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Pet Forum / Aquaria / Marine Reef / November 2007Water Change Fish Loss?
I`m really bummed. I think I might have unknowingly siphoned a Scooter Blenny out of my tank during a water change, is this possible? The other possibility is that I might have disrupted the DSB a bit when cleaning out some Macro Algae. Could this release ammonia into the tank bottom where the Blenny inhabits? I havent seen a body yet............ > I`m really bummed. > [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > > I havent seen a body yet............ How do you do your water change? Where do you collect the dirty water? I collect dirty water to a Instant Ocean salt bucket and always inspect the water to put back to the tank some snails or micro-hermit crabs back to the tank... How long is the fish unseen? Maybe just hidding somewhere? >> I`m really bummed. >> [quoted text clipped - 12 lines] > and always inspect the water to put back to the tank > some snails or micro-hermit crabs back to the tank... Interesting. I use a pump with a cover over the intake to change water. I guess that keeps me ftrom sucking up my pets too. But it doesn't help when I vacuum. Anyone else do this?  SignatureJim What was the best thing before sliced bread? > Anyone else do this? I have a python and syphon the water out into a sink downstairs. I use a sock over the python to keep my critters out of the intake. George Patterson Worry doesn't improve the future; it just ruins the present. Don't vacume your substrate. Wayne Sallee Wayne@WayneSallee.com jthread wrote on 11/18/2007 6:56 PM: >>> I`m really bummed. >>> [quoted text clipped - 17 lines] > > Anyone else do this? Yeah--- I think it`s gone. I havent seen it for 48 hours. I didnt vacuum the sand, I pulled a few "Stalks" of Macro out of the tank. They had attached themselves to rubble, or just packed the substrate more with their roots. So I probably disrupted things a bit when taking them out. It just wasnt in my paradigm of expectations that a fish could get siphoned out.I will screen the tube in the future. I still dont think that was the cause. > Don't vacume your substrate. > [quoted text clipped - 23 lines] >> >> Anyone else do this? Also the prefilter for a mag 5 pump works very well in the siphon tube. Wayne Sallee Wayne@WayneSallee.com StringerBell wrote on 11/19/2007 7:28 AM: > Yeah--- > [quoted text clipped - 34 lines] >>> >>> Anyone else do this? > Also the prefilter for a mag 5 pump works very well > in the siphon tube. [quoted text clipped - 42 lines] > > >>> Anyone else do this? i dont think i have ever siphoned a fish out, i currently use a 1 inch tube, but its a bit big, i like 5/8th's inch tubes, and siphon into a 5 gal salt bucket as well. a good way to change is place a bucket halfway between your tank and sump,and run one siphon into the bucket, and another siphon into the sump, that gives an easy change that doesnt interrupt any water flow of tank level. it allows for easy acclimation but takes a bit more salt since 5 gallons changed this way only gets apprx 4.75 gallons of fresh saltwater in the tank, the other apprx .25(estimation, and depends on your tank size) gal ends up back in the bucket. i usually let this flow for 15-20 mins or once the salinity and temp is equaled in both the tank and bucket ensuring its mixed. Consequentially you will see your fish in the bucket happily swimming around in good water if you happened to sucked it up. no tube screen needed when using this method. this may be kind of far fetched but screens kill fish too if the flow is fast enough to suck them into it. What ????? Wayne Sallee Wayne@WayneSallee.com wolfdogg wrote on 11/19/2007 1:01 PM: >> Also the prefilter for a mag 5 pump works very well >> in the siphon tube. [quoted text clipped - 49 lines] > method. this may be kind of far fetched but screens kill fish too if > the flow is fast enough to suck them into it. > What ????? what what? lol. you didnt understand my method? you quoted 3 users comments, not sure what you mean by "What" im thinking fishnut is obviously right, the blenny prob died and got eaten. I could not comprehend what you were trying to say. Wayne Sallee Wayne@WayneSallee.com wolfdogg wrote on 11/20/2007 1:29 PM: >> What ????? > [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > im thinking fishnut is obviously right, the blenny prob died and got > eaten. i call it the stress free method, you siphon your tank into your water change container that has fresh mixed salt water, and simultaneously you take second siphon hose and siphon the water change container into the sump(assuming the sumps on