Clownfish mystery death

[Jungle321]

Hi
At the beginning of March I set up 25 gallon saltwater aquarium (18x18x18 including the DIY filtration panel,20g display tank) I kept the aquarium cycling (I added bacteria daily and later on, weekly until I ran out of the bacteria).In April I added first corals (Green star polyp, purple sea whip, and palythoa) , snails and blue legged hermit crabs. The hermit crabs disappeared after week, and the snail died month after purchase. The corals seem to be doing just fine. In June (6.20) I went to local fish store and I tested my water for ammonia, nitrates, and nitrite (all 3 were undetectable) and the salinity was 1.024 .
So I decided to buy 2 clownfish, I acclimated them by floating the bag for 10 minutes and then by adding cup of water after every 10 minutes for 40 minutes (They seemed to be stressed because they were breathing rapidly). After that time I added the fish to the tank, and after couple of hours I found both of the clownfish dead. I went back to the store to talk to the LFS owner to ask him if he could help me figure out what was wrong. We tested the water and the parameters were still alright . After couple of suggestions from a store owner I went back home with chemical absorber (it changed color to brown after week). I also checked with multimeter to see if the issue was not caused by electricity, and as it turned out there was more than 30v (of which most came out of the heater) so I replaced the heater and I also added a grounding probe (it solved the issue). So after the issue seemed to be solved I started buying new animals (one at a time) turbo snail and hermit crabs (all of them are still alive and appear to be in good shape). Since everything was doing just fine I decided to go and get new clownfish (only one to check if it will survive), the ammonia and nitrites were undetectable (I did the tests at LFS to be 100% sure) . I acclimated the clown fish the same way as I did before and it also was breathing rapidly but I thought that it was due to stress caused by change in environment, the poor clown fish was dead after 13 hours.
At this point I have no idea what to do and I am asking for help to solve this issue.
Thank you for time you take to read this.

 

[Kryptonian]

I'd suggest sending water in for a better test. Look for other chemicals or hard metals. What did you make your DIY filtration panel out of?
Did you start with 100% RODI water?
Is your water getting proper aeration?

It seems like crabs and corals are still alive and kicking from the post. You have some other "thing" in your water that's knocking out fish. Clownfish are tough little guys so I'm curious what a water test would show.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Some things that come to mind:

is this a new Tank?
Are you are youre not getting false salinity and its lower than gage is indicating?
What salinity gage and type of water are you using?
What is your eater temp?
What is the salinity at your store you are buying fish from ?

 

[Kryptonian]

^^ That's a good point! My LFS has much lower salinity than my tanks.

 

[Jungle321]

The filtration panel is made out of black plexiglass.
I always buy saltwater (if I remember well, they use Red Sea salt) from LFS and I also use RODI water from that place (so I would assume that the salinity level would be the same or very similar since they use same water).
The tank was set up in March.
1.024- I use the hydrometer Accuprobe Aquarium Solutions (shows same readings as the refractometer from LFS).

 

[Jungle321]

What tests should I do?
I’m wondering what would have to be in water to kill fish that fast...
Would it make sense to use activated carbon filter ?

 

[Philly Reefer]

What is the pH for your tank? This can easily be the cause of them dying.

 

[Jungle321]

The tests that I currently use show around pH 8.0 (although the tests I use are inaccurate, that’s why I rely on tests from LFS)
If the pH was bad wouldn’t it affect corals too?

 

[LeftyReefer]

Are your filters or media/socks, etc... finding anything weird?

 

[Philly Reefer]

The tests that I currently use show around pH 8.0 (although the tests I use are inaccurate, that’s why I rely on tests from LFS)
If the pH was bad wouldn’t it affect corals too?

Yeah if your ph is stable. Its should be ok

 

[DiefsReef]

One thing I noticed in your explanation was you add a cup of water every 10 min and you also stated your LFS much lower Salinity.

I would suggest below;

If salinity is within 1 point:

After temperature acclimation simply release fish to your tank

If salinity is within 2 points:

After temperature acclimation, release all fish and transport water into a bucket.

Take out 25% transport water and discard it. Replace it with same amount of tank water or new saltwater.

Wait 10 min and repeat the water exchange again. After exchange wait 10 min. Check the salinity and it should be within 1 point and you can choose to either release them into tank or do another exchange if there are very sensitive fish in the mix.

If salinity is more than 3 points:

Do all the steps above and keep replacing transport water with new saltwater or tank water giving 10 min in between till salinity is a match.

 

[Jungle321]

Are your filters or media/socks, etc... finding anything weird?

