4 Dead Fish

[Skysters]

Flashing is when a fish is irritated by something , could be water or anything else , but keep a close eye when u see it ( u will see ur flish flick against something like a rock the filter ,anything ) it could also mean ur fish may have ich so watch the fish carefully for white spot ..

your water test is showing ur ammonia
so ammonia could be a factor if they are swimming in their own waste as well as food waste . it will upset and make them poorly

do a gravel clean to clean any waste in and on the gravel , i would remove decos n stuff to make sure its a good clean

as ur doing ur gravel clean do a water change.. least 25% today .. then re check ammonia levels again , if need be do another change later in the day so u get the levels to zero no need to redo gravel clean a second time someone else correct me if im wrong ( but this is how i sort it ) but if its only a hint of green the above water change will help

make sure you are using the correct dechlorinator

gravel cleaning not sure how often you do it but i give mine quick gravel clean once a week to remove food waste , ( without moving decos and such ) and once a month i do a complete gravel clean where everything but fish is outta the tank .but i keep something that clowns can hide if they wish but u can move easily to make sure i remove anything thats got below gravel


When feeding fish , once every other day helps

your clowns , remember when dosing tanks ..clowns are super sensitive to treatment so only half recommended dose shud be used with any meds


anyone with a lot more experience than me feel free to correct me

 

[Aquatious]

Ahh I see. I haven't seen them rubbing on anything... but I'll keep an eye open just in case.

I'm using sand in this tank rather than gravel, and probably once every 2 water changes I will try and suck up any rubbish on the sand. I don't do it every time as it is such a big tank with massive bits of wood in that it is a royal pain in the neck to do - much harder than my gravel tank. I generally just swirl the syphon near the surface of the sand trying to dislodge the rubbish without actually losing all the sand... I'll do this this afternoon and also clean one of the two filters.

I moved some of the wood and rocks today trying to find the lost sharks, and now my large catfish is swimming all around trying to find the best hiding place - it is nice to see him active as he hides a lot of the time. He's got two or three places now, but he doesn't seem sure which is best! Taking a look at his mouth he could easily have swallowed a shark corpse

 

[Chad]

Just curious, not sure this has been brought up yet...have you checked for stray voltage? Sometimes heaters can go bad and electrify the water. Most of the time this isn't obvious to you because it isn't like it's shooting blue lightning bolts but it really screws around with the fish. It's certainly something to check.

 

[Aquatious]

That's a very interesting idea - how would I check? Maybe I should replace both heaters just to be sure...

 

[Chad]

You can get a meter to check. You can also buy a grounding probe online that is made for aquaria.

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

Was the new food you accidentally added to this tank high in protein?

I got caught out in the last week when trying New Era foods for the first time, fish started doing out of the ordinary things, which is almost always a sign something is wrong. I then checked the nutrition analysis and found they were all 40%+ protein, which is high and will cause an ammonia and nitrite spike, which will then lead to the bacterial colony pulling more oxygen out of the water to replicate and consume the toxins. An emergency ~95% water change was not an option for me, as the tank contains extremely sensitive Halfbeaks, so I removed ~50% of the water and added 25l of fresh containing 5x the standard dose of Seachem Prime for the total tank volume and went bonkers with water surface movement (full power FX5 and Eheim 2078 above waterline, Biopro 2200 powerhead lower down). Thankfully my crisis is now over and I am more more conservative with the New Era food portions!

Another possibility is that you contaminated your tank with something the new Bala Sharks were carrying but not showing signs of disease, I now quarantine everything for at least three weeks after a horrid incident that killed my 6 growing Synodontis decora; Steatocranus casuarius "dad"; 1 Synodontis nigriventris. My new fish only share tanks with other new fish during quarantine, not only to look for disease, but also to ensure everyone is eating well with nicely plump stomachs after fasting during the fish transportation to the LFS and then normally getting underfed.

 

[Aquatious]

A quick update - no more fish losses since 28/12 so I'm hoping this little saga is over. I've cleaned one of the filters and will do the other at the weekend, and I've increased oxygen from an air pump and more height from the filter output (loads of bubbles throughout most of the tank now).

Thanks for all the advice. I'm still not 100% sