It never ends for me.....

[ICEnVy]

I must be a sucky SW tank owner because I still havent managed to get my Nitrates down after months. Some advice I got on here told me to do larger PWC (40-50%) until they were down... After I did that twice (a week apart) everything in my tank started to die. So I was like agh- and took my water to a very good (well I thought it was) LFS and they told me now I was having ammonia problems too. So my ammonia was .5 and my nitrates were 60. So the guy said use ammo-lock. When I used that my mushrooms all detached from the rocks and 80% died, then my anemones closed up for like 2 weeks. When I called back another guy told me that what I was told to do was wrong and use reef solutions additive to help the bacteria and stuff in my tank come back and no water changes for a month. Well now my Nitrates are 80 and my ammonia keeps going to .5 and higher and I can't seem to stabilize anything. My fish are okay that have been in there, but any new fish I've added has died in 24-48hrs. On top of that I have this weird wormy thing taking over my tank (asked about this on previous post). So can anyone help? Or should I just give up?

 

[melosu58]

Do not give up!!! Some of the advice you recieved I do not totally agree with. I definitely agree with PWC`s but not 40-50%. I and others on this site suggest frequent 10-20% PWC`s. When you do extra large PWC`s it changes the chemical make up of your tank. When things are going wrong in the tank I always suggest PWC`s but 10-20 %. Your LFS suggested ammo lock for your tank. PWC`s are always suggested before adding chems to your tank. What we need to do now is find out where it is coming from. Are you overfeeding? Did you have a fish disapear and die? Do you have enough biological filtration in your tank? Find the source of the ammonia. Another thing all those added additives are junk and will foul up your tank. Again small frequent PWC`s are better. I cant help on the worm thing but Stick in there and you`ll do OK. I am a ambassador for PWC`s. As I said smaller frequent ones. I do a 15% PWC every week for 9 yrs now and if you look in my gallery you`ll see why I do it. Good results mean keep doing the same thing. Wish you the Best.

 

[kansei]

I agree , aquariums fresh or salt will do better with more frequent , small changes . Twice a week 10-20 % would be better than weekly 30-40 % .

 

[Ziggy953]

I totally agree. One thing that I would like to add is that when you do your PWC mix your SW up the day before you are going to do the PWC. Put a small PH and a heater in the bucket or what ever you mix your water in. By doing this it will allow the salt to mix well and the water to get to temp. I use a 32g trash can to mix my water in and a 32g to hold my RO/DI water in. I try to keep at least 20-25g on hand at any time just in case.

 

[MT79]

I see in your info that your using a bio-wheel. I've read online about people who've had nitrate problems when using the bio-wheel on tanks w/ a fair amount LR. Basically the bacteria on the LR can't keep up with that on the bio-wheel and the end result is increased nitrate. After you get the ammonia cleared up, I would remove the bio-wheel and see what happens. Feed the tank sparingly, and don't add any new fish for a couple weeks so the bacteria on the LR can catch up to the demands of the tank. To get rid of the current ammonia and nitrate, small but frequent PWC's work well as mentioned. I would aim for 20-25% daily for a few days in a row until things stabilize. Good luck

 

[MT79]

One thing that I would like to add is that when you do your PWC mix your SW up the day before you are going to do the PWC.

Very good point. It's always best to wait at least 24hrs, I prefer a couple days or more, before using new saltwater. It is/can be toxic until thoroughly mixed.

 

[melosu58]

I agree with them I always wait 48 hrs before I add mine.

 

[rubikcube]

Have you checked your tap water for ammonia or nitrates yet?

 

[Ziggy953]

Good point Rubikcube! If you aren't using RO/DI water that could be part of your problem.

