[dgshoeman]

i am new to saltwater i have a 55 gal freshwater with cichlids doing great having babys and all but i started saltwater in december of 08 30 gal hex it was hard to do anything with so i got a 40 gal tall rectangle and i have a emporor 280 a seaclone skimmer 2 power heads one of them turns digital temp gauge tank is at 78degrees i have 30 lbs of base rock and 35lbs of live rock with aquacultured coral on it 1 green rose coral and a couple of star corals i have a 192 watt coral life pc with luner lighting the tank is 19in deep with a mix of live sand and crushed coral i took the sand from my 30 gal hex and most of the base rock the coral is all new i have a watermellon mushroom 15 pollups i have some yellow zenthia and a chunk of brown,pink button polups the new tank was setup 3 weeks ago the coral all did great from the start but i cant seem to keep any fish even damsels alive for more than a week now my corals have started shrinking and wont open anymore im using strontium,iodine,amino with trace,purple up my ph is 8.2 my amonia is 0-.25 if i go over 3 minutes my nitite is 0 my nitrate is 10 and my calcium is 460 my kh is 11-13 i have 2 star fish,8 snails mexican,6 blue leg crabs and one cleaner shrimp all doing great why are my corals now suffering with my water still being good? its now march 27th what is problem oh and salinty is 1.023

 

[dgshoeman]

oh and also im using nite out in my media box in the emporor 280,my light is on for 9 hrs and this problem only started 4 days ago which is 3 days after i began using night out my nitrate is the same as it was 2weeks ago i am also using chemi pure elite theres no phosifates my crapy seaclone 100 protein skimmer is pulling out about 1/4 cup of green-brown goo every 2 days also i used stability for my bacteria growth my luner lights are on 11 hrs i got some algae but very minimal i also started using an air pump about a week ago a guy at the pet store said im killing everything by over oxigenateing the water from what i hear that is impossible anyone have suggestions

 

[zona322]

first of welcome to the site

as for the tank do 1 gal water changes every other day for the next 3 weeks and stop using all chemicals and put carbon in your canister filter to get ride of what ever is in the tank, the reason that you can not keep fish is your amonia. it needs to be 0 when you get a fish it will be ok for a little bit but the amonia will burn him. so like it said do your water changers and test your water every other day and tell me how it is going
let us know if you need any other help all of us will do are best to help
craig

 

[dgshoeman]

did all the changes the mushroom coral never came back but it hasnt died off yet either it just wont open but i have 5 fish now no amonia,or nitrites,5-10 on nitrates and 440 on calcium,0phosfate and kh is 12 ph is 8.2 at 78.4 degrees i got 1 purple xenia,3button polup rocks,1yeelow polup not doing so good but i have a christmas tree worm,an orange button that are doing great and my fish are doing good too i got a mandran-with copopeds,1 tomato clown,1 lawnmower blenny, 1 mimic yellow tang,1christmas wrasse,also one coral beauty angel fish other than the coral everything is doing great the worst one is the mushroom though its been a month and wont open im debating whether to throw it out its shrunken just not dead

 

[archer772]

Stop all dosing unless you are testing for it, regular WC's will replace everything that you are dosing as in strontium,iodine,amino with trace, high levels of iodine can be very bad for your inhabitants and try to get your dkh down in the 8-10 range.