No, in the filter I only find algae that I scrape off the glass. The plexiglass was not marked as reef safe but I cleaned it very well to make sure there’s nothing on the surface of it and as fas as I know many people use plexiglass and acrylic sheets in aquariums.

One thing I noticed in your explanation was you add a cup of water every 10 min and you also stated your LFS much lower Salinity.

I would suggest below;

If salinity is within 1 point:

After temperature acclimation simply release fish to your tank

If salinity is within 2 points:

After temperature acclimation, release all fish and transport water into a bucket.

Take out 25% transport water and discard it. Replace it with same amount of tank water or new saltwater.

Wait 10 min and repeat the water exchange again. After exchange wait 10 min. Check the salinity and it should be within 1 point and you can choose to either release them into tank or do another exchange if there are very sensitive fish in the mix.

If salinity is more than 3 points:

Do all the steps above and keep replacing transport water with new saltwater or tank water giving 10 min in between till salinity is a match.

.
Did I actually mentioned that the salinity is different in my LFS? If I wrote anything not clearly I’m very sorry. What I meant is that since I use same saltwater as the LFS does, then I should have identical or very similar salinity.

 

[LeftyReefer]

So your polyfilter changed to dark brown in 1 week? Have you continued to run/replace the polyfilter? Has it continued to turn dark brown quickly each time? Carbon can't hurt. I'd keep running polyfilters and carbon until they stop turning brown.

You say you buy your water from the LFS and it tests fine, what about your substrate and rock? new? used?

What are you topping the tank off with, to account for evaporation? Have you tested that water?

How far away is your LFS? you mentioned that both times bringing the fish home, they are breathing fast.... This seems strange if you are getting the fish locally. A quick across town transfer should not stress them that much... When does the rapid breathing happen? before or after you add water from your tank?

 

[Jungle321]

So your polyfilter changed to dark brown in 1 week? Have you continued to run/replace the polyfilter? Has it continued to turn dark brown quickly each time? Carbon can't hurt. I'd keep running polyfilters and carbon until they stop turning brown.

You say you buy your water from the LFS and it tests fine, what about your substrate and rock? new? used?

What are you topping the tank off with, to account for evaporation? Have you tested that water?

How far away is your LFS? you mentioned that both times bringing the fish home, they are breathing fast.... This seems strange if you are getting the fish locally. A quick across town transfer should not stress them that much... When does the rapid breathing happen? before or after you add water from your tank?

Yes, I continued replacing the polyfilter but now it stays nearly white.
For substrate I use Caribsea Aragonite, and I use dry rock from LFS (they use exactly the same rock in their tanks) everything was new.
For topping the tank off I use RODI water from LFS so I assumed it was fine (and I don’t really anything to test that water).I do it manually but frequently.
My LFS is about 25 minutes away from my house. I’m not really sure when the clownfish started breathing rapidly, but I think it started when I started adding the water into the bag. At first I didn’t pay much attention to the breathing because it looked like if the fish was stressed ( I had some experience with freshwater fish and it looked pretty similar like a stressed freshwater fish). The first time the clown fish died I didn’t how they behave (I only found dead fish later on that day), but this time I noticed the fish at some point had trouble keeping balance -shortly before it died-(it was terrible to watch the fish and have no idea how to save it...) ,like if it was poisoned from something or like if it was sick.

 

[Hugh Mann]

This seems very strange to me.
Notoriously hardy clowns are dying in hours, but inverts and corals are doing just fine.

First batch of invert deaths could be explained by whatever your polyfilter pulled out, but now that it's staying clean.

Hmm. I wish I could help. Going to follow this to see what you figure out.

 

[Philly Reefer]

I think you need an icp test on your water.
And I would suggest possibly getting your own rodi system

 

[Jungle321]

The only thing that comes to my mind is the filtration panel, the pvc pipe (the one that is for drinkable water only), and the 3D printer parts (Hatchbox PLA) but all these things are used by many people in their tanks...
How do I do an ICP test , I’m not really familiar how to get it and where to send the water sample.
I very appreciate all the responses!

 

[Jungle321]

Hi! So i changed couple of thing in my tank- I removed all 3D printed parts and added activated carbon filter, I also added a protein skimmer and moved the wave maker to create more movement on the surface. I added a new clownfish on Saturday (I did drip acclimation until salinity was equal to salinity in my tank) . On Tuesday I added second clownfish. Both fish are alive and seem happy! I suspect it was oxygen related issue (not enough oxygen for fish but enough for corals and inverts)