Sudden death cause?

[JTCdudeman]

Ive been trying to figure out what happened to my tank about a 2 months ago to cause a sudden death of my 3 peppermint shrimp, some sort of crab, and turned my water white. I think i also lost all my copepods and amphipods at the same time.

Ive searched all over and found no help to my problem. This event happened overnight with no distinct changes to the tank within a week of the occurance. The usual topoffs and nothing else different that I know of. The temperature was normal when I checked it. Ammonia tested 0, nitrite 0, nitrate ~5 range, ph 8.2. I even tested calcium thinking it may have been out of whack and found nothing. I didnt have any other test kits at the time to check it out. The water only stayed very white for about 6 hours and I found these animals all dead once the water cleared that afternoon. I then noticed I also had lost all of my copepods and amphipods shortly thereafter. I would assume they were from the same event, but Im not sure of it.

None of the other tank inhabitants were phased by this including various hermit crabs, various snails, assorted fish, macro algae, nuisance algae, mangrove trees, sps coral, mushrooms, zoas .


Any ideas, or maybe some questions that might help me further?

My amphipod/copedpod population is still 0 since then consdering I have no new eggs on the glass anywhere and for a while I had more copepods than I could handle. So, they obviously havent recovered and Im afraid to put more in until I get this resolved.

 

[JTCdudeman]

anyone got any thoughts on the matter at all?

 

[MJSavage]

Clams spawning?

Mike

 

[mikchabe]

You mentioned you have macro algae - do you have caulerpa? any chance it crashed/went sexual?

 

[JTCdudeman]

well.. it could be clams possibly... Ive seen several clam shells show up out of nowhere in the sand. But, they are very small and Ive only seen 2 or 3. They arent significant in size by any means.

Yes, I do have a bit of caulepra. Its on 24/7 hoping to keep the small amount I keep from going sexual. I only keep a small amount to feed my sailfin tang. He loves the stuff. Someone told me it was toxic to them, but its the only fresh macro I have that he eats and hes been munching on it for atleast 6 months without any problems. The water color wasnt green at all, but its possible this might have been the cause. Would it going sexual kill shrimp and copepods?

 

[mikchabe]

The water will turn white, not green, when caulerpa goes sexual. I've had this happen, did a partial water change, and the water cleared up in less than a day.

It also could have been a bacteria bloom caused by something dying or too much food decaying, but since it only lasted 6 hours its not likely.

Shrimp tend to be pretty susceptable to sudden water changes or poor water quality, so its possible either was the cause.

Eggs on the glass would be from the snails, and they tends to be seasonal. Your amphipod/copedpod population might have been wiped out, so you might need to add some to restart your population.

Since two months have passed without any other problems (I assume nitrite is still zero), I would try adding one shrimp.

I hope this helps.

 

[Reefmad97]

Do you dose kalk into your tank? If so the water would have turned white with an overdose and killed all your invertebrates. :sad1: