dennis romano
Valuable Member
A few months ago, I picked up a baseball size Hawkwing Conch. It was pretty cool, cruising around the bottom doing what conchs do. Besides cleaning up, I would feed it nori every other day. The other evening, I was feeding the fish, basslets, cardinals, pipefish and orange spot file, with everyone eating. I noticed that the conch did not look right. It was in the same spot all day. I tapped the shell and it withdrew into it. Ok. The next day, I went to the basement and smelled something bad, like sewer gas. Looking around, the tank with the conch was the source of the smell. I turned on the lights and found carnage. Royal grammas, cardinals, the pipes and file were all dead. Happily, there were a few survivors. None of the corals, gorgonians or sponges were showing distress. Scooping out the bodies, I checked the conch. It, too, was dead. Two bubbles came out of the shell and burst at the surface. The stench was horrible, like opening up a septic tank! Out came the shell and it got dumped in a bucket of water. I tested the water and double checked it at the LFS. Surprisingly, all parameters were good. I did a 25% water change and changed the carbon. Surviving fish are all doing well. The only explanation that I can think of is that the conch died overnight and rapidly polluted the tank. This tank has been running for over twenty years, with this the weirdest die off. No more conchs for me.