 

[Sadielynn]

1st off DON'T GIVE UP!!!
Second slow down deep breath.
I would say get rid of the Bio wheel NitrAte factory , next do a small water change no more than 10 gallons each time and no more than maybe 2 times a week ..... Do check your water sourse for NitrAtes, Phosphates, and ammonia , if you can not get RO/DI water dont panic we use distilled and have had no problems (I could get RO/DI but I am not paying 3.50 a gallon !We rent so a unit is not gonna happen either...)For mixing salt water up what worked for me is mix the plain H20 for 24 hours on the 24 hour mark add your salt 24 hours later check your SPG , we never used a heater in ours but when I did a change on our nano I dripped it in at a rate of 4gtts per second through our filter where the heater is and that is where it would mix with tank water.At one point and time or another we have all hit a brick wall ...and felt like we were off. Now Never never never trust a LFS , get your kits and do your testing at home I have the aquarium pharmasutical kits and they are pretty easy to use , you may need to have them cross refrence your findings but that should be about it . They are there to make money bottom line they dont care if you are sold something that could damage your system . Most ammonia locks and such are fresh H20 only . You could try purigen , phosguard , or chemipure to help ya to settle things down a bit ...As for the bacteria to use I have use the biospera with eh results others swear by it ,dont get cycle this has been pinned as causing algea in salt water tanks .You may need to do a restart but I dont think that this is the case. Remember we all go through tough times at some point anyone who tells you other wise is a liar !I will be the first to say when I firs started I crashed my tank too and had listened to the LFS while it crashed !

 

[ICEnVy]

Ok. So I have tested my tap water and all levels are 0. However my sister-in-law was saying something about copper in the water and it causing problems? I have never heard of this though..... Ok the guy at the store told me to keep the bio-wheel on til the tank started looking better to get my bacteria up, but I figure I will try taking it off anyways. Well I had a nitrate and ammonia problem before anything died. Then I lost my starfish and a week later my scooter blenny, and then I bought 4 chromis and they all died, then a month later I tried a lawnmower blenny and he just disappeared after a week. The ammonia didn't rise though with these, it just stayed the same. (I took them all out ASAP) I don't use R/O water because I have to drive an hour to get it and that is just too much.

 

[Kurt_Nelson]

So, are you just mixing your salt mix with tap water out of the tap? Or are you putting any chemical tap water conditioner into the water before mixing the salt up with it? I think most tap water conditioners have stuff in them to knock out the heavy metals, like copper. In fact, I think some salt mixes have stuff in them to take care of heavy metals also.

If you're not using a tap water conditioner, you're probably having issues with not only copper, but chlorine/chloramine also. But I would've expected that to cause you problems from day one though. And that doesn't explain the ammonia/nitrate issue.

In trying to figure out what might be going on with your tank, I noticed a post of yours late last year that mentioned making about 20 lbs of homemade rock. Did you put that in the tank? Was it properly cured? I have no experience with that stuff, but I'm guessing that if it's not fully cured before it goes into your tank you could cause quite a chemical problem. Could that figure into any of this?

 

[ICEnVy]

Yeah, I am using SeaChem Prime. I just now started adding those rocks I made, and only one at a time every 2 weeks. I def properly cured them.

I figured out what that worm thingy is I think..... a smaller bristle worm.

It looks just like that pic from a site. So theyre bad I heard.....

How could I have got this? I noticed them after I got my lawnmower blenny.....

I told you it never ends & I have A LOT of them.....

 

[Sadielynn]

Just a run of the mill bristle worm smaller ones are safe larger ones eh that depends on who you ask if they are greater than 3 inches in my system there is no pardon they get pulled out and flushed . They respond to the ammount of food in a system and will come naturally with live rock and reproduce by the demands of food . As for the water what about distilled from a local market ? That is what we use as I am not paying $3.50 a gallon ! I have had good luck with it .... that is what I use for top off as well. Using tap water there are just really too many things that could be causing your issues as others have said

 

[melosu58]

As for the water what about distilled from a local market ? That is what we use as I am not paying $3.50 a gallon ! I have had good luck with it .... that is what I use for top off as well.

I agree with Sadielynn on this also. For the first 7 yrs of my tank I used distilled water. You can get it at super markets and you can get RO water at Walmart if you have one of them around you. You can also get your own RO/DI unit and make your own. You can get a real good one on ebay for about a hundred dollars.

