Hello everyone,
Two out of three of my yoyo loaches have died, and the third one is acting strangely. I hope that somebody has some insight that may save him!
History: I have a 60 gal planted freshwater tank that's been set up for roughly 4 months. I've been slowly adding fish, and about 3 months ago I added the fish (2 neon tetras and the 3 yoyo loaches) from my old 29 gal tank (it has been set up for 2 years) to the new thank. 1.5 months ago I started injecting CO2 into the tank.
Tank facts:
Ammonia - 0
Nitrites - 0
Nitrates - 0
Substrate - sand layered over cinder pebbles (the cinder is a substrate fertilizer for the plants)
Water changes - 10-20 % weekly
pH - 7.8
hardness - unsure, but San Diego tap water is VERY HARD
Current Residents of the 60 gallon tank:
- 3 danios
- 3 siamese algae eaters
- 2 neon tetras
- Now only 1 yoyo loach
- 6 harlequin rasboras
Issue: Almost as soon as I added the loaches to the 60 gallon tank, I noticed that they like to lay down and wriggle around in the sandy substrate. I know loaches dig, so I didn't think too much of it. About a month or so ago, I noticed that they were more rubbing than digging. They do a sort of sideways rub on the sand, really fast, and then go back to swimming. About a week ago I noticed one of them was getting redness around his mouth. No swelling, nothing else, just red mouth. I thought he had probably cut himself on something (perhaps the cinder? some of it has come to the surface of the substrate, and it looks pretty scratchy) and it was getting infected. He stopped eating, too, which I guessed was from the mouth sore. Of the other two loaches, one seemed to have a small sore behind one gill (picture included, see arrow) and possibly one cloudy eye (see other picture), and the other one looks fine. All of them act a little strange though - darting, hiding out more than usual, not really coming to the surface to eat. I started dosing with Melafix to cure the infection that I thought was occurring.
Two days later the loach with the mouth sore died. As of yesterday (day 5 of Melafix), the remaining two ate a little, but continue their strange behavior and the small sore on one of them seemed unchanged.
This morning I woke up and the one with the sore was dead. No other lesions on his body, and none on the other loach at all. All the other fish in the tank are completely normal.
My loaches have been awesome troopers for 2 years, and I can't understand what's bringing them down now. Does anyone have any ideas? My only theory was the infection due to an accidental scrape (doesn't explain the behavior though). The only other thought I have is that although my pH hasn't changed much since adding CO2 (from 8.0 to 7.8 ), perhaps the hardness has gone down drastically and that's had an effect?
Any ideas??? Please??
Two out of three of my yoyo loaches have died, and the third one is acting strangely. I hope that somebody has some insight that may save him!
History: I have a 60 gal planted freshwater tank that's been set up for roughly 4 months. I've been slowly adding fish, and about 3 months ago I added the fish (2 neon tetras and the 3 yoyo loaches) from my old 29 gal tank (it has been set up for 2 years) to the new thank. 1.5 months ago I started injecting CO2 into the tank.
Tank facts:
Ammonia - 0
Nitrites - 0
Nitrates - 0
Substrate - sand layered over cinder pebbles (the cinder is a substrate fertilizer for the plants)
Water changes - 10-20 % weekly
pH - 7.8
hardness - unsure, but San Diego tap water is VERY HARD
Current Residents of the 60 gallon tank:
- 3 danios
- 3 siamese algae eaters
- 2 neon tetras
- Now only 1 yoyo loach
- 6 harlequin rasboras
Issue: Almost as soon as I added the loaches to the 60 gallon tank, I noticed that they like to lay down and wriggle around in the sandy substrate. I know loaches dig, so I didn't think too much of it. About a month or so ago, I noticed that they were more rubbing than digging. They do a sort of sideways rub on the sand, really fast, and then go back to swimming. About a week ago I noticed one of them was getting redness around his mouth. No swelling, nothing else, just red mouth. I thought he had probably cut himself on something (perhaps the cinder? some of it has come to the surface of the substrate, and it looks pretty scratchy) and it was getting infected. He stopped eating, too, which I guessed was from the mouth sore. Of the other two loaches, one seemed to have a small sore behind one gill (picture included, see arrow) and possibly one cloudy eye (see other picture), and the other one looks fine. All of them act a little strange though - darting, hiding out more than usual, not really coming to the surface to eat. I started dosing with Melafix to cure the infection that I thought was occurring.
Two days later the loach with the mouth sore died. As of yesterday (day 5 of Melafix), the remaining two ate a little, but continue their strange behavior and the small sore on one of them seemed unchanged.
This morning I woke up and the one with the sore was dead. No other lesions on his body, and none on the other loach at all. All the other fish in the tank are completely normal.
My loaches have been awesome troopers for 2 years, and I can't understand what's bringing them down now. Does anyone have any ideas? My only theory was the infection due to an accidental scrape (doesn't explain the behavior though). The only other thought I have is that although my pH hasn't changed much since adding CO2 (from 8.0 to 7.8 ), perhaps the hardness has gone down drastically and that's had an effect?
Any ideas??? Please??