uh-oh another dead fish

[stang8s]

Im going to try and hunt down some cal solutions for my meter later today.. I have another 10 gal of salt water brewing and I will re-run tests later tonight.. Hopefully will get to the bottom of this before anything else dies.

Just ran an "old-school" ph test and got 8.5
My meter now reads 8.4 since i tweaked it this morning.

 

[stang8s]

hmm i forgot i have a royal gramma in here too, just made an apperance and reminded me.. so 5 fish left

Guess I counted this one too soon. Appears to be MIA now too, saw it earlier but did not come out for feeding tonight... uggggggghhhhh

 

[stang8s]

Just did some more tests:

Alk 3.5
Calc 450
PH 8.6
temp 80
Salinity 1.024

 

[Greg Hiller]

Jeff,

Not sure what the problem is. If that pH is correct it is mighty high. When in doubt a water change is always a good idea. You don't have anything like a sea apple in your tank do you?

 

[Aquadiva]

Have you seen Randy's current article in reefkeeping on causes and cures for high PH?

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-03/rhf/index.htm

Seems to be timely in your circumstances. I wish I could help you further, but I havn't a clue except for what has been suggested already. I hope you can figure this one out. Best of luck. I hope this helps.

-Linda

 

[stang8s]

Thanks. i had read an older one he wrote, this one is better as far as amounts to use for adjustments. The strange thing is that my ph always runs a bit high, yet I do not use any kalk and i have a reactor/co2 system.

Greg, i do not have a sea apple but I am leaning towards some sort of poisoning like that. It is very odd, fish go from swimming around and looking great to dead. There is no in between - swimming around funny stage or looking ill stage. And whatever it is does not phase corals or inverts apparantly.

I did cut out alot of xenia from the tank Sunday but this has never caused a problem before. I also have the new Raccoon Butterfly in there (added sunday) that is killing alot of mojanos but I have never heard of them releasing anything toxic.

 

[stang8s]

Well no additional deaths overnight. As of last count, I still have 2 clowns, 1 butterfly and 1 tang. Did another 10 gallon water change just now..

 

[stang8s]

I just added aprox 1/2 of Randy's recommended starting dose of vinager to lower my ph a bit. I suppose I could have increased the bubble count on my reactor but I was worried that would mess up my calc/alk and cause even more problems.