Tank crashed...need advice on restarting...

[Legent]

Hi fellow reefers,

After 1 month, my 4 gallon tank crashed after one of my fished died on me...the fish wasnt eating well and it crashed shortly after i introduced a coral my friend gave me...

Learnt my lesson and gonna tank things reallyyyyy slow now...

Right now I've removed the dead crabs and snails with the uber stinky coral with just my liverock and sand and filter still turned on.

My question is, what do i do now if i wanna restart the tank again?

Should I 'wash' the rocks and sand or should i just change out the water and let it cycle again?

My sand bed is filled with nasty stuff i guess and do i need to remove my 1 inch sandbed?

My current filter media is coral chips, Pura complete and some ceramic rings. Do I remove and wash the media? What other suggestions for filteration should I use? I have 2 compartments behind my tank to fill in media.

[Gouldian]

If I were you, I will:

• remove whatever nasties and die-off
  
• clear of 1 inch of the sandbed
  
• run the pura for another few days to absorb any trace elements that is causing the crash
  
• change to new pura media after the that
  
• wash the LR with old tank water if they are slime or whatever nasties
  
• all this time, I will keep the circulation and skimmer running
  

[bluemask]

Looks like you did not do a proper cycling before adding livestocks I would suggest buying a big bottle of beneficial bacterias & dose daily till all crucial perimeters are within acceptable level.

[Legent]

My tank was fully cycled and tested for 4 days before livestock...

My initial guess was that maybe the broken off coral had died in the water and causing huge ammonia spike. 2 polyps had broken off during transportation of the clove coral. And there was no way to tell if it was alive or dead......

Or if not its the dead fish that started the chain reaction...

[braincoral]

Given a small tank ..

Best is to redo the whole thing ..,

Cycle the tank longer ...

[james72]

Small tank are harder to keep than big tank due to the volume of water. One small live stock die on you or you overfeed or oversee any parameters, game over.

I always feel small reef tank are for experts only.

[jxlex]

I will vote for a complete restart since tank is small...

[Jameshong]

Take this opportunity....upgrade to bigger tank . !

[jxlex]

[netviper]

Bigger tank minimize the chance of crashing. Nano tank needs more experience to maintain it.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

[Zac]

I will restart tank also

[andythiam]

Bro kindly update us how is your restart also.

[Legent]

Hi Bros,

Just restarted my tank. Took everything out, filter media, sand, water, everything.

Washed my tank, left the live rocks in the old tank water placed it into newly washed tank, fill in new sand of about 1/2 inches, mix water to abt 1.23 salinity, then pour in.

This is the new look now.

I intend to only keep corals and sexy shrimps, no more fish. Scared liao.

Bros I now have 2 empty compartments originally meant to put in filter media + cartridge (the ocean free qianhu 16 litre tank)

The previous filter cartridge and coral chips are all brown and disgusting. So what will be a good material to fill it in? More live rocks? (very small kinds or i break them myself) The pura complete will go in later.

Thanks for any advice bros

[Legent]

Man i do not know how to post pics under the reply tab!! lol

[Legent]

haha found it...here's my new tank look... Also I had a narcisccus snail alive after the crash. Should I keep this little thing in the new tank?

[fishyfishyfishy]

Hi Bros,

Just restarted my tank. Took everything out, filter media, sand, water, everything.

Washed my tank, left the live rocks in the old tank water placed it into newly washed tank, fill in new sand of about 1/2 inches, mix water to abt 1.23 salinity, then pour in.

This is the new look now.

I intend to only keep corals and sexy shrimps, no more fish. Scared liao.

Bros I now have 2 empty compartments originally meant to put in filter media + cartridge (the ocean free qianhu 16 litre tank)

The previous filter cartridge and coral chips are all brown and disgusting. So what will be a good material to fill it in? More live rocks? (very small kinds or i break them myself) The pura complete will go in later.

