Anthelia dead or alive?

[felixfish]

The 2 times I have attempted to put corals in, 1, pulsing Xenia (wilted and died), and 2, a rock filled with Anthelia waving hand corals (didn't open, took out) I have had no luck. My anthelia dropped a few arms and I added them to my tank. It's day 3 now and only 2 of the polyps are open. Do you think it is just acclimating to my system at home? I have been running an algae turf scrubber and my nitrates and phos are reading like .1 If they are going threw some acclimating stage, I would like to try and add that rock full of them again.

 

[Toolman]

Xenia does that don't give up on it The only way I got rid of it was to trade in the rock it was growing on started off with a piece the size of a quarter and 6 months later it owned the tank.........:grumble:

 

[little_fish]

Are you also having problems keeping snails and crabs alive? Also didnt you have a piece of exposed copper wire in your tank?

 

[felixfish]

Yes. I haven't checked for copper yet. My hermit crabs are doing fine, and I have one snail that's living, but he doesn't move around very much. I did a voltage test and found this cheap heater was leaking 6v into the tank and I unplugged it. And a day after the snail I had living moved from a spot near the bottom of the tank to the top. You think that copper wire I had in the tank leeched to anything in the tank? My fish are doing fine.

 

[little_fish]

I would suspect you have copper in your rocks and sand, and that is what it killing your inverts. Its toxic at levels test kits cant measure, so im not sure if that will help you at all. Also its impossible to remove copper from the rocks and sand. So you either need to do a FOWLR with this tank or start over with all new rocks and sand.

 

[felixfish]

So if it's not measurable with tests how do I know if I have it? If I have to change all that I will not be happy. Thanks for your advise.

 

[little_fish]

Considering almost off the inverts you have put in the tank have died but your fish are just fine, i would suspect you have a copper problem

 

[felixfish]

Is that going to effect the coral? If I do have this issue, I have a semi deep sand bed, could I scoop out the top layer and either replace, or have the live sand exposed?

 

[little_fish]

Copper is toxic to all inverts, corals are inverts, therefore they will be effected by the copper.

And the copper is everywhere in your system, removing a layer of sand wont change a thing