OOOPS I made a slight mistake.

[guitarest]

OK so Sunday was kinda boring and i was sitting in the living room where all the tanks are and looking at the 100gal tank. A light bulb went off and I decided to move some stuff around in the tank to open it up a little more. I figured a greater flow of water, more open areas would equal a happier tank. So I started removing all the oyster shells and a few of the silk plants, then the huge turtle walk way converted to a fish ramp. I modified the unit by drilling a few holes in it and stuffing a few plants in the holes. The air no longer is trapped in the walkway so life is good; the crabs and crawfish love the turtle walkway. So back to the story I did allot of moving around and while I was careful sand was disturbed and it did cloud the tank some. After I was finished the tank cleared up nicely but today the chemicals spiked and it clouded up. The nitrates and nitrate were in the danger zones but the ammonia was nil. Everything else was in the good zone so here comes the stupid question of the day............

Was this huge spike caused by moving all the plants and shells and disturbing the sand in my tank? The tank has been very good for a few weeks since fish have been removed and I got control of my over feeding them.

Now on to something else I have had tanks almost all my life but this is the first time on this scale and I do like to share my little misadventures.... lol Speaking of something thats started happening recently is some of the fish have lost fear of me and know that when I sit down in front of the tank with a small cup its feeding time. I purchased some really small shrimp at Rouses and I will tear them apart in my fingers and the Spade fish, the Croakers, the Bull Minnows and also the large Catfish have started eating out of my hand. Its frigging cool.................... At least to this child it cool...

[Sandy]

I could be wrong, but I do believe that stirring the sand up moving things around alot may cause a chemical spike. I think it depends on how deep the sandbed is and how much it gets stirred around.

I think it is cool being able to hand feed fish. I think there is still alittle child in all of us!

[Gerwin]

messing with the sand can absolutely cause a Nirite spike have seen this many time at the store via water samples from tanks that have been moved but just a little stirring rarely does this unless you were on the edge of going bad anyway.
Feeding heavy organics like fresh shrimp is good nutritionally, I mean its the real deal how could it be bad? as long as its all eaten (every bit) and you do not feed till they are just super fat (what goes in must come out) fish have to look for food in nature they stay on the search (probably why fisherman catch them )

Over feeding is IMO the #1 cause of failure in the aquarium hobby and its hard to train the curator because it is so cool to have your own little Ecosystem that waits on you to care for them.

Water Change Partial, immediately when this occurs. and rinse of organics from filters but do not bleach and scrub them down,and do not replace them with new! just a quick rinse. Figure out why it occured and resolve it.

Probably need to cut and paste this somewhere....

[Doug]

Water Change Partial, immediately when this occurs. and rinse of organics from filters but do not bleach and scrub them down,and do not replace them with new! just a quick rinse.

I always used to give sponge block filters and the like a gentle squeeze and rinse in the partial water change water just removed from the tank, with the aim being to remove excess particulates, but not to kill biological activity within with chlorinated tap water. Is this not a common practice these days?

[guitarest]

Wow so then the water change and cleaning the filters like I did was the right thing to do... I'm learning... lol

I am pretty careful about the real food, I do make sure its all eaten and the only ones allowed to have large chunks of shrimp/fish are the blue crabs. Their gills produce such a huge and powerful stream and excess food jets off to a waiting fish out side the claws length.

At night time I drop 2 algae tabs on the hermit crab highway and by morning they are gone also.

Thanks for the advice again...

[guitarest]

messing with the sand can absolutely cause a Nirite spike have seen this many time at the store via water samples from tanks that have been moved but just a little stirring rarely does this unless you were on the edge of going bad anyway.
Feeding heavy organics like fresh shrimp is good nutritionally, I mean its the real deal how could it be bad? as long as its all eaten (every bit) and you do not feed till they are just super fat (what goes in must come out) fish have to look for food in nature they stay on the search (probably why fisherman catch them )

While I tried not to stir up the sand but I did move allot of sand and in some places near to the bottom of the tank..... Note to self dont do that again.