Cucumber spawn killeing fish

[Diver Dan]

Hey i need some input my cucmber spawned today and now my chromis is half dead, my RBTA is ripping itself apart, and my zoas are closed up. What do i do? I just read that cucumber egg cells are toxic to fish... Should i do a WC?
Trever

[kthehun89]

take out the cucumber, you dont need it at all!

[Diver Dan]

Umm i dont think that will help as its already done spawning everything is breathing heavy. Dragonette is dead. 1 chromis is dead. And everything else is dying

[kthehun89]

WC, carbon, filter pad, rinse thoroughly

[barometer]

uh, cucs are toxic Trever. Though the spawning may have been cool, you very well may have a fouled tank on your hands. I'd do a big WC.....maybe a couple and run some new carbon as suggested.

[Diver Dan]

Thanks for the help guys.
So heres the breakdown of what i did:

1st- I Noticed my cucumber was shooting out red spawn. I took some pictures and thought "oh this is cool my coral will have lots to eat!" but in the back of my mind i wondered if it was taxic to keep fish from eating it. Went on my merry way and came back home from Jons 3 hours later with my new CBB and some coral. I looked at my tank and saw two different RBTA heads. I thought, "Cool my nem split!" Not even... When I flipped the rock over, bristle and other worms were climbing out of its mouth; I began to freak out. Then I take a step back from my tank. "Well theres a dead chromis... And theres my dragonette... and theres another dead chromis... And my blue tang (then white tang) in a rock." Now im really freaking out.

2nd- I catch all my fish, as i realize the cucmber spawning earlier today had caused this. Blue tang, check. Clowns, check. CBB, check. Chromis, too hard to catch, no check. I put them all in a 3 gallon bucket of water i just got from Jon because i didn't have water that wasn't filled with toxic eggs:D Within minutes of being in there my blue tang dies of shock from going to cold bucket water from warm display water... My new CBB, onyx, black osci, and RBTA are all thats left fish/invert-wise.

3rd- I get on here and freak out some more. See above.

4th- I call the last person with a reef i saw today, "Jon it's me, yeah, my fish are dying... My cucumber spawned and its poisoning the tank... Can i keep them at your place for awhile?" Jons the best reefer ever and said yeah. We raced to Jon's threw them in the tank and went to PK to get some carbon. From there, we went up to scripps, Soo much traffic; we got there and filled up 45 gallons of scripps and headed back.

Finally- I did a 35 gallon WC and one chromis made it through so far! Now im going to do a few more large WC's throughout the week and hope it doesn't affect any of the corals too much. However, the zoas are not liking all the toxic ova of the cucumber.

Lessons:
1. Dont ever buy a cucumber and give it such optimal conditions (;)) that it spawns in your tank.
2. Reef tanks suck, dont buy one of these either.
3. Crashes happen to everyone so be prepared with a lot of scripps water.

2nd tank crash in a couple days and most the fish that i killed all came from Marlin so i think he may have jinxed livestock;) Be careful things always happen in 3's...
Trever

[Techknowledgy]

Cucumbers are only good in salad.

Massive water change or three, making sure you blow all of the devils spawn down the toilet with the funky water. Micron (Diatom) filter if you have one. Super carbon. Double filter sock, repeat........

[Diver Dan]

http://i174.photobucket.com/albums/w98/diverdan_2007/IMG_6681.jpg

[Techknowledgy]

Diatom Filter.......water changes. It is the spawn of Beelzebub.

[LotsaFishies]

dang that's crazy! sorry to hear this Trev! :(

what kind of cuc, btw Trevor?

[JoeJ]

Nice pic of the blow hole of death! Sorry for your losses!
I've got a similar ticking time bomb in my tank. It has grown at least 3X, so that means that much more toxin when then time comes, if ever.
This makes for a Sea Cucumber market in which the sex organs have been excised (haha....they'd probably grow back, though!!).