absolutely clueless

[ace37]

So in the span of a day my torch coral died and my firefish got spooked my my female clown and tried to jump out and hit my cover and is now dead. My water parameters are 0 ammonia 0 nitrite 10ppm nitrate 8.2 ph i have reef LEDs for lighting and on top of everything i have a crap load of hair algae. My zoas, shrimp, and clowns seem to be perfectly fine. So why are things randomly dying. And how the hell do you get rid of hair algae

 

[justanotherfishhead]

Don't panic, just a bad day. Sounds like your water is okay, and the firefish was just a fluke. I'm not sure about torch coral cause I've never had one, but are you sure it's dead and not just going through a funk? Sometimes corals act weird for a few days and get over it. As for hair algae, just scrub it off the rocks and maybe add a few more clean-up crew (turbos are good) and do a few large water changes. I had it too, they say sometimes it's just a phase a new tank goes through and it'll get better.

 

[ace37]

The torch basically spit its self out the only thing left was the stony base.

 

[wontonflip]

Don't know about the torch, but how long have you had the firefish?

How many clowns did you have in the tank? You said your other clownS (plural) are fine? So you had 3, but one tried to jump out? Maybe the others bullied the 3rd one? Were the other 2 dead fish behaving ok?

 

[ace37]

The only fish that died was the firefish and i had him for almost two months as for the clowns i have a mated pair and they are fine . They are just being clowns.

 

[Northstar24]

Hair algae means you have excess nutrients in your water. You're nitrate may only be testing at 10 ppm, but I'm guessing its far higher than that and the hair algae is absorbing it before it can show up on the tests. Do you have a phosphate test? Nuisance algae really comes down to nutrient export

Also, do you use tap water or RO/DI?

The excess nutrients could have been enough to cause the torch coral to 'melt' away. I recently battled some nitrate issues due to overfeeding a new fish, and I lost several corals in my tank the same way.

As far as the firefish goes, they are fish that are easily spooked, just sounds like you got hit with some bad luck. I dont think there is anything different you could have done here

 

[ZyberGoby]

with Hair algae do not scrub it off the rock tweeze it off and remove it from the tank scrubbing will spread it faster than it just growing in one spot. i would deff look at your phosphates because hair algae will feed on it and grow like wild fire the higher it is. I'm just getting over a crash and had a vary bad case of hair algae. one thing you can do is its an easy rock to remove is pull it out and spray it with hydrogen peroxide let it sit for about 3 min then place it back in the tank when you see it turn gray/white start tweezing it off. if it is on corals you can do the same. if it is bad you can do what Smitty and i have done drain the tank spray every thing let it sit for about 3 min replace the water then do a water change and tweeze away the die off algae. as for your torch prob just melted away if the head is floating around the tank it is a vary slim chance its still alive and will attach its self to a serface and rebuild its stalk but its a slim chance. firefish are like dartfish they do jump so that could just be the case with that.

 

[Smitty]

Is your led light too close to the tank, because the leds can kill some corals(i know from experience). And a few turbo snails will take care of the algae for you.

 

[ZyberGoby]

Is your led light too close to the tank, because the leds can kill some corals(i know from experience). And a few turbo snails will take care of the algae for you.

+1 smitty the turbos are great just to add if you have any thing that is not glued inplace or some how attached they will bulldoze through and knock things over if not off where they are. but other than that little annoyance they are great at consuming algae.