Featured Really Struggling Any Help Would Be Appreciated

Hi all

Ive not been back here for a while, was so excited when we had our new marine tank and posted here and and posted pics etc

Short story over the last month, we have lost 6 out of 10 fish which we now believe was/ is white spot, acted on the advice of the LFS but after a lot of research we now have a hospital tank set up and will be putting the remaining fish in to treat with copper in the next couple of day just waiting for the treatment to arrive tomorrow, only worry is the hospital tank is not mature only set up toda

Sorry for the long post but its late and i am so worried after such a financial loss and losing some lovely fish i am really feeling low.

The other problem is the company have at last supplied us with a Sump, which should have been supplied with the tank in the first place, we already had a external protein skimmer running on the side of the tank while waiting for the sump, the company set up the sump and we removed the external skimmer into the sump, since moving the skimmer into the sump we are suffering with micro bubbles being sucked back into the tank from our external canister filter ( this was supplied with the tank) no matter what my hubby does we cannot control the bubbles, The skimmer was fine while it was running on the side of the tank.

we are at a loss what to do next

 

an external canister filter should not really be necessary and could in fact be a disadvantage now you have a sump

 

On my qt/hospital tank I have a powerhead, air stone,and a small internal filter.

 

I also add reef balance beneficial bacteria.

 

The external canister came with the tank, the LFS had purchased a job lot of tanks that were made to order and they were not aware that the one we purchased had a weir, long story short they agreed to supply a sump as it was there mistake, they said it would be fine to use the Canister as return pump, we did have our doubts, but decided to give it a try, we have purchased as return pump which is coming today, not sure what to do as the canister is 2500 litres per hour, and the pump we ordered is 1800 litres per hour, the tank is 420 litres, and about 100 litres in the sump.

 

ive done the same as you and added quick start, the water not mature.

 

No we have added fresh water to the hospital tank but not put any fish in yet, were have lost another fish since posting we have 3 left a wrasse and two gobys none have any white spot on and have been treating the display tank with NT LABS parazoryne hoping it would help until the hospital tank is safe to use. the filter has foam pads and ceramic media. the skimmer is a Boy hang on skimmer. when we first put it on the side of the tank it did produce loads of bubbles but we did the white vinegar to break it in and it was fine. nothing else has changed other than putting it in the sump.

 

The tank did cycle, we added 50kg of live rock, we put beneficial bacteria in, added live sand and within 2 weeks the tank parameters were perfect, we took some water to our local fish shop, told him our tank was only 2 weeks old and he gave us the go ahead to add the start which was our two clown fish, we had a royal gramma ready in another tank which again the marine specialist at my local shop said give it a few days for the clown fish to settle then add the gramma in, I admit we did add the fish rather quickly but it wasn't ever against the advice of my local fish shop. Where we went wrong I think is we went to a different shop and they said it was okay to add a Bi-colour Angel in with a Coral Beauty, due to the size of our tank (100g) and all the rock and hiding places, we obviously can't be sure what caused the ICH but there was no visible signs fighting like damaged to fins, everything seemed to get on fine, we do have a boxer shrimp which I feed by hand and has never been aggressive to the fish.

We didn't want to use the water out of the main tank due to the ICH I didn't want to cause any issues in the QT tank.

We overfed the fish when we found out they had ICH to try and help boost their immune system so when we got the water tested yesterday we were told the phosphate was a little high but it wasn't anything to worry about

We lost 2 Platinum clowns, Bi colour angel, Royal Gramma, Banggai Cardinal, Mccosker's Flasher Wrasse and a Coral Beauty.

KH- 10, Cal - 500, MG - 1500, Nirate - 0, Nirite - 0, Ammonia - 0, Phos - 0.03.

The cal and mag are a little bit high but that is because we haven't added any coral and we are using reef salt.

 

Thank you for your reply its very helpful.

 

Whats the name of the LFS you are using? How much bacteria did you add? did you leave the skimmer on when adding?

 

The LFS is Maidenhead Aquatics, we now use another LFS..I cannot remember the exact amount of bacteria as my partner put it in the tank but it was the recommend dose per Litres, No the skimmer wasn't even installed when we first set up the tank.

 

QUICK UPDATE remaining fish are doing well no sign of white spots, not taken them out of the tank yet i am tempted to leave them alone for now and give the Hospital tank more time to mature completed the NT Labs Parazoryne in the display.. display tank perimeter all normal

 

If your display tank has had Ich, then it needs 72 days fallow. Or, put fish in hospital tank and strip display tank down, clean out, start with fresh water/substrate etc.