Sea Aquarium Is Dying..i Need Help :(

[chookchook]

first time posting, long time lurking, and in need of serious advice.

we've had a sea aquarium for around 6 months, given as a birthday present to my better half. it had already been up and running for a while before we received it, but the original owner had always had problems with it so thought we could do better. how wrong he was.

the tank is about 130-150 litres?



theres 5 huge pieces of 'live' rock and lots of small bits.

ok on to inhabitants and stuff...original occupants are marked with an 'O' in the list...newer additions over the last 4 months are marked with an 'N'



there is (or at least was....)
6 kenya trees, (N)
assorted zoas,(O and N)
bubble algae(?)(O)
some yellow leather like flat things (O)


fish wise there is (or was....)
3 clowns, (O)
1 sea angel(?) (O)
1 snail (N)
2 damsel fish, (O)
2 hermits,(N)
a cleaner shrimp, (N)
2 emerald crabs,(O)
a long green wormlike caterpillar looking thing, (O?)
lots of bristelstars and feather dusters. (O)


equipment-wise there is 3 powerheads, one big hang on filter that takes up the entire back of the tank - 3 chambers, one with charcoal one with filter wool one with green pellet like things in. theres a protein skimmer too and heater

every week we have been having to change around 10 litres water due to evaporation, but also taking out another 5 litres 'old' water to refresh with new (so 15L per week new water added...made up with 100% RO water and sea aquarium salt, mixed in a bucket before being added to the aquarium)

now for the first few months everything was fine, no deaths, lots of new life being found coming out of the rocks etc then we added 1 cleaner shrimp, 2 hermits and a snail as advised by the aquarium store to combat the bubble algae. we also purchased a piece of live rock with some lovely looking kenya trees and another with some green zoas on. everything was drip acclimatised to the tank.

at home the shrimp went belly up within 2 hours of going in so we took him back with a water sample to the store, where they said our salt percentage was too high and to slowy bring this down by adding less salt over the next few water changes. he said it could take a few weeks to get the salt level down, if we did it too quick, we'd loose everything in the tank to shock.

so over the next few weeks we took out old water and added new, but with a lower salt level than usual. the water in the tank would hover between the 1028 and 1026 mark on the refractometer (is that what its called? long glass thing that bobs in the water and measures salt level and temp?)

2 months later still no change so we went back to the store for advice,even purchased a new refractometer just incase the old one was broke, they said we needed to add some minerals to the water as 100% RO water was taking everything out. so he gave us a little bottle of some brown liquid (no label he said it was minerals for the plants and fish? he only had a huge bottle for the stores use but sold it off in smaller bottles for clients) he said to add a teaspoon full every week. so we did. all our zoas closed up tightly withing weeks and have not opened since..........our kenya trees starting looking limp.

fast forward to last week, still fighting the high salt level, have lost 1 angel, 1 clown, 1 damsel over the past few weeks. the zoas are all tightly closed up and have an almost white slimy covering over them, yet still squirt if you nudge them so i think they are still alive, barely.
this morning i came downstairs to the most god awful stench ive ever smelt.....coming from the sea aquarium. thinking something had died i started moving chunks of live rock to the side to look under (whilst trying not to puke at the stench) when i moved the live rock with the kenya trees on, they all kind of disintergrated into mush totally clouding the water.....they were deader than dead and had rotted i guess? (yet they'd still looked like normal, just a bit limp unti i moved them and they fell apart)

so now i have cloudy rotten smelling tank, i dont care about the plants but would like to save the crabs and remaining fish. where do i go from here?

i am busy making RO water as i type, but for just 5 l it takes over an hour (low water pressure make the tap run slow) myplan was to make up 130L new water, take everything out the tank, throw out rock with dead/dying plants and just keep a few pieces that are clean of decaying plants. fish and crbbs in and go from there. but im guessing the shock would kill them??



please if anyone can advise me what to do id be greatful. i dont know whether to trust the guy at the shop or not...his advice seems to have finished off my tank.


i have water tests for ammonia, nitrate, nitrite and PH but not for calcium/phosphates (ran out after doing near daily checks for months and have yet to purchase new, its on my list for this weeks shopping)

 

[chookchook]

anyone? any advice at all to help at least save the fish?

 

[ALW]

Ok first get rid of all your water and start again. From what you say, you have a Hydrometer not a Refractometer. A hydro goes into the the tank water. With a refracto using a syringe you take a few mls of tank water out of the tank, placing it onto the glass and the holding it up to the light to get an sg reading. Hydrometers are inacurate so i wouldnt trust it. Go buy a refractometer, you can pick them up for about £30. You can not save the Kenya Trees they have died. take them out and remove what is left of them from the rock. The sg of the tank should be between 1.020-1.025! You dont need to add any minerals to the tank, everything you need for those corals is already in your salt mix. What type of lights do you have for the tank? Also when you are doing water changes i would personally do a 25% change every month. As long as you re-drip them, the fish and inverts they should be ok in the new mixed water. At the moment you are more likely to lose them from the current water than from a new mix of water.

 

[chookchook]

what do i do with my other chunks of live rock?

so if i set up a smaller tank with new water and transfer the fish over they should be ok? should i remove EVERYTHING from the old tank and basically clean it out? also i have a grainy substrate that has stuff living in it...not sure if its sand or something else....do i keep or throw? and the zoas?? any chance of them surviving? they've been closed for over 2 months but still spurt out stuff if knocked.

would the salt level have caused all this or something else (like that stuff the fish store man gave me)
i can pick up a refractometer at the weekend when i get into town but not sooner, im stuck at home this week due to a bad back of all things(!)

 

[ALW]

what do i do with my other chunks of live rock?

so if i set up a smaller tank with new water and transfer the fish over they should be ok? should i remove EVERYTHING from the old tank and basically clean it out? also i have a grainy substrate that has stuff living in it...not sure if its sand or something else....do i keep or throw? and the zoas?? any chance of them surviving? they've been closed for over 2 months but still spurt out stuff if knocked.

would the salt level have caused all this or something else (like that stuff the fish store man gave me)
i can pick up a refractometer at the weekend when i get into town but not sooner, im stuck at home this week due to a bad back of all things(!)

Ok a quick list of what you should do

1. Make up some fresh salt water with an sg at 1.023
2. Bag up your fish and inverts
3. Empty the tank of water giving the sand a quick clean using a gravel vac
4. Quick scrub all your live rock in the old tank water to get rid of all the dead corals
5. Fill the tank back up with temp at 24c
6. Place the rock back into the tank
7. Re-drip your fish and inverts
8. Keep a close eye on the tank over the next week (Testing the water every few days)

It could have been that the sg was too high, but also i dont know what the lfs gave you to put into the tank so it could have been that or your ammonia, nitrate and nitrite levels were too high. Sounds like the zoas arnt dead so hopefully they will come back.