Emergency...help please

[krislewis3]

8834788346I screwed up, and forgot to turn my cannister filter on for 4 hours after my WC. I had air stones on, and didn't nicotine that my filter wasn't on. Have I killed all the bn in my filter??OMG......I added 1 teaspoon of safe..but I'm freaking out...please advise....Kris

[rickztahone]

4 hrs isn't too long IMHO. Yes, you will lose a good part of your colony, but not all of it. Monitor your parameters, and do more WC's accordingly. I have left a filter off over night, and while I did get a small spike, after a few water changes it was back to normal.

If I remember correctly, were you the one getting false positve readings because of the prime? How do your discus look?

[krislewis3]

88348

Thank you Rick for responding. Yes, I am the one who was concerned about my tap water readings. I just did another test, which are the readings i just posted.....what do you think? I'm thinking they look better. If I have lost significant BB, how long should it take to re-establish it? And should I do 100% daily wc, and if so, for how long??? Oh yea...the fish look, and are acting fine. Kris

[discuspaul]

As Ricardo said, you should be just fine. Even if some BB have been lost, they will re-establish very quickly - probably overnite. Just check for ammonia say, twice daily for next couple of days, and do a large wc right away if you get any noticeable reading.

[Altum Nut]

Kris...I would think it should be fine. Your canister filter I assume would have had water in it while it was off and you did not clean the media so it should still be packed and sure there is lots of beneficial bacteria that will multiple in no time.
Just monitor and make sure any ammonia levels don't spike.
Your second reading looked much better...

...Ralph

[krislewis3]

Thanks for the encouragement guys. I will keep a close watch on ammonia, and if I don't like a resding, I will be back here asking more questions. Helpfully, I can slide through this mistake without any major problems. I will keep you guys posted. Thanks again, for now...Kris

[warblad79]

Relax, just keep up with the large WC , don't worry too much. The colony will establish in couple days. Sometimes I purposely turn off my canister filter to quarantine the whole tank besides I do 100% WC daily anyway so canister filter don't really matter. In Asia they don't any filtration just airstone.

[Ryan]

One note on canisters: if they do go without power for too long, the bacteria will suffocate and die. You can usually go a couple hours, but I'd be leery about letting it sit for much longer than that. Essentially what happens is the bacteria die off and create a nasty, smelly soup in your canister that gets pumped into your tank the second you turn it back on. People have wiped out whole tanks of fish that way.

A few weeks ago I unplugged the canister on my 210 during a water change and forgot about it for almost two days. It wasn't a big deal because I also have a wet-dry system on that tank, but when I realized the filter had been off I dragged it to the bath tub and opened it. The smell almost knocked me over. I must have squeezed sponges in hot water for 30 minutes trying to get all that nasty dead bacteria out of them. Essentially I had to start over. Luckily there was plenty of beneficial bacteria in the wet-dry.

Anyway, my point is that you can sometimes salvage the BB, but if you leave it off for too long, it's best to err on the side of caution and open the filter for a good rinse and squeeze before firing it back up again. It'll at least get any stagnant water out and hopefully take the bacteria that died off with it.

[MadMatt]

88348

Thank you Rick for responding. Yes, I am the one who was concerned about my tap water readings. I just did another test, which are the readings i just posted.....what do you think? I'm thinking they look better. If I have lost significant BB, how long should it take to re-establish it? And should I do 100% daily wc, and if so, for how long??? Oh yea...the fish look, and are acting fine. Kris
I would suggest there really isn't much ammonia that a 50% wc couldn't solve. If you really want to get your water back to zero do 60% wc every two hrs for 6 hrs (3 times). Make sure you use aged water. This will bring your water back to zero and away you go with a more established filter. If it starts to creep start doing water changes again.
While your canister cycles again you can always use a HOB with ammonia removing chemical media, this will remove part of the ammonia while you play the wait game on the canister.
I have had to do this before and never had an ill effect. If your afraid your removing minerals you can always treat with discus essentials.
Best of luck, but you can solve a low reading of ammonia with a wc or two.
;)

[DonMD]

In one of our recent storms I lost power for 8 hours (generator was in the shop for maintenance, go figure). Both canister filters on my 125 display, after the power returned, had zero ammonia bump. No problems at all.

[krislewis3]

This is a photo of today's ammonia test prior to WC. I'm thinking that the bn in my cannister is alive and well. Do you guys agree?




88373

[rickztahone]

agreed.

One thing to keep in mind with discus, is that they will ALWAYS tell you (without speaking lol) when they aren't well. You will notice a difference in behavior. More skittish, hides more, less appetite, darkening, etc. Keep an eye on these things and others things aren't as important many times.

[DISCUS STU]

I screwed up, and forgot to turn my cannister filter on for 4 hours after my WC. I had air stones on, and didn't nicotine that my filter wasn't on. Have I killed all the bn in my filter??OMG......I added 1 teaspoon of safe..but I'm freaking out...please advise....Kris

Four (4) hours?! That ain't nuthin'! I once forgot to open the valve on my Eheim for about four days, possibly longer. I'd like to say it only happened once. (lol).

With water changes and plenty of tlc nothing died, even without having an active filer or water changes for a few days (I was less diligent then). This goes into the "Stupid Mistakes" column that everyone makes sooner or later.

[warblad79]

I remember someone mention on different thread saying that Test Kit is the worst invention.

[DISCUS STU]

I remember someone mention on different thread saying that Test Kit is the worst invention.

Really? It just looks like an all-in-one of all the individual test kits that I bought singly that cost me much more money.

Think I'll look into investing into this one sometime in the future. As a 4-in-1 it seems to have everything that's important with the exception of water hardness (gh) and carbonate, which is another API kit.

[MadMatt]

This is a photo of today's ammonia test prior to WC. I'm thinking that the bn in my cannister is alive and well. Do you guys agree?





88373
At least the BB that eats ammonia is doing well. What about your nitrite???