Clown Loach Emergency - 16 yr tank sudden problems

Pictures and video of the fish?
If you use a phone to film the fish, hold the phone horizontally so the footage fills the entire frame. You can upload videos to YouTube, then copy & paste the link here.

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Without seeing the fish I am guessing but will say it is old tank syndrome, high nitrates, and possibly a dirty tank that has lead to a protozoan or bacterial infection in the fish's brain.

The nitrates build up over time and cause the pH to drop slowly. This can normally be countered by doing bigger water changes and gravel cleaning the substrate every time you do a water change. I normally recommend doing a 75% water change and gravel clean every week. This keeps the nitrates low, pH stable and helps keep harmful disease organisms like protozoa, at low levels.

Clean the filters once a month. Wash filter media/ materials in a bucket of tank water and re-use the media. Tip the bucket of dirty water on the lawn.

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• Right now, the best thing to do is wipe the glass down.
• Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for a week.
• Clean the filters if they haven't been done in the last 2 weeks.
• Add some salt, (see directions below).

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SALT
You can add rock salt (often sold as aquarium salt) or swimming pool salt to the aquarium at the dose rate of 1 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres of water. If there is no improvement after 48 hours you can double that dose rate so there is 2 heaped tablespoons of salt per 20 litres.

Keep the salt level like this for at least 2 weeks but no longer than 4 weeks otherwise kidney damage can occur. Kidney damage is more likely to occur in fish from soft water (tetras, Corydoras, angelfish, Bettas & gouramis, loaches) that are exposed to high levels of salt for an extended period of time, and is not an issue with livebearers, rainbowfish or other salt tolerant species.

The salt will not affect the beneficial filter bacteria, fish, plants, shrimp or snails.

After you use salt and the fish have recovered, you do a 10% water change each day for a week using only fresh water that has been dechlorinated. Then do a 20% water change each day for a week. Then you can do bigger water changes after that. This dilutes the salt out of the tank slowly so it doesn't harm the fish.

If you do water changes while using salt, you need to treat the new water with salt before adding it to the tank. This will keep the salt level stable in the tank and minimise stress on the fish.

When you first add salt, add the salt to a small bucket of tank water and dissolve the salt. Then slowly pour the salt water into the tank near the filter outlet. Add the salt over a couple of minutes.

Well water chemistry can change with the season (dry /wet season) and and even droughts. You really should be monitoring your PH, Kh, and GH of the well water and the water in the tank. If you have anyPH, KH< GH from the past it would be helpful to recheck this. If you don't it may not be possible to know this is the problem.

Some substrates contain some solid calcium and magnesium carbonate and well water is may be a little acidic . The calcium and magnesium carbonate would counteract any acidity the water. But in doing so the solid carbonate will dissolve and some will be removed with each water change. Depending on how much solid carbonate you have it could take years to run out. Eventually you could run out of solid carbonate and which that happens the PH, KH, and GH levels could change in the tank. Depending on how much solid carbonate you have it could take years to run out.

Do you have any decorative snail shells or crushed coral in the tank? Those are solid carbonate. If you don't the substrate may be the only source.

Hi all, thanks for all the help. I was able to capture the following photo tonight.



This is fish #2, so not the fish that originally showed symptoms. That fish, fish #1, is still doing the same thing. Clamped fins, swimming vertically near surface, etc.

This fish, fish #2, was acting a little lethargic over the past few days and just now I turned off the lights and shined a light in the tank and saw this. I immediately gasped. It looks like... Ich? Velvet? My only hesitation here is that I've been fooled before into thinking a fish that looked like this was covered in parasites, when it was just sand. You can see the substrate I use in the photo, and how easy it is (at least for me) to confuse a roll in the sand with a deadly disease. What do you all make of this? I'll check again in the morning to see if it is the same or if it has shaken off.

I'm essentially at this point... I'm fairly convinced I had old tank syndrome, or just some bad water quality that crept up on me, and it stressed the fish. I now need to decide if:

1. What I am seeing in the fish behavior is a product of that stress, and they will maybe, hopefully recover now that things are corrected via water changes... OR,
2. If what I am seeing is a pathogen that has taken over because of the stress and that will require treatment to save the tank.

I've resisted the pathogen explanation because this is an isolated tank all by itself. No changes in years and years and no opportunity for cross contamination. So unless pathogens have been there for half a decade and just now showed up due to the stress, or somehow came in via our well water, it just seems unlikely. But now, this photo. Does this prove the pathogen theory, or is that just a sandy loach?

Adding another photos with a bit of a wider angle. I don't know if this helps determine what is going on there, but I wanted to point out the driftwood in the upper right corner. See the white specks on it? That's how the substrate looks when it gets on something, be it fish, wood, stone, what have you. So I need to figure out if that is what I'm seeing here, or if this is a clear cut and bad case of some parasite. If the latter, I will have to hop in the car early tomorrow and drive a few hours to try to get some meds and/or salt. I live way out in the middle of nowhere!

