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OSjoylynn · 05/02/2015, 11:12 AM

Hey guys! I need some advice. I've had my tank for about 3 weeks. It was inherited form a friend who had success with it for 5 years. I followed her directions exactly..two days ago when I got up my mandarin was dead and long spine urchin was losing spikes- they weren't breaking so much as actually coming out with flesh attached.
I freaked out grabbed a bag of the water and raced to the store. They tested the water there and found my salinity was way too high. Due to evaporation? I bought a refractometer, to avoid this EVER happening again, raced back home to get the salinity back down. The fish bounced back (2 clowns 1 blue chromis and a young engineer goby) the short spined urchin is also recovering well.
The main concern I'm having now is the long spine urchin and mushroom corals.
Urchin looks really really sick. It's been 24 hours since I corrected the salinity issue and he is still alive... But not looking good. The mushroom corals seemed to thrive in the higher salinity. It's at 1.025 now -down from 1.033 and they are detaching and looking very deflated. They looked proud and happy in the high salinity.I have various colors and a couple mushroom bubble anenome. It's really heartbreaking. I feel terrible. Is there a humane way to put the urchin out of his misery? Or should I wait and see?

05/02/2015, 11:12 AM	#1
OSjoylynn Registered Member Join Date: May 2015 Posts: 7	High salinity damage Hey guys! I need some advice. I've had my tank for about 3 weeks. It was inherited form a friend who had success with it for 5 years. I followed her directions exactly..two days ago when I got up my mandarin was dead and long spine urchin was losing spikes- they weren't breaking so much as actually coming out with flesh attached. I freaked out grabbed a bag of the water and raced to the store. They tested the water there and found my salinity was way too high. Due to evaporation? I bought a refractometer, to avoid this EVER happening again, raced back home to get the salinity back down. The fish bounced back (2 clowns 1 blue chromis and a young engineer goby) the short spined urchin is also recovering well. The main concern I'm having now is the long spine urchin and mushroom corals. Urchin looks really really sick. It's been 24 hours since I corrected the salinity issue and he is still alive... But not looking good. The mushroom corals seemed to thrive in the higher salinity. It's at 1.025 now -down from 1.033 and they are detaching and looking very deflated. They looked proud and happy in the high salinity.I have various colors and a couple mushroom bubble anenome. It's really heartbreaking. I feel terrible. Is there a humane way to put the urchin out of his misery? Or should I wait and see? Last edited by OSjoylynn; 05/02/2015 at 11:18 AM.