Tank crash. Never thought it would happen to me

[Tkieu78]

Well guys
Title says it all my huge 10 inch ritteri decided to walk. Which then caused it to get blended into a smoothie by my mp40 causing my water to be polluted which then made my skimmer overflow. That's a wrap. In 24 hours full melt down. Tank looked fine last night and to come home from work at 630 to see no fish. Milky water and dead fishes.
Yea my fault. Was anemone ****ed off which it decided to walk? Should I have covers on my mp40s. Float switch to turn off the skimmer to prevent overflow. User error on my behalf. A very very hard lesson learned. Stocked this tank for the last two years....
Time to do a massive water change and let it run with nothing for awhile and water changes till I can get some decent readings.
I guess it's a forced break from the hobby for a couple months for me

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[Ihuntbugs]

Sorry to hear that! Those were good looking fish!

 

[Tkieu78]

Worse part pics didn't have the recent addtions. Pair of pintails. Trio of flame wrasses. Tiny trio of bellus angels....


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[Tkieu78]

Everything was good for months till the ritteri decided to take a walk.....


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[Dennio]

Wow. What a great collection of coral and fish.

Sorry to hear about the tank.

 

[JUNBUG361]

How devastating, that's hella f---ed up.

 

[etesami]

Men,F--k this.
You should be very sad.
Sorry to hear that.

 

[NewJack]

Take that needed break. Spend some time with the wife and kids, get your head on straight, and come back bigger and stronger than before.

 

[yellojello]

Tank crash. Never thought it would happen to me

Damn sorry bro. Happens to the best of us. After recovery, it's quite fun replanning everything. Like going full on SPS

 

[tri4god]

Sorry to hear that. If I may ask, what was it exactly that crashed everything? Nitrates from the anemone? (For educations sake)

 

[DivingTheWorld]

I'm sorry to hear that Toan! That's he nightmare we all dread. Don't give up, you can build it back up again!


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[pcfish]

Toan,
Sorry to hear about the crash I have been in the hobby for so long and have thought about getting out several times. With my new tank, I have battled ick lost most of my fish but quarantined the tank and bought new fish.
Then I went on vacation and came back to a bunch of dead sps. Just now starting to put sps back in my tank.
It's always good to take a break and plan and decide what you want to do. Just last night I was dealing with a leak in my closed loop.
Hang in there I think the reward of having a reef out ways everything that goes wrong and there is always something that happens unfortunately.

 

[five.five-six]

Sorry for your loss, I bought my last anemone bout 27 years ago for this exact reason.

 

[650-IS350]

Sorry to hear bro, yes do take the break. Its pretty disheartening to see all that you have worked on gone in a flash. Been there on my 100 gal crash years ago when soft ball and small volley ball sized colonies gone next day.

I my self and strongly considering a break from the hobby after being in it since late 90's of and on.

 

[Tkieu78]

Thanks for all the kind words guys. As for the the restart. Do I empty out the tank and clean everything up for the restart? New sand. Baked clean rock? Or can I get away with a massive water change and small changes for a couple weeks? I plan on taking a break for a couple months. So let it run as is with water changes. Or restart and cycle all over again?


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[DivingTheWorld]

Thanks for all the kind words guys. As for the the restart. Do I empty out the tank and clean everything up for the restart? New sand. Baked clean rock? Or can I get away with a massive water change and small changes for a couple weeks? I plan on taking a break for a couple months. So let it run as is with water changes. Or restart and cycle all over again?


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Is everything dead, or just a majority? If you still have some stuff alive, I'd try to resurrect it. You might also be surprised as some corals which appear dead may come back to life once the conditions are normalized. If it's pretty much a total loss, it might be better to start from scratch.

 

[Grasshopper23]

Do massive water change and see what is still alive. I lost a 65G during a vacation when the siphon stopped and the temp dropped to ~60 for maybe a day or two. I came home to soup. Thought I lost everything but was surprised to see what was still there when I did a 50% water change.

I probably waited a day because I thought all was lost. I just got the siphon going and did the water change the next day. Some zoas and shrooms remained and a few heads of Frogspawn and I think a bit of SPS. I would say I lost 80%+... but not 100%. I only had a few fish and was very surprised when I did the water change to find the Coral Beauty still alive.

After I realized there was still life I did a couple more massive water changes. I eventually shut down that tank because of the failure potential of the overflow.

 

[Grasshopper23]

One you see what is alive I would set up a smaller temporary tank with clean water until you see if you can get the DT back to normal.

 

[D-Nak]

UGH, sorry to hear bro. Let me know if you need anything.

IME, tanks can quickly recover from anemone disasters. Most of the deaths occur from nematocysts spreading toxin throughout the tank. It's possible that a lot may survive from water changes alone.

 

[d0ughb0y]

Yea my fault. Was anemone ****ed off which it decided to walk? Should I have covers on my mp40s. Float switch to turn off the skimmer to prevent overflow. User error on my behalf. A very very hard lesson learned.

Not your fault. The ritteri will find a way to kick the bucket no matter what you do. You did everything right. I'm sure your next build will be just as good, if not better.