 

[Kurt_Nelson]

I wouldn't be concerned at all about the bristleworms. Yes... there is one species that can cause problems with corals. But the one you showed a picture of isn't that species. I freaked when I saw the few (?) that I have, but have since calmed down and just consider them part of my cleanup crew. They will do a great job of keeping your sand bed clean.

OK... so you're using Prime, which should knock out the copper/lead/chlorine/etc from your tap water - that's good. And it sounds like your homemade rocks aren't the issue. I'd still suspect your tap water, assuming you aren't putting any other additives in your tank. If you're doing water changes, and are not grossly overfeeding your tank, or have something dead in there that's hiding, your nitrate levels should be going down and not staying the same. I know you said all the levels in your tap water were zero, but I find it hard to believe that your tap water doesn't have any measurable nitrAtes in it. Are you using a city municipal water source, or well water? I agree with Sadielynn... try some supermarket distilled water for a while and see how that works for you. Just make sure you check the distilled water though, to know exactly what you're putting into your tank, nitrate-wise.

 

[Sadielynn]

I'd still suspect your tap water, assuming you aren't putting any other additives in your tank. If you're doing water changes, and are not grossly overfeeding your tank, or have something dead in there that's hiding, your nitrate levels should be going down and not staying the same. I know you said all the levels in your tap water were zero, but I find it hard to believe that your tap water doesn't have any measurable nitrAtes in it. Are you using a city municipal water source, or well water? I agree with Sadielynn... try some supermarket distilled water for a while and see how that works for you. Just make sure you check the distilled water though, to know exactly what you're putting into your tank, nitrate-wise.

for the nitrates how old is the test .... They have a short shelf life after opened 6 months to a year at most .It may well be worth replacing it ..
Also some wal -marts dont sell ro/di .... their distilled comes purple cap purple lable ...for about 67cents a gallon

 

[ICEnVy]

Well, I thought it might be because my test was old- but I took my water to 2 different LFS and the levels read the same for them too. The LFS said my tap water has 0 Nitrates also, so I dunno? The water is city water, but it comes from a lake about 2 miles away, so I dunno if that makes it better? So can I use filtered water from like my PUR thingy? Will that work as good as distilled water? My sister-in-law tried to tell me RO water is just double filtered water? Dunno how true that is..... She works at a really horrible LFS. I don't know how long something dead would stay around in there, I have around 100 snails and they seem to devour stuff very quickly. I don't overfeed anymore (for several months now) so..... I have no idea what my issue is, but I turned off my bio-wheel today, maybe I will see some improvement.....

and I guess consider the bristle worms part of my tank and be careful. How is it that things like this just randomly appear in SW tanks????

 

[melosu58]

How is it that things like this just randomly appear in SW tanks????

They have been there awhile. You are just seeing them now. They come in LR when you purchased it. There are alot worse things to be concerned about coming from your LR.

 

[Sadielynn]

Well, I thought it might be because my test was old- but I took my water to 2 different LFS and the levels read the same for them too. The LFS said my tap water has 0 Nitrates also, so I dunno? The water is city water, but it comes from a lake about 2 miles away, so I dunno if that makes it better? So can I use filtered water from like my PUR thingy? Will that work as good as distilled water? My sister-in-law tried to tell me RO water is just double filtered water? Dunno how true that is..... She works at a really horrible LFS. I don't know how long something dead would stay around in there, I have around 100 snails and they seem to devour stuff very quickly. I don't overfeed anymore (for several months now) so..... I have no idea what my issue is, but I turned off my bio-wheel today, maybe I will see some improvement.....

and I guess consider the bristle worms part of my tank and be careful. How is it that things like this just randomly appear in SW tanks????

In short no the PUR will not remove all the impurities from your water .And now is not the time to take cheep cuts with the issues that you are incurring now. It mainly removes clorine and some other hard metals but not all or 100%.
RO/DI is a really filtered down water yes but it is like a hepa filter for water . The water passes through a series of filters and carbon.
RO/DI
With removal of the wheel you should see marked improvement with every water change. It may take up to 8weeks to see it drastically but you will see it .As for the bristle worms they are usually deep into the rock reveling them selfs when food is present ... they just multiply and then you start to see them .