[thief]

Hi guys,

well minutes ago I walked in upstairs after watching mythbusters for like 2 hours. Now I haven't been upstairs since the morning. So when I walk in the first thing that I see is a lovely carpet of HC Pearling. So I take a closer look and I see 2 dead baby shrimp. I bought 6 baby RCS about a month ago from HouseofCards. Great fellow he is! Anyways I find that they are dead. Then I look and see that 4 are huddled together in a corner along with one of my ottis. I have 2 ottis in this tank. I find one stuck in the background Hair grass and one laying on it belly barely breathing and the other one who was stuck was breathing maybe every 5 seconds. So I get the ottis unstuck and put him on his belly so he can breath better.

Next I turn my Mini Elite filter ( I highly recommend this filter) and turn it to full power so it shoot tiny bubbles like crazy into the tank. Next 2 minutes after this I am taking close observations of my tank. About 3 months ago I saw 1 lonely Hydra on a leaf of HC. No more was found since. I take Really really close observation of this tank almost everyday. So what I see hundreds and hundreds of these guys! Everywhere from substrate to the glass. I originally found these guys in my 55 gallon.

But anyways the culprit: DIY CO2. Now I have been using this for the last 4 months. It's been working out fabulous. Obviously this time it was overdose! But lately the DIY CO2 Water Bottle been slowing down. the Yeast was always stopping at about 1.5 inches of sugar. I diddn't know why so this time I thought add more. Welp I diddn't calculate it into the equation. More yeast put in more output coming out resulting in overdose of CO2.

So I guess this is my first real BAD experience in the planted tank hobby. I am glad that I went through it though. Lets me know what can happen in the future. So basically I am shaking and heart pounding as I typed this and I hope my ottis live and the shrimp.

My ottis really mean ALOT! I have spent for ever going through them and having them die and this pair has been working for a while and they ussually run around chasing eachother and pooping. lol Also I plan to set up shrimp tanks and be breeding them and selling them to the locals on this board.

I guess in this thread you can tell your Close Calls like I just have as I am sure this is a big event for everyone whos been in the hobby. I haven't had something like this since I started my first planted tank which is my 2.5 gallon here. I thought everything was going to go fine for ever and I am glad I was proven wrong.

Thanks for reading!

 

[Tex Gal]

So glad you found them. I keep a small filter and airstone handy just for an emergency like this! When I first mix up my DYI CO2 I unhook it from the airstone the first night. It's safer that way. I also have an HOB in that tank so I know they will get some O2 from the water agitation at the surface.

 

[ferris89]

good thing you got up there when you did!! another couple hours and.... *shudders*

 

[mikaila31]

Very lucky indeed!


I once killed a lot of Cherry shrimp, by overdosing pressuried co2. About 150 of the little guys. I felt so bad, and still do. Came very close to killing the fish too. The tank use to be overflowing with shrimp, but now theirs only around a dozen. I miss them, but I feel too bad to start over again.