the bottom), you need to adjust the hoses with a Kink, or Knot in them, or simply raise or lower the water change container until the flow reaches an equilibrium. Then the sump receives water at the same rate as the tank loses it. its the way i learned from Marc. this way your tank water level doesn't drop at all, and anything sucked up will end up in the bucket consequentially. this way is better than siphoning out water, having your Weir stop or your water level drop, then pouring water back in which slightly stresses the creatures, then having to restart the flow again. some setups wont have the weir (u tube) problem, others will, but overall its a stress free way to do a water change. > i call it the stress free method, I take advantage of the water changes to siphon/pump crud out of the system. I've been dumping out 5 gal buckets of sludge lately. I admit, it would be more stressful on the critters. You're method would allow a gentle mixing of the water. I'd use a float valve in the sump to give you the right flow rates. I also use the waste water to scrub the pumps, etc so I don't kill the coraline on the outside. I kind of like the coated look. --Kurt >>i call it the stress free method, > > I take advantage of the water changes to siphon/pump crud out of the > system. I've been dumping out 5 gal buckets of sludge lately. Maybe you could set up the syphon from the collecting container into the sump in such a way that most of the crud stays in the collecting container? Perhaps a strainer on that syphon hose and set it up to pull water from the top of the container. I also use the syphon process to remove crud, and I don't have a sump, but Wolfdogg's procedure sounds very practical. I would try to work out a way to make it work for you. George Patterson Worry doesn't improve the future; it just ruins the present. George Patterson wrote on 11/27/2007 10:58 PM: > Perhaps a strainer on that syphon hose and set it up to pull > water from the top of the container. A blue jean leg sewed together at one end works great for this. Wayne Sallee Wayne@WayneSallee.com It also takes longer, and waist salt. The way I do water changes, is I make the new salt water slightly saltier than the aquarium water, then pump the new water into the aquarium into a sock at the bottom of the tank. The new water stays at the bottom, and the old water goes over the overflow. I also hook a hose to the side output valve of the return pump plumbing, so I can at the same time, pump old water from the sump down the drain in the bath tub. Salt water works great for the septic tank. So the water in the aquarium does not drop, except for a tiny bit because there is less water flowing in the tank to keep the water higher than the overflow. I can do a 50% water change very easily this way. Wayne Sallee Wayne@WayneSallee.com wolfdogg wrote on 11/27/2007 2:47 PM: > i call it the stress free method, > [quoted text clipped - 12 lines] > some setups wont have the weir (u tube) problem, others will, but > overall its a stress free way to do a water change. > It also takes longer, and waist salt. > [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > water from the sump down the drain in the bath tub. Salt water works great > for the septic tank. salt isn't particularly good for a septic tank. figure if you're using a bucket of salt in a year, and it all goes into the tank, where does it go from there? a lot of time it's still in there, or in your field, and it doesn't do any good for the bacteria that should be in the tank. i use mine for killing weeds in the driveway. however, you have to watch where the salt will migrate to during rains. in az, that doesn't happen frequently. > So the water in the aquarium does not drop, except for a tiny bit because > there is less water flowing in the tank to keep the water higher than the > overflow. I can do a 50% water change very easily this way. > > Wayne Sallee > Wayne@WayneSallee.com regards, charlie cave creek, az Bacteria still grows just fine in the septic tank, just like it does in our aquariums, and the salt kills the tree roots that try to grow in, and clog the drain lines, assuming you do enough volume in salt water for this. It's kept my septic system going well for many years. Wayne Sallee Wayne@WayneSallee.com charlie wrote on 11/28/2007 12:57 PM: >> It also takes longer, and waist salt. >> [quoted text clipped - 25 lines] > charlie > cave creek, az > It also takes longer, and waist salt. > [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > to the side output valve of the return pump plumbing, so I can at the > same time, pump old water from the sump down the drain in