Vacation disaster

[Jeff1192]

So I just got back from a 12 day holiday to New Hampshire, Boston and Cape Cod with my wife and kids. When I leave like that I have my 90 gallon fully automated with a fert and food doser and my sister-in-law who lives nearby comes and feeds the shrimp in my 6 gallon.

Our house is not air conditioned so the temperature in our house shot up to over 32 degrees while we were gone. My 90 gallon is on the main floor and the water temperature was at 36 when I came home.....not good. To make matters worse my auto-doser malfunctioned so no ferts and very little food went into the tank. Surprisingly the algae isn't too bad and the plants don't look too terrible either...beat up....but they'll come back.

My fish are another story.....they were almost completely wiped out. The only thing left are 2 gouramis, my 8 rummynose tetras and I have managed to find 2 of my 4 fancy plecos so far. There are still some cherry shrimp and amano shrimp as well.....everything else is gone.....not even a trace of them. The poor fish who survived must have survived by eating the dead ones......

I am so depressed. I'm doing some small water changes to bring the temperature down to a reasonable levels. I'll then have to slowly start dosing ferts until I get up to my regular levels of dosing.

This is my first major loss in my tank since starting it up in 2007.  It SUCKS.

Jeff

[morrom]

Sorry to hear that man, total bummer for sure  ! I dread leaving my tanks for a long period of time...
I wish your tank a speed recover to its former glory.

Trevor

[Fishnut]

Oh no!!  That's awful!  I'm tank sitting for someone who also has several things automated.  I checked today and did the scheduled water change.  The fish are all ok, but how am I to tell if the food and the ferts are getting administered properly?!  I just might check them a bit more often now that I read your post.

[brotherluv]

I feel your pain!  From one day to the next my Chromis, perc, and Blenny died.  Last Thursday night the Chromis were eating from my hands the next night they were gone!  It was heartbreaking!  I have one perc left in a quarantine tank.  I'm just waiting for a bit until I can find a mate for my lone survivor before they go into the main tank again.  It's hard to recover from this kind of disaster!!  I still feel horrible!! My portable air conditioner in the livingroom tripped the breaker and stopped while I was at work...Hopefully you can get everything restored!!  Sorry to hear your news.

[dark_rain]

My condolences I'm newer to the fish game, and my worst experience was losing 14 fish in one day...definitely not fun. I guess the possitive is that you didn't lose everything, and now you can decide what new fish you'd like to add. Best of luck in the future!

[washefuzzy]

I have an air conditioner just for my fish other wise my apartment would be above 90F.
First year I lost a lot of fish from the heat.
Fish can go 2 weeks without being feed so it was probable the heat that killed them.
Sorry for your lost. That sucks.

[dan2x38]

Jeff so sorry to hear of your loss. There are no words to help really but things will come back hang in there. Wish I had something to offer as replacements plants/fish but totally out of f/w. Remember you can get some great deals in Pt. Claire like Cardinals and Fancy Plecos too. If you'd like will keep an eye open for you let me know.

[lonereefer]

Just went through the same thing went to the cottage last weekend and came back toe the house steaming and my reef tank pretty boiling. No a/c at the time and 2 250watt fortunately no real seroius loss. But I'm glad it was only 3 days

[Jeff1192]

We have an a/c unit that hooks up to our patio door but obviously can't run it while we're away. I actually found my other 2 fancy old is last night while cleaning and trimming the tank. I was pretty happy about that. The other thing that took a real beating was my Christmas moss wall. It looks horrible now. I trimmed it all back and reattached the few green parts that were left bit will take some time but it will come back. My flame moss survived quite a bit better bit still looks rough. My plants will all come back I think. It will just take some time.

The only positive in all this is it lets me change up my tank a bit. I purchased some new cories yesterday to replace the ones I lost. I don't want to add too much at once so I'm going to take my time restocking things.

Jeff

[Fishnut]

Don't forget to quarantine!

Glad things are looking up

[Kodge]

Sorry to hear that. Nerve racking things, vacations. I think I got off light - got back from two weeks away last Saturday, the first long trip since I got the 37 gallon set up. Lost one platy, a second in QT not doing so well. Some of the plants have died right back.

I set up an automatic feeder - didn't get the quantity right I guess, despite lots of trial runs. It must have dumped out way too much food in the first week, looks like a bit of an ammonia spike and a small drop in pH. A few water changes and very good vacuuming, and all fish look OK, and plants are recovering.

Anyone know of a temporary aquarium service where someone could look in on a tank once a week, or anything like that?

Or perhaps I need to make get some friends involved in the hobby...

[Zigot]

I feel your pain.
Same thing happened to me ( many times ) so now I have to decide what need to be done.