicated parasites. This was about 4 weeks ago. In the meantime, I watched my KH and it came down on its own (currently around 9.7 in both DT and QT). And my remaining corals looked happy again. All seemed well.
So last weekend I replaced my fire shrimp (one of my sons is in camp and was really attached to the old one - didn't want him to figure out he'd gone missing). My usual mistake was buying something new when I was getting on a plane the next day. Anyway, the shrimp wasn't eating as I got on the plane and I was concerned.
Last night I got home. The shrimp was probably 2 days dead. CUC was working him over pretty good. The main tank had no fish in it at this time and has always had great water parameters (KH issues aside).
I had on my calendar that the QT fish could be moved to DT and I decided last night to move all three (2 clowns and blenny). I prepped my moving jug, did a 30 minute acclimation (which in hindsight wasn't the best job I've ever done but my QT tank has virtually the same parameters as DT since I usually take water from DT and move to QT during water changes).
The fish went in around 7 PM, swam to their old spots (clowns that is) settled under ledges and seemed normal. This morning the small clown was dead. I was in a panic. I captured the other clown (who looked ok but was breathing heavily) and started to re-acclimate him to return to the QT. By the time I had him in the QT he was gasping for air and swimming badly - clearly in distress. At this point I spent the next hour watching him die. Can ammonia of .25 cause poisoning?
I have to admit, I was so depressed that I considered breaking the tank down and getting out. I had never lost a clown before (my first tank in the 90s had two clowns that survived moves, small tanks, exploding heaters, etc. and lived over 7 years (one lived 10)). I did a thorough water test of both tanks. The parameters are similar in both (good levels). Only parameter that was different than usual was in the DT which showed ammonia of .25 (usually reads 0) which I attributed to the shrimp death/decomposition. Salinity and temp was the same in both tanks as well.
I'm thoroughly stumped and waiting to see if my blenny survives. I've changed out 25% of the DT water to be safe, ammonia is now down between .25 an 0.
Having a terrible day
Sometimes you have to share the bad stuff to get it off your chest. I put up a post a while back on losing my first stock (fire shrimp, one acro frag and a birdsnest). Basically, I had turned my lights off for the three day cyano treatment (which worked great) but believe that I lost the stock because my KH was off the charts high. The other issue was that my two clown fish were pooping long white stringy things and getting picky with the food.
I moved the clowns into QT with a blenny and treated with prazi. They immediately started eating again and never developed any symptoms that indicated parasites. This was about 4 weeks ago. In the meantime, I watched my KH and it came down on its own (currently around 9.7 in both DT and QT). And my remaining corals looked happy again. All seemed well.
So last weekend I replaced my fire shrimp (one of my sons is in camp and was really attached to the old one - didn't want him to figure out he'd gone missing). My usual mistake was buying something new when I was getting on a plane the next day. Anyway, the shrimp wasn't eating as I got on the plane and I was concerned.
Last night I got home. The shrimp was probably 2 days dead. CUC was working him over pretty good. The main tank had no fish in it at this time and has always had great water parameters (KH issues aside).
I had on my calendar that the QT fish could be moved to DT and I decided last night to move all three (2 clowns and blenny). I prepped my moving jug, did a 30 minute acclimation (which in hindsight wasn't the best job I've ever done but my QT tank has virtually the same parameters as DT since I usually take water from DT and move to QT during water changes).
The fish went in around 7 PM, swam to their old spots (clowns that is) settled under ledges and seemed normal. This morning the small clown was dead. I was in a panic. I captured the other clown (who looked ok but was breathing heavily) and started to re-acclimate him to return to the QT. By the time I had him in the QT he was gasping for air and swimming badly - clearly in distress. At this point I spent the next hour watching him die. Can ammonia of .25 cause poisoning?
I have to admit, I was so depressed that I considered breaking the tank down and getting out. I had never lost a clown before (my first tank in the 90s had two clowns that survived moves, small tanks, exploding heaters, etc. and lived over 7 years (one lived 10)). I did a thorough water test of both tanks. The parameters are similar in both (good levels). Only parameter that was different than usual was in the DT which showed ammonia of .25 (usually reads 0) which I attributed to the shrimp death/decomposition. Salinity and temp was the same in both tanks as well.
I'm thoroughly stumped and waiting to see if my blenny survives. I've changed out 25% of the DT water to be safe, ammonia is now down between .25 an 0.
