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Questions: Missing fish and found one baby...

2K views 7 replies 7 participants last post by  okiemavis 
#1 ·
Hi. I have had a tank set up with tropical freshwater fish for a little over a week now. (2 dwarf gouramis, a flame and a blue neon, 2 platies and 2 balloon mollies.) All has been well, but yesterday I noticed my flame gourami was nowhere to be seen. I saw all my fish the night before, alive and well, and looked at them first thing in the morning and noticed he was missing. I only slept about six or seven hours after going up to bed that night, so in that time he disappeared. Tank is covered, and I have looked everywhere.

Now, while my husband and I were looking for him, he lifted up a decoration and turned it upside down and we found a tiny baby fish wiggling around. I think it could have been one of my balloons because although I knew I had four livebearers, I didn't know any were pregnant for sure, but she does look a little slimmer today. So I guess over night she had babies, and we discovered a sole survivor. I sent hubby up to petco and he got a safety net for it, which it is now in. I rubbed some flakes in my fingers good to make it as fine as I could, but I will probably go back to petco to get some drops or first bites I have been reading about online.

So any tips on how to give this little one the best chances to grow and live would be appreciated. And does anyone have any advice on where this gourami went??? Has this happened to anyone before? He and the neon gourami are the biggest ones of the tank, so if he died, would it have been possible, for one fish his same size and four tiny ones to devour him in less than seven hours? The pet store lady suggested that, but I don't know.
Also, what if he is buried somehow and dead in there? I would hate to upset the balance of my tank and rip it apart to find him? I just tested my water and it was great and all the fish seem good. I'm nervous to do anything drastic so soon. But I don't want them to be unsafe with something dead hidden in there. I have good filtration, but I think he'd be too big to get filtered. Any ideas, guys? Thanks so much. :)

Sincerely, Heather
 
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#2 ·
You've got to find him, otherwise it will make things very bad for the surviving fish. As it is, your tank had the potential to poison the remainder of your fish due to "new tank syndrome", in which a person gets a new tank and fully stocks it because of course the LFS didn't bother to explain cycling. How big is the tank? Temp? I STRONGLY advice you to get a liquid test kit (API is one of the best) and post your parameters. NO TEST STRIPS!!!!

And welcome to the forum.
 
#4 ·
Questions: Missing fish and found one baby...Update...

Okay...so we found the fish, dead obviously, under the undergravel filter and also discovered another baby. Put it in the net, but both died today. :-( I did a 25% water change and put a new filter cartridge in, so perhaps that was a bit stressful on them? Idk, but it needed to be done. I did have my water tested last week. It was really good, but I am gonna do it again tomorrow and probably once a week.
We brought the dead fish back to Petco and exchanged it for a female rainbow platy and got some money back. While I was looking around, I discovered a couple baby black molly fry, which they gave us for free. :) I have those in the net now. They are slightly more developed than the other two that died and are doing well swimming around and eating. They are so cute! :) All is well for now.
 
#6 ·
I second Flashygrrl's post. You need to get yourself a liquid test kit instead of relying on the fish store to tell you what's going on. Unless there was a miracle, there's no way a week-old tank is already cycled and has good parameters for a healthy tank. I would probably attribute the dead gourami and dead fry to ammonia buildup in your tank. Is there any way you could move your fish out of your tank and continue cycling fishless? This would be the best bet for your fish. If you leave things going as-is, you're likely going to have more deaths before the cycle finishes and the tank stablizes.
 
#7 ·
an uncycled tank really isnt a great environment for wee fish, especially if you didnt throughly acclimate them, and its tough on the bitty ones too. Itll just take a little time is all, try to resist the urge to swap out your filter cartridge, though, until its so clogged it slows the water flow down. good stuff grows on it which will help you along :)
 
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