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Sick and dying fish- multiple species

7K views 48 replies 7 participants last post by  jimmadsen 
#1 · (Edited)
Greetings all. I have a 50 gallon curved front tank with 2 aquaclear 50g filters on there. One has charcoal the other does not. Temp stays at about 70 deg. Lighting is a 50/50 Actinic daylight bulb. Light and bubbler with 2 8" strips on each side of the tank with large bubbles run on a timer from noon to 9pm.

Have currently:
8 neon tetras (a few weeks ago had 10)
6 tetra skirts (2 white / albine, 2 zebra striped, 2 glo)
5 male guppies (seems to be enough of a school they do not fight)
4 oto's
1 bristlenose pleco
1 other pleco type catfish that looks like a blackish white and brown with a horizontal stripe4" oto forgot his type

Substrate is about 3 inches of gravel. Have an algae ball and a live plant. Try and change weekly to two weeks at 20% always vacuuming gravel.

Few weeks ago had a third glo tetra seem to have swim bladder problems. Started to corkscrew, swim sideways float to the top and such. He eventually died and got pulled pretty quickly. Subsequent research leads me to fear it was a parasite.

In past 2 weeks have had 2 neon tetras die for no apparent reason. Nobody in the tank seems to be nippers and they were pretty safe in their school.

Today found a very lethargic oto lying on his back until disturbed then swims around. And a glo tetro losing the roundness over his eyes, now looks more angular. This poor guy kept getting stuck on the filter. No apparent discoloration or fin nips.

Did a 15 gallon change and replaced carbon and put in a ammonia absorber. Vaccumed out the gravel real good as well.

Further inspection shows 2 neon tetras with 1 bright white spot each on flank, one near gill the other at fin joint. This is a bright white. The type of bright white that you can spot across the room with the actinic bulb. I also say on 2 of my glo danios (blue and purple, supposidly the bigger hardier ones of all the colors) that their stomoach areas are losing their color and turning pale white. No noted swimming problems to these four fish. My other 2 glo danios do not appear to have same issue.

I will be working on getting all 6 into my 2 gallon hospital tank. But that is way to small for all of them!

Is this parasite? Neon tetra disese? My imagination? Thanks for the help.

Jim

1. What is the size of your tank? 50 gallon

2. What are your water parameters? State the brand of test kit used. Brought to petco and asked them to test to be sure, nitrates tad high, everything else normal (am getting my own kit soon)

3. Is your aquarium set up freshwater or brackish water? freshwater

4. How long the aquarium has been set up? 9 months

5. What fish do you have? How many are in your tank? How big are they? How long have you had them? fish as above, skirt tetras 8-9 months, guppies 4-5 months, danios 6-7 months, neons 3-4 months, otos 4-5 months, unknown pleco 4 months, bristlenose 3 months, neon tetras 2-3 months

6. Were the fish placed under quarantine period (minus the first batch from the point wherein the tank is ready to accommodate the inhabitants)? no, only the one tank except for a hospital tank at 2 gallons

7. What temperature is the tank water currently? 70

8. Are there live plants in the aquarium? yes

9. What filter are you using? State brand, maintenance routine and power capacity. 2 auqaclear 50 gallon filters. both with sponge cleaned weekly, one with charcoal, both with biomax tablets. Just put in new sponges new charcoal and ammonia remover to be on safe side to one without charcoal. These replaced per manufactorer

10. Any other equipment used (aside from heater and filter which are two very important components of the tank)? bubbler

11. Does your aquarium receive natural sunlight at any given part of the day? What is your lighting schedule (assuming you do not rely on sunlight for our viewing pleasure)? light on noon to 9 pm, some daylight when curtains open in living room same time frame. plenty of algae growth

12. When did you perform your last water change and how much water was changed? How often do you change your water? Do you vacuum the substrate? today, 15 gallon, 1-2 weeks, yes

13. What foods do you provide your fish? What is the feeding schedule? tropical fish flake, once a day at night

14. What unusual signs have you observed in your fish? see post

15. Have you treated your fish ahead of diagnosis? If so, what treatments did you use? State your reasons for planning ahead of proper diagnosis. no
 
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#34 ·
May have beena fish that just took more than it could handle. Keep an eye on the others, as previously suggested by us.
 
