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View Full Version : Girlfriend Ruined Tank!!!!


joshso
07/18/2007, 10:09 PM
OK here is the situation. I've been out of the country for around four months. My girlfriend was taking care of my tank. I came back to find the majority of my coral gone, red slime everywhere, and green algae on the glass. I have a 55 gallon with 1 mandarin goby, 2 green chromis, a clown, a yellow tang, and a damsel. I run a canister filter on it. I first removed all of the red slime that I could find. I cleaned the algae off the glass. There was also red slime all over the sand on the bottom which I removed. I cleaned out my canister filter (I am just running with filter pads in it). In the mean time a friend was getting rid of her tank and gave me about 30 lbs of live rock. I now have approximately 125 lbs. I then re-aquascaped my tank and stirred up alot of the sand. I also saw that alot of detrius was caught under my live rock. The tank looks 100% better. However when I was testing the water the other day my ammonia read off the charts 50 ppm +. Is this because I stirred up the sand? I would like to purchase some sand sifting stars and sea cucumbers but am afraid with the high levels. It's been less than a week since I did this.

DONSRENEE
07/19/2007, 07:02 AM
Yes, you can get a nutrient spike after stirring up the sand, and you also added live rock - can do the same. I would recommend water changes. Then add the cuke after you water spike is over. I would not recommend a sand sifting star. It will eat everything in your sand bed that makes it alive, and then starve.
Good Luck,
Renee

rafa316
07/19/2007, 07:32 AM
Did you have a serious talk with ur GF about responsability?

b16drag
07/19/2007, 07:52 AM
new girlfriend! ;P

taillonjohn
07/19/2007, 08:09 AM
not a new GF, just need a back-up,...

joshso
07/19/2007, 09:30 AM
Thanks for the advice on the tank and the girlfriend. LOL

drummereef
07/19/2007, 10:11 AM
The ammonia spike is likely because you disturbed the sandbed and rock. There is always the risk of this when doing major changes. I would continue to siphon out as much detritus as possible at water changes. Skim heavily for a while and do diligent water changes. Don't add any animals until this cycle has completely finished. I would skip the sand sifting stars all together. You'll be better off fighting this yourself for a while rather than adding another animal. ;)

luke33
07/19/2007, 11:22 AM
I wouldn't blame your prob on your GF, i'd say your biggest prob was going away for 4mths and leaving a canister filter on it, which i'm guessing didn't get cleaned. The reason for all the algae is because of all the trates produced by the canister filter imo. That would be my first thought.

bimmerzs
07/19/2007, 11:35 AM
However when I was testing the water the other day my ammonia read off the charts 50 ppm +.

I would recommend adding something to bind that ammonia up like Prime or Amquel as you water change like crazy to get the ammonia down. That's a lot of ammonia.....especially with critter's in the tank.

Cheers!

Randall_James
07/19/2007, 11:41 AM
May as well take advantage of the problems and vacuum the sand out and rinse all the detritus out of it.

I would have to say that was pretty gutsy to leave an amateur in charge of a reef tank for 4 months.... (maybe she should have been given and RC logon?) sure some local guys could have helped out

ArgonDreams
07/19/2007, 12:05 PM
Double post?

First Thread on this with questions on the accuracy of Ammonia. (http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=1165951)

kevin2000
07/19/2007, 12:22 PM
Ammonia levels that high will quickly burn the gills of your fish and likely kill off all of your livestock ... your first priority s/b to reduce ammonia which will require multiple major water changes. Use of an ammonia conversion product like prime or amquel may help as well.

You should note that use of ammonia conversion products may make your ammonia test kit worthless. The conversion products convert toxic ammonia into less toxic ammonium and most ammonia test kits can't distinguish between the two. If you use a conversion product then consider purchasing an ammonia test kit which can measure free ammonia only or just purchase an inexpensive Seachem ammonia alert badge (registers free ammonia only).

Hope this helps.