Loachstrong said:

Adding another photos with a bit of a wider angle. I don't know if this helps determine what is going on there, but I wanted to point out the driftwood in the upper right corner. See the white specks on it? That's how the substrate looks when it gets on something, be it fish, wood, stone, what have you. So I need to figure out if that is what I'm seeing here, or if this is a clear cut and bad case of some parasite. If the latter, I will have to hop in the car early tomorrow and drive a few hours to try to get some meds and/or salt. I live way out in the middle of nowhere!

View attachment 160678

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Deep breaths! I completely understand the fear and panic, but it's not ich, doesn't look like velvet either, and I'm pretty confident its a sandy loach that's been digging through the fine sand! Notice most of it gathered on the head.

To check for velvet, do the test that @TwoTankAmin recommended, where the tank light is off, and you shine a torch into the tank and examine the fish that way. If velvet were present, it looks like a fine golden shimmer on the fish, as if it's been sprinkled in glitter almost.
Continue with the water changes - since you've already got the nitrates down to a much safer level and they didn't go into shock, I'd be doing daily changes, and get that water quality up. Try to keep their stress low in other ways, with dim lighting only, plenty of hiding places so they feel secure etc. Feed them up with tempting food as long as they're still willing to eat (are they eating?) without over-feeding and having food go back in the tank. Make sure you give the substrate a decent gravel vac as you do the water changes. Can work on that in sections over the following weeks.

I'm really, really rooting for you! They're beautiful, chunky, healthy looking clowns, and you've obviously done well with them for nearly two decades now. I know how attached you must be.

It's not velvet or white spot.

The fish is covered in excess mucous and has sand on its head.

The excess mucous all over the body and fins suggests a water quality issue. Do big daily water changes for at least a week, clean the filters and see if it improves.

Colin_T said:

The fish is covered in excess mucous and has sand on its head.

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I feel like this could describe me on a few nights back in my 20s.

Thank you. This morning, fish #2 no longer looks like this. So sand and mucus it likely was. Still a little lethargic and I can tell he/she is just a little "off," but seems to be holding steady at that.

Fish #1 is still doing poorly. I fear he/she might be a casualty of this event.

Water change incoming today. I'll see if anyone is interested in a light feeding before doing so. I've held off till I had a better understanding of what was going on.

Loachstrong said:

I feel like this could describe me on a few nights back in my 20s.

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*cough* me too.. *cough*

Loachstrong said:

Thank you. This morning, fish #2 no longer looks like this. So sand and mucus it likely was. Still a little lethargic and I can tell he/she is just a little "off," but seems to be holding steady at that.

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Glad that fish #2 seems to be holding steady, and that it was just substrate. Completely understand the "oh my god, it's something awful!" fear when you see that though and you've already been worried for them!

Loachstrong said:

Fish #1 is still doing poorly. I fear he/she might be a casualty of this event.

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Don't give up on him/her yet! Saw a thread recently where a goldie looked at deaths door, but the owner put huge work and love into saving him, and within a week or so it was a different fish. Hardly recognisable. I'll go find that thread and link it for you, it's really amazing. Where there's life, there's hope.

Loachstrong said:

Water change incoming today. I'll see if anyone is interested in a light feeding before doing so. I've held off till I had a better understanding of what was going on.

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Smart to feed first (and lightly) before the W/C so you can clean up any uneaten food after. Do me a favour? After the water change, give the tank at least an hour to settle and for the water to mix, then test it again and let us know the numbers. I think the key to resolving this is to up the tank cleaning and go through the daily water changes for at least a week, while carefully observing the fish when you can. Make note of behaviours, any other symptoms, timing of any freak outs etc. Doing big daily water changes is a hassle, but it's not forever, and it sounds as though they may be saveable.

Be careful with clowns and salt. If it is to much you will know because the fish will behave as if they were drunk, If this happens you need to get the salt down to a lower level fast. Normally this is how I do a salt dip on fish.

They go into the sw in another container and I monitor the fish. It stays until it starts to act drunk and then I immediately return it to the unsalted water of its tank. If you are adding salt to the tank, then the only way to remove will be from water changes.

Finally, it is not true that the bacteria are unaffected by salt. It changes the composition of the bacterial colonies which should have multiple strains of bacteria doing the work. That diversification is way less in sw. If you look at Dr. Tim's cycling products which contain live bacteria, you will see he offers several version based on where it will be used:

One & Only Nitrifying Bacteria for Freshwater Aquaria
One & Only Live Nitrifying Bacteria for Saltwater Aquaria
One & Only Live Nitrifying Bacteria for Reef, Nano and Seahorse Aquaria
One & Only Live Nitrifying Bacteria for Koi Ponds and Water Gardens

Grommen, R., Dauw, L. and Verstraete, W. (2005), Elevated salinity selects for a less diverse ammonia-oxidizing population in aquarium biofilters. FEMS Microbiology Ecology, 52: 1-11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.femsec.2004.10.001