Thanks for any advice bros

You might like to invest in a good brand of bio media for the filter compartment. You can try looking at bacteria King or biohome. You can also add a quality carbon for water clarity. Last but not least make sure you cycle for at imo at least 2 to 3 weeks with just live rocks you might like to dose bacteria for them to colonize the rocks. You might also like to invest in a little wave maker like those from resun or sunsun (I'm not exactly sure) for better water quality.

I used to have a similar tank for 4 months too !

[Legent]

Went ahead and bought 300g of bio home, used about 100g of it plus filter wool on top. Added half finger sized prawn in. My first time using a prawn to cycle.

So when should I take out the prawn? Or leave it in there till I register 0 ammonia?

And how often should i change out the wool? Or should I just put biohome only? Cos I read and heard about destritus clogging on the biohome and will cause a lot of nitrate.

[fishyfishyfishy]

In my opinion, I chose not to use wool. It's gona clog up detritus and I don't think it really do much to maintain your water considering the hassle of changing every week. Alternatively you might like to look at poly filter wool, at least it's benefits seems to outweigh it cost of Cumbersome weekly changes.

I would take out the biomedia and shake it or rise it with salt water every 1 month plus or 2 months to get rid of any detritus.

Personally I don't use market prawn to cycle, however I guess it would be safe to remove it when ammonia and nitrite reads zero or close to it. I believe you should refrain from water changes during cycling as well.

Cheers

[jxlex]

If I'm not wrong you have 3 compartments behind with the first 2 being usable. IMHO if u want to put mechanical sponges, etc, I would put in first compartment and leave the biohome in the second compartment. Do change it 1-2 a month... I prefer going the biological way though...

Have fun bro!

[jxlex]

I think you can just leave it in there till it rots away

Nh and no2 undetectable should point u to the right direction bro...

[Legent]

Bros, the water parameters for the past 4 days are as follows with the prawn rotting pretty quickly.

I have live rocks, new sandbed with biohome media. Live rocks are from the crashed tank of about 1 month.

Day 1 : Ammonia 0.5 Nitrite 0.25 Nitrate 5ppm

Day 2 : Ammonia 0.5 Nitrite 0.25

Day 3 Ammonia 0.25 Nitrite 0.5

Day4 : Ammonia 0.25 Nitrite 0.5 Nitrate 40ppm

So question:

1. I have a lot of nitrate buildup. Does it mean the cycling is done?

2. There is still ammonia and nitrite. Could it be that my biological filter has reached it max conversion rate and my prawn is too big a piece for the tank to break down?

[Gouldian]

Bros, the water parameters for the past 4 days are as follows with the prawn rotting pretty quickly.

I have live rocks, new sandbed with biohome media. Live rocks are from the crashed tank of about 1 month.

Day 1 : Ammonia 0.5 Nitrite 0.25 Nitrate 5ppm

Day 2 : Ammonia 0.5 Nitrite 0.25

Day 3 Ammonia 0.25 Nitrite 0.5

Day4 : Ammonia 0.25 Nitrite 0.5 Nitrate 40ppm

So question:

1. I have a lot of nitrate buildup. Does it mean the cycling is done?

2. There is still ammonia and nitrite. Could it be that my biological filter has reached it max conversion rate and my prawn is too big a piece for the tank to break down?

Nitrate is the by-product of nitrification, thus when you have high nitrate it only means that you cycle is yet to complete. This is because you still have the prawn decaying in your tank. With decomposition, ammonia will be produced and nitrification.

You will need more time for the nitrification bacteria to build and handle the decompostion now happening in your tank.

Side note:

Nitrifying bacteria reproduce by binary division. Under optimal conditions, Nitrosomonas may double every 7 hours and Nitrobacter every 13 hours. More realistically, they will double every 15-20 hours. This is an extremely long time considering that heterotrophic bacteria can double in as short a time as 20 minutes. In the time that it takes a single Nitrosomonas cell to double in population, a single E. Coli bacterium would have produced a population exceeding 35 trillion cells.

[Legent]

Haha wow a very scientific answer...hehe...nice to learn something new!

[jxlex]

remember to water change too

[terencekhung]

It's always need to be slow for better results