Ric The Redneck's Tank!

[rictheredneck]

right a quick update, just got back from gfriends mum and dads. picked up a 2 foot tank with hood and flurecents, heater, a few pieces of tufa and an internal filter, i grabbed some of the sponge from my girlfiends internal juwel filter to place in it.

just setting up now and transferring water.

 

[Danno]

I got an idea for your live rock. Grab a piece, stick it in a garbage bag, and hit it with a hammer. You will have more aquascaping ideas and it will create a higher surface area.

 

[rictheredneck]

well it looks as though the whitespot has receded on the tang, it hasn't spread to any of the other fish. all are still in quarantine tank and and i haven't administered any meds, just fed loads of seaweed and vits. probably just me panicking should of given the fish a chance to get rid of it by itself. a lesson is learned though - quarantine all fish before hand! was kinda impressed how quick i could get a hospital tank together.

gonna keep em in quarantine till the weekend, i have run out of salt and the display tank is only 2/3 full from transferring water and i dont want to transfer it back to the display, might do a little tank maintenance and aquascaping whilst its empty.

 

[rictheredneck]

right guys the bad news my new wrasse has died came home from work yesterday and it was floating around. im thinking i have made a huge mistake transferring them into a quarantine tank all the stress of moving, being put in a small tank and a poor filter cant of helped things. i am still unsure how the powder brown is, it has no visible white spots on its body but a couple of minute spots on its fins literally 2 of them. i transferred them back to the display tank last night lights havent come on yet so i cant tell how they are doing but i have no floaters. i didn't end up administering any meds i was planning on getting them at weekend. so I'm gonna keep an eye on them in particular the powder brown and i might have to replace it into quarantine if it gets more sick.

things i should of done

1. set up a quaranitine tank.
2. quarantine the new wrasse before putting it into the display tank.
3. if one of my fish do get sick try and let it fight it off itself before doing any drastic measures.

i guess I'm kinda gutted really it was the first loss id ever have, I'm kinda wondering why it died, since its died relatively quickly I'm kinda thinking about cyanide, but am i being naive i thought cyanide is a rare thing and i shouldn't expect it from a reputable dealer? but most probably it was the stress from moving it from the lfs into the display tank and then into quarantine. I'm none the wiser how my tang got white spot - was it introduced with the wrasse, i didn't appear to have white spot? did it just get stressed with the new inhabitant? was there something wrong with the lfs water? or again from moving it.

 

[SkiFletch]

Might not have been a cryptocaryns (ich) outbreak but just stress spots on the Tang, especially cause powder browns are very sensetive fish. Get yourself an auto feeder for the Tang, they like to eat a lot during the day, and this will greatly improve their longterm health.

As for the Wrasse, I wouldnt be surprised if it was Cyanide... It doesn't matter how reputable your LFS is if the slave labor Indonesian diver who collected them is lazy. Unfortunately collection is so far removed from the LFS that it's nearly impossible for the LFS itself to have any affect on the practices of the collectors. A sad reality in our hobby

 

[littleme1969]

Sorry about the loss, I find marine fish compared to tropicals can be hard work, seem to stress much easier and are more prone to things like Ich. I currently having my own little struggle with a clown I got a month ago, just get him right and looking good then he comes down with something else

 

[rictheredneck]

havent posted anything for a while so i will let you all know all my fish are gone except the chromis and damsel. it was a combination of the stress of quarantine, meds and whitespot.

 

[rictheredneck]

Jesus i haven't been on in ages had a tough time with the tank after pretty much losing everything we decided to move my girlfriends inhabitants into my tank her mum n dad were after re decorating their living room so with my new fish 15 chromis we added a powder blue, 6 line wrasse, 2 cardinals, 2 clowns, bi colour blennie and a false gramma the tank a VERY over stocked. and my water quality was poor with very high nitrates.

http/uk.youtube.com/watch?v=fjyXYJFanH4

i bought a pack of 60 snails off ebay to help keep the tank clean i introduced them and very quickly realized that they cant right themselves if they get turned over so in no time at all my tank crashed with close to 60 dead and dying snails.

i lost all the fish except that damsel the wrasse and 7 chromis, i was gutted and pretty much lost all enthusiasm for it and the hobby in general.

after a couple of months i got off my ass and sorted it out i currently have an invert only tank took all the fish back and got a couple of clams which i dunno if any of you remember was the original reason for setting it up.

pics to follow...

 

[SkiFletch]

Ouch, sorry to hear that, crashes are never fun

Glad to see things are on the mend though

 

[rictheredneck]

pics as promised!

 

[SkiFletch]

NICE CLAMS!

 

[rictheredneck]

cheers ski glad you like, i really want one with a black mantle but ive never seen one here in the uk. u get many over the pond?

 

[SkiFletch]

Black mantle? No, they're not common here that's for sure.

 

[rictheredneck]

having trouble keeping phosphate down in my tank so I'm gonna try dosing vodka.

i have a single fish a powder brown, which eats the more desirable nuisance algae but still left with loads, and the Halimeda is using a fair whack of my calc alk and mag supplements. my sps is growing but very slowly. i use ro water with a tds of 2 rarely feed frozen foods. my 400w halide is on roughly 8 hours a day and my tmc v2 600 skimmer rated roughly twice the size for my tank should be able to cope. i don't use ozone or carbon but will maybe utilize carbon at a later date if i think it is needed no other phosphate remover will be used during this trial. tests are done using salifert test kits. i will add some pics this weekend.

heres my diary.

day 1 28/8/08

phosphate 0.25 ppm
nitrate 1 ppm
0.4 mL dosed.

 

[n3ont3tra]

You're back!
*waits for pics*