Abstract​

The activity and changes in the structure of the community of the ammonia-oxidizing bacteria belonging to the Betaproteobacteria were monitored in freshwater and artificial seawater biofilters for two months after inoculation with a commercial nitrifying consortium. Both in freshwater and artificial seawater, ammonium oxidation proceeded immediately after addition of the inoculum, although initial activity in artificial seawater was lower than in freshwater. Denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis of the ammonia-oxidizing bacterial community of the inoculum and the freshwater and the artificial seawater aquaria as a function of time showed that initially only one dominant ammonia-oxidizer, closely related to Nitrosomonas marina, was detectable in all the systems. The fingerprint of the ammonia-oxidizing bacterial community in the artificial seawater biofilters continued to be dominated by this single band. In the freshwater aquaria, in contrast, the composition of the ammonia-oxidizer community became more diverse after one month, with 4–7 new bands appearing in the denaturing gradient gel fingerprint. Since the inoculum is cultivated at an average salinity of 11 g l−1, it is argued that the elevated salinity selects for a less diverse ammonia-oxidizer community in the inoculum and the artificial seawater aquaria.

RAISE the water temperature to 84f. Mother nature wants you to make a temperature for the fish that it cant do on its own.

I forgot to link the thread I promised to earlier, so here it is! Especially check out the first and last photos - the difference in incredible, and both @Colin_T and I weren't terribly optimistic that he would survive, based on the first pic. Just shows what a fish can recover from, and not to give up yet!

How are they doing since the water change? Test results?

Hey all, I know it is super annoying when someone posts an emergency, you help them, and then they ghost the thread... I am really sorry. Life/work, etc. got wild for a little bit there, and it was all I could do to attend to the tank, let alone post updates. Thankfully all has settled a bit now and so I wanted to close this loop and thank each of you for offering thoughts and advice and well wishes.

I ended up losing 2 of the 4 clowns. The original one that I posted about did eventually die. But it took awhile. The other one went from healthy to dead in about two days. The other two have been healthy and active and thriving ever since.

I'm still not sure what caused this. The old tank syndrome is as good a theory as any. Maybe that first clown was the canary in the coal mine. And I was able to get the parameters under control in time to save 2 of them.

Here is an interesting tidbit though. Through this process I have come to learn that my eyes have gotten really bad at distinguishing between shades of colors. So like, the different shades of red in a water test. When I had my wife come in and double check my work, because things were not making a lot of sense, she let me know that what I thought was an off the charts red... was really more of a middle to low red/orange. In other words, what I thought was crisis levels, she let me know was actually just slightly above normal.

So that leads to another possible theory... what if the tank was fine (or, ya know, fine'ish). And the original loach was just sick. Old age. Some disease unrelated to the tank itself. Or maybe had a blockage from some food. Who knows. But it happens, right? And since I thought the tank was pinned in the red zone and imploding, I did lots of big water changes to try to save it... and in doing so, shocked the second loach to death.

Suppose I'll never know. But here I am. With two VERY happy and healthy and active loaches. I've never seen them like this. They are all over the tank.
Which then brought up a dilemma for me:

1. These two fish are the happiest I've seen
2. But I know loaches thrive in bunches, with 5 seemingly being the smallest school recommended

So, here I am, with a quarantine tank of 4 little clown loaches. Hoping they make it through the next couple of months so I can safely add them into the big tank.

The thought did cross my mind to give my two old clowns to a trusted local fish store so they could find them a good home... and I could get out of the hobby. But, I decided against that because I live in the middle of nowhere (a really, really rural area... 2 hours to the closest fish store) and realistically the number of good homes for them around here would be minuscule. And, because, well, I feel like I owe it to them. 16 years ago I unknowingly "adopted" long lived fish. We've been in this adventure together that entire time. Through tank upgrades, house moves, floor reinforcements, various tank mates... I owe it to them to see this through. To provide them a home until their time comes.

Thanks again, everyone.

I only have a trio that's three years old in my 240 gallon. I wont get more since they should each get to 6" or more eventually. Right now they are 4" fish from the little guys they were back in 2019. They eat a lot,big eaters so more would just add to the load. Also..I havent added any fish in over a year now and just don't want to risk infecting the tank in the name of a few more. I've made that mistake in the past and don't like its results.

Loachstrong-

I sympathize. About 10 days ago I discovered my biggest (abut 12 inches) and oldest (about 22 years old) floating dead ear the H.O.T. magnum spraybar. It was fine right up to the time it must have died overnight. Since it was way to big to flush, I burried it in my garden. it was one of three big ones in my group and the two almost as big but clearly lower in the lexking order have been moping now for almost a week. While they used to fight the big one for the same cave, since it passed neither of the the other two will go into the cave. One of th two has been with the lost one since day one and the third big one came a few years after. The other 7 are all in the 3 to 5 inch range.

My clowns are now all in a 150 and, had I not lost the big one, I was contemplating a 220. I had expected my clowns to outlive me.

Keep yourrs if you can. They are really neat fish and they truly are clowns- even when old big and fat.