the bath tub. Then you would add fresh water to the tank to get the salinity right again? George Patterson Worry doesn't improve the future; it just ruins the present. Well, let's say, that the salinity in the tank was 1.024. Then I would make the new water 1.025 to 1.026. Doing a 50% water change would change the tank water to 1.0245 to 1.025. So when doing the water change, I would end with the sump water level slightly lower, where the sump water level would be at that salinity. I drip lime water to maintain water levels, so that will slowly bring the water level back to normal position. If I am going to do a water change, and I feel that the tank needs more fresh water, then I add some fresh water, and then do the water change. I use well water, so it's cheap. Now that I have both well water, and city water, I will eventually hook up a RO unit to the city water, one of these days. :-) The well water is so high in iron, that I don't want to hook up a RO unit to that. But my well water works great for the aquariums. It's also very high in hydrogen sulfide, which is deadly for the fish. But that degases very quickly in the storage bins, and the iron precipitates out. Wayne Sallee Wayne@WayneSallee.com George Patterson wrote on 11/28/2007 10:41 PM: >> It also takes longer, and waist salt. >> [quoted text clipped - 10 lines] > George Patterson > Worry doesn't improve the future; it just ruins the present. >i call it the stress free method, > [quoted text clipped - 12 lines] > some setups wont have the weir (u tube) problem, others will, but > overall its a stress free way to do a water change. I call it wasteful method :-) Anybody having anything to do with chemistry will tell you, that you are wasting a lot of your fresh saltwater - you mix it with dirty water so effectively you are replacing less water than the full bucket in the traditional method using two buckets: one for collecting dirty water and one full with fresh saltmix.... I cannot see how this method lower any stress... Here is why: If you have a problems with overflow/weir than you HAVE TO FIX them immediatelly or the next temporary power outage will cause your weir to stop and after restarting power your circulation pump will dump all the content of the sump on your living room floor... My overflow/weir/sump system is designed that it can take ANY power outage in any moment and the smp will never run dry and never overflow... It can be done and should be done :-) If I knew that my overflow will pour water over my floor with the next power outage I am not home I would be very stressed man :-) Second - corals will not suffer temporary exposure to air... It happens on the reef crest every day with the tidal action... If you are worried that some coraline exposed to air will white out you can get it wet during the water change with a small plastic cup... But for the most cases it is unnecesairy. > I call it wasteful method :-) > Anybody having anything to do with chemistry will tell you, > that you are wasting a lot of your fresh saltwater > I cannot see how this method lower any stress... > Here is why: > If you have a problems with overflow/weir than you HAVE TO FIX > them immediately > Second - corals will not suffer temporary exposure to air... the waste is pretty much minimal, its not much, as you leave the apparatus running about 15-20 mins, until the salt levels are the same, and the waste depends on the size of the container vs the size of the tank. you will notice i did mention it has a bit of waste of fresh saltwater, i know this, but if your using a 5 gal bucket, and a 60 gallon tank, the waste is only about 2.5% i suspect. If you were to use one bucket in, and one bucket out, it no longer becomes a 15-20 stress free change, instead it becomes a bulk of fresh sea water pouring in with no immediate mixing in the bucket. the method with 2 buckets as you mention just simply keeps the tank full, but doesn't allow for the brilliant mixing in the container. it only wastes minimal. the creatures are the concern. i do have a problem with the overflow, which you recognized, this problem is the front 3 sides of my inside overflow box is separating from the back side, and has been stable like tis for about 12 years now with a slight separation, i siliconed it once, but its not really a problem. the power outage feature always works fine, and the weir always stays full, just when more than 5 gallons are removed the gap int eh back causes it to drop below the 2inch pvc weir unfortunately. However, this isnt the reason i use this method, i use it so that the water can mix first in the change container instead of on top of my species. corals