Rude Awakening

Well, today was far and away my worst day as an aquarist. In the morning, as I walked behind my 30 gallon aquarium, I saw the water in the bubble counter was almost gone, which I thought odd. I then noticed that the bottle had been sweating quite a bit, as it had water all over the surface and a pool underneath. I was at this point that I realized the bottle was empty and the rate at which it evacuated was sufficient to push water out of the couter as well as drop the bottle temperature significantly.

Looking at the gauges confirmed my conclusion, but it took another instant for the nightmarish realization of what the water conditions were. I knew the pH must have plummeted, but I was hoping against hope that the fish were all right. That's when I saw the first dead neon tetra floating at the top. As I circled around to the front of the aquarium, my heart drop as I gazed upon an aquascape full of little fishy carcasses. Hoping against hope, I nudged a few of them to elicit some hopeful movement (the drawf gourami was resting vertically like a statue), but I found no signs of life. Even the snails were completely inactive.

I took some time to try and find all of the little bodies all over the aquarium and bagged them for the trash. I did a huge water change to try and help raise the pH, but I would have to leave the tank alone to go to work.

When I returned home in the evening, I was pleasantly surprised to find that my snails were up and moving about. It was a little solace in an otherwise heart-wrenching day. In my cursory internet search, I found a couple of websites that told similar stories to mine:

• http://www.aquariumadvice.com/
• http://forum.aquatic-gardeners.org/

They left me feeling simultaneously vindicated and angered, both at whoever wrote the directions that were sent out with the regulator and at myself for trusting them to the extent that I felt comfortable with it turning on without my supervision.

Exit Light... Enter Night!

Well, this "grey slime algae" has been one tought nut to crack, but I'm beginning to think that the addition of pressurized CO2 is not going to help. So I need to find some way to get rid of it before the CO2 system is ready.

Wandering around on the web, I found this thread on Aquatic Plant Central that was mostly about grey slime algae: Ethromycin Use? I had considered using hydrogen peroxide per a suggestion elsewhere, but the thread turned into a debate on the merits of tank medication. Tom Barr made a strong arguement for the use of a black-out. So I'm going to drape a couple towels over the tank and hope the algae is gone when I uncover it later this week. Then with my new Estimative Index approach to fertilization and some bottled CO2, hopefully the plants will be ready to kick ass at the end of the week.