- Location
- Albany, NY
Well yesterday afternoon a fellow reefer called in distress as his 90 gallon tank had leaked and was full of corals that needed saving. Being an exepreienced reefer with a 450 gallon and 125 gallon tank, he correctly assumed that I can help board many if not all of the corals. Time was critical to get the corals moved and into water so they could survive. I spent several hours last night moving corals, rocks and frags from 3 coolers after acclimation into my tank. About 1 am I had finished and went to bed. Having worked with corals before, and needing to get to the bottom of a 36 inch deep tank, I wasnt worried about gloves as even my shoulder length ones would have had water in them. When fragging or even cleaning filters I am always gloved with eye and other precautions, but never thought about needing precautions moving corals into the tank. Of course up till now I have brought one or two corals home at a time (except for possibly a frag even but even then have only had a few) and they were bagged so limited if any chemical warfare via transportation. About 2 am I started wheezing and have spent today coughing with a deep asthma like wheeze. In hind sight, as I now have a fever, I am reasonably certain that the zoas, palys and other corals while in the coolers were engaged in chemical warfare to protect themselves. Without thinking about the numbers in the coolers and that they were all occupying the same space, i went about making sure they got into the tank quickly and had enough space around them to be good neighbors. What I should have paid attention to, was that the likelihood of them moving without being upset by the move and proximity to other corals was great. I am now monitoring my breathing and symptoms and have contacted my physician along with writing a note to insure that if I call 911 that folks know quickly what happened. Fortunately I do not think I got a huge dose, but with deep wheezing, painful cough, fever and headache, I am reasonably certain the creatures I was trying to help save, attacked me as they tried to defend themselves from each other. Word to the wise, gloves and precautions always.
