Urgent Extreme overdose calcium

Help! I have a mixed reef tank, my calcium was pretty low so I decided to use some purple up I got from a friend, the bottle slipped into the sump and spilt, the tank is extremely cloudy I fear for my yellow tang and coral, i already started the filter for a water change any other advice would be great I'll add photos ASAP.... It's about 80 gallons with sps lps , clowns, engineer gobies, I wanted to only add about 7 ml I bet about ten times as much fell in, im about to take a calciuM test...

 

The easiest solution would have been (for future reference) turning off the return pump, and removing and replacing the sump water.

 

Hi danhodl

once the water clears, which it will do, I think you will find everything will be OK
These types of event are pretty common IME, I have seen it a few times, here and round and about the place

you may find your calcium and alkalinity are elevated, and post those numbers when you have them

you may get some precipitation, as it is possible not all the ions will stay in solution
so you might want to check heaters, pumps, powerheads etc for heavy carbonate deposits which can effect performance (clean these in vinegar if you do notice an issue)

Nvizms suggestion is fantastic for anyone else who has a similar issue in future, if you drop something in the sump, turn of the circulation , and then deal with issue in the sump

Steve

 

I did that but most of it got through, kind of panicked really, I was half asleep from driving today. calcium was at 380 and alk was between 13/14. Still a bit cloudy so I'll retest later tonight. my alk was at around 8 before so the increase I'm thinking will burn some coral but a large water change should remedy that some, it was time anyways for one.

Thanks guys. I figured Steve that overdosing purple up might be common but didn't see much of anything on my initial google search so I ran here cause I knew 3reef was watching out

 

You should be OK, but never, ever, never pour anything directly into the water. Pour it into another container, cup, bowl whatever, then into the tank or sump. Use those containers for fish related stuff.

And look into the proper dosing of calcium and alkalinity. Lose the Purple Up.

 

Sorry for the photos I used my phone. My camera is dead

 

Actually I use esv b-ionic, but for whatever reason my calcium has been so low for the past two months, and decided to see what the purp would do, ya I'm def keeping my bottles far from the sump from now on, this was scary

 

As far as supplements go I think Calcium is the best to have an accident with. The excess Ca+ usually falls out of solution before anything dies.

 

Calcium is one thing, but purple up contains a lot more than just calcium, has a lot of "trace elements". I believe one of those that it has a rather strong concentration of is iodine, which can be deadly in high levels.
I would do a big water change ASAP. And please post the actual ingredients so we know exactly what we are dealing with.

 

I think Purple Up is mostly Magnesiumm actually but that is the inherant problem with additives like this is it's not really clear what you are adding.I would check the Mag. level and take PL's advice and do a waterchange as it does contain ionic calcium and iodine as well as strontium.
All the other advise given here is sound IMO.