wont suffer from temp exposure to air yes, i guess, but i wouldn't want to do it as my house is pretty cold and it just seems counter productive. Also, i don't imagine anybody likes to see their tank drop this unnecessarily if theres another way :-) , and also sometimes when we do this, we stir up the water when the flow bashes back into the lower-watered tank once we start the flow again as some of us use our sump to pump it back in which stirs up the water from new heavy currents and further stresses corals with cloudy water and causes them to retract. I guess if you water doesn't stir up at all, and none of your corals retract when one does their changes then thats ok, in the best of setups, but the tank lowering isn't always necessary when doing water changes. i think marc levenson swears by this method (melevsreef.com) and the waste if minimal if your only doing a 15% change or less OR using a container thats small compared to your tank size. If your doing a 50% change then yes, this would be wasteful, but usually we should be doing a small 10-20% change and to some the trade-off of 5% salt loss is worth the trade-off of keeping the stress down. since changes can be hard on the creatures. This is just the way i do it when doing regular maintenance, but not when doing mass emergency changes. HTH > if your using a 5 gal bucket, and a > 60 gallon tank, the waste is only about 2.5% i suspect. 5/60 * 100 = 8.3% If it fully mixes, 8.3% of your 5 gallon bucket would be new salt water. >> if your using a 5 gal bucket, and a >> 60 gallon tank, the waste is only about 2.5% i suspect. > > 5/60 * 100 = 8.3% > > If it fully mixes, 8.3% of your 5 gallon bucket would be new salt water. You guys... :-) Even assuming a 60 gallon tank having 60 gallons of water (real net volume will be smaller) you both have made a mistake :-) In the bucket mixing method you will have 5 gallons of new saltwater mixed in a total volume of 60+5 water. 5/65 is 7.7%. After the water mixing you will take out 5 gallons of this mixture out but water change ration in the tank will be 7.7%. In the draining and refiling method you drained 5 gallons out of 60, and then you added 5 new saltwater to 55 remaining. Than you will replace 8.3% The difference between two methods (wated water) will be 8.3 - 7.7 - only 0.6 % of volume. Small amount but wasted for no good reason :-) In my case, I usually make bigger water replacements so from a 58 gallons oceanic running with 10 gallons sump I am draining two IO salt buckets 6.5 gallons each and replace them with two buckets of fresh saltwater... 13 gallons of new water diluting total volume of less than 58. There is no stress on animals related to the water change as long as you keep most stresful parameters of the new water (like salinity, temperature) close to the tank water. Pszemol wrote on 11/28/2007 4:30 PM: > In the bucket mixing method you will have 5 gallons of new > saltwater mixed in a total volume of 60+5 water. 5/65 is 7.7%. > After the water mixing you will take out 5 gallons of this mixture > out but water change ration in the tank will be 7.7%. Yea, I saw that too, but he probably has at least 5 gallons of rock and sand, bringing the water volume back to 60 gallons. :-) Wayne Sallee Wayne@WayneSallee.com > Yea, I saw that too, but he probably has at least 5 gallons of rock and > sand, bringing the water volume back to 60 gallons. :-) Yes, I should have made a more detailed analysis. I didn't mean to neglect the 5 gallon bucket (+5 gallons) and subject aquarium not being fully filled, rocks, sand (-5 gallons). :-) I don't think that I can buy into the 0.6% wastage. When you dump out the 5 gallon bucket of water, roughly 8% of it was the original mixed salt water used for the water change. It would be worse for larger water changes. Don't even get me started on the people that add RO/DI water to fill the tank back up before a water change. :-) Much better to drain concentrated liquid crud and then refill with salt & water to get the correct SG. --Kurt > Don't even get me started on the people that add RO/DI water to fill the > tank back up before a water change. :-) Much better to drain > concentrated liquid crud and then refill with salt & water to get the > correct SG. Yes, toping up before water change works against you. Hello Stringerbell, Sadly, the probability is that the fish died, and that if you have hermitcrabs or other inverts. they would have eaten it within hours. Regards, Fisshnut. >> I`m really bummed. >> [quoted text clipped - 14 lines] > >How long is the fish unseen? Maybe just hidding somewhere? |
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