#35 ·
Lost a neon last night. It was one of the ones that I put back in.

Here are water test results:

pH: 8
Ammonia: 0
NO2: 0
NO3: 40

Going to be getting the pH taken care of asap, whats a good goal?

NO3, I have 2 aquaclear 50's on the tank running 24/7. Filter 1 has sponge that is 2 months old. Rinsed with every cleaning. Charcoal a week old. Biopellets about 5 months old (pet store was out of these). Filter 2 sponge 5 months old (still looks to be in great shape, rinsed every cleaning). Ammonia absorber week old. Biopellets 6 months old.

Every cleaning I vacuum the gravel. Have 1 live plant and a moss ball. Aeration was on 9 hours a day, took it off timer and now running 24/7. Aeration is 2- 8" strips on either side of tank with large bubbles using a tetra whisper60. I use topfin water conditioner with every fill.
 
#37 ·
Just checked my tap water. It has a pH of 8.4-8.8!
Did you remember to shake the water in a jar very briskly for a few minutes to outgas the CO2? If yes, then this should be a fairly reliable number.

Lost a neon last night. It was one of the ones that I put back in.
This is not really a surprise, if this was one of those with spots/blotches. Sometimes these last, sometimes not.

Here are water test results:
pH: 8
Ammonia: 0
NO2: 0
NO3: 40

Going to be getting the pH taken care of asap, whats a good goal?
What do you mean by taking care of the pH? And as part of this, what is your tap water GH (general hardness) and KH (carbonate hardness, or Alkalinity) as these are closely related?

Nitrates at 40ppm is high. What is the tap water nitrate?

NO3, I have 2 aquaclear 50's on the tank running 24/7. Filter 1 has sponge that is 2 months old. Rinsed with every cleaning. Charcoal a week old. Biopellets about 5 months old (pet store was out of these). Filter 2 sponge 5 months old (still looks to be in great shape, rinsed every cleaning). Ammonia absorber week old. Biopellets 6 months old.

Every cleaning I vacuum the gravel. Have 1 live plant and a moss ball. Aeration was on 9 hours a day, took it off timer and now running 24/7. Aeration is 2- 8" strips on either side of tank with large bubbles using a tetra whisper60. I use topfin water conditioner with every fill.
Nothing wrong here with respect to cleaning filter, etc. I would increase the plants, but given all this aeration and to allow you to keep it running, floating plants would be best. They assimilate CO2 from the air, not the water, so driving CO2 out with bubblers is not an issue, and it will allow more oxygen (sort of). Water Sprite is ideal, or Brazilian Pennywort.

Water changes (what you mean by "every cleaning" I assume) should be weekly, and change half the tank.

Now, a side comment. Soft water fish like neons will have some issues with a pH at 8. But I want to see the GH as this is even more significant. And any attempt to adjust pH must first deal with the GH /KH or it will almost always fail.

Byron.
 
#38 ·
Home NO3 is 0.

I will stop on way home from work tomorrow to get a GH and KH test kit. Unless the API Master Test kit will check this and I just missed those instructions. Anything else I may want to look at getting while I am there?

Water changes are now being done on Saturdays at 50% with a full vacuuming of gravel.

Will look into the floating plants as well as I am not a huge fan of putting the plants into the gravel. Next time I start the tank (next time we move) I want to plan different and put down better substrate than gravel. I will be researching that when the time comes so I can have a game plan.

I will not change the pH until I get the results of hardness and alkalinity. After all, they have been in the high pH water for quite some time now anyways. I do however want to get it down to a better range for all of the fish.

Thanks
 
#39 ·
Home NO3 is 0.

