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View Full Version : Crash Recovery


Lampshade
12-13-2009, 09:07 AM
So.... I've had a 55g set up for about 9 months now. I started off with some well esablished live rock from other tanks(thanks guys :D), have about 50+lb's now. The rock had growth on it, muchrooms, GSP, all kinds of goodies(some baddies too, majano anemomea's) . I was even given a couple SPS frag's from someone taking down their setup, and they held up very well, kept color, and even with my "new" tank, showed growth. The live rock was truely alive, turning off the lights would bring out all kinds of creatures from the rock. was fun to watch the bristle worms, and all the other snails and stuff come out, then jump on here and try to ID them.

So anyways... the bad part

About a month ago my heater stuck on.. you know.. after i'd bought a PLC, written the code, but didn't put it in yet because there was "no rush". so my temp went up, way up, i'd come home from work and saw it high, so quickly, unplugged the heater, and did a water change to bring the temp down over about an hour(probabaly should have been 6+). With the water hot, the SPS was already showing bleaching, which apperently can happen within an hour, so i wasn't too worried. But, after they stayed bleached for about a week, i started to worry, then my mushrooms started to shirvel. My GSP went into recesion and hasn't been green since(looks more like a pink covered rock with mini zoa's growing from it). so now after a month of water tests, store advice, chemicals, etc, i'm running out of idea's. My live rock is no longer "alive", the inhabitants are either dead, or... well... probably dead. I've got 2 clowns and a damsel doing fine, and the inverts seem to be doing great, my urchin's grown far too much in the past 2 months even. So overall, i'm wanting to save my GSP, and hopfully bring back the mushrooms that have shriveled up into the rocks.

If anyone's had a tank crash, or knows of a nice smooth way to recover, please let me know.

gobytron
12-13-2009, 06:24 PM
water changes.
I would be doing a 10-20% change every day until things started to improve.

when die off starts, there can be a long and intense spike in ammonia and with your bio filter being weak this can create a pretty vicious circle without regular removal.

Lampshade
12-13-2009, 11:39 PM
Thanks, i'll be trying that, hopefully everythig settles down soon before anything gets worse. Just did Day 1, i'll do a full set of tests again tommorow before i do another.