Updates

Well a lot has happened since my last post.

We lost the cleaner shrimp a week or so ago. Just one day wasnt' there any more. I ketp doing water changes and my parameters didn't get better. So checked with a local reef store and they suggested we stop feeding "so much" and we dropped to a once a week schedule. No more. My critters were so hungry the peppermits killed and ate a snail (orange one too). Rainbow (the cleaner) disasppeared and if I had ot wager I'd bet she rain afoul of the bristle star. Either that or a mold didn't go well and same result.

We bought a pair of clownfish a while ago and had one get behind the foam wall and die. In trying to get it out I stirred up the tank. Well the second one passed a few days later and I had to stir the tank up something awful to get it out. Ended up taking the tank apart and draining all the water. Put in another small bag of live sand and rearranged the rocks (dumped the elkhorn coral crud from SWF.com) and put everything back together. The good news was that a headcount showed that I had nearly everythign that had been put in the tank. Even if I hadn't seen them all in some time.

So anyway, we let the tank settle down some more but the parameters were still not great. Broke down and bought my skimmer and it is now in place. Pulling yellow/brown gunk out of the tank. Goting to test the water agin in a little bit.

Oh yea. We replaced the two clownfish and these are alive and swimming around after a week. So I'm thinking the first pair was ill to start with.