I will stop on way home from work tomorrow to get a GH and KH test kit. Unless the API Master Test kit will check this and I just missed those instructions. Anything else I may want to look at getting while I am there?

Water changes are now being done on Saturdays at 50% with a full vacuuming of gravel.

Will look into the floating plants as well as I am not a huge fan of putting the plants into the gravel. Next time I start the tank (next time we move) I want to plan different and put down better substrate than gravel. I will be researching that when the time comes so I can have a game plan.

I will not change the pH until I get the results of hardness and alkalinity. After all, they have been in the high pH water for quite some time now anyways. I do however want to get it down to a better range for all of the fish.

Thanks
If you are going to be adjusting water parameters like pH, then the GH and KH will have to be dealt with, so the API liquid kit (GH & KH) is worth getting. But you can get the numbers from the water folks so we know what you may be facing. GH/KH may be high, or it may not; the pH is related and adjusting the pH must include KH particularly, but having said that the pH can be high with a low GH/KH.

Regardless, on no account get any of the pH adjusting solutions. They probably won't work, depending on the KH, and they are never the best way to handle this anyway.

Did I mention my article on how all this relates?
http://www.tropicalfishkeeping.com/.../water-hardness-ph-freshwater-aquarium-73276/
 
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#40 ·
I checked with all 3 of my area pet stores (petco, pet smart, pet supplies plus) and none have the liquid test kit for GH and KH. They did have the test strips for about $5 a test, but I wanted the liquid. Got them coming for Thurs from amazon.

No new changes in the tank, all seem to be doing well.

Good read on the water, thanks
 
#42 ·
Tank:

GH 5 drops using API liquid test meaning 89.5ppm
KH 7 drops meaning 125.3ppm

Tap:

GH 3 drops meaning 53.7ppm
KH 3 drops meaning 53.7ppm

I think I read the results the way I should
Is there any calcareous rock/gravel/sand in the tank? Any of these made from limestone, marble, dolomite, aragonite or crushed coral? Just wondering about the rise between tap (lower) and tank (higher).

Aside from that, this is still soft water, which is fine for all named fish except the guppy that should be in a bit harder water.

How are things going on the health front now?
 
#44 ·
Have this, Top Fin® Starry Night Aquarium Gravel - Gravel & Sand - Fish - PetSmart

About 40 pounds worth.

Health wise everyone seems to be doing ok, everyone seems to be very active and no signs of distress. The danios still have the discolorations though but are very active.
That link doesn't seem to be correct... if it says in the info or on the bag that it will not affect water chemistry, you're fine. Isn't much anyway, it is still soft water so fine for those fishies.:)

Keep up with your weekly water changes, and monitor the fish. Might be fine now. Let's hope so.
 
#46 ·
Lost an oto this morning, did not appear to be nipped on. Was sitting at bottom of tank upside down. May have just died.


Water change tonight along with testing again. Should I do anything about the pH?
Not at this time certainly. When fish are recovering from something, the less stress the better, and fiddling with water params is stressful. Something is being added to your source water to raise pH [this is common in areas with soft water, I have it here] but we can look into this later.

Otos are not hardy fish, so I wouldn't jump to conclusions over losing one. Again, stability is the key, until we can be fairly certain things are settled.

Byron.
 
#47 ·
Did water change last night. A lot of the gravel was pretty clean when I vacuumed it.

Just tested water now, figured give it time to equalize the new water. Some of these test colors are hard to tell apart but this is the best I got:

pH 7.4 not sure why it dropped, did not do anything other than water change
Ammonia 0
NO2 0
NO3 5
 
#48 ·
Did water change last night. A lot of the gravel was pretty clean when I vacuumed it.

Just tested water now, figured give it time to equalize the new water. Some of these test colors are hard to tell apart but this is the best I got:

pH 7.4 not sure why it dropped, did not do anything other than water change
Ammonia 0
NO2 0
NO3 5
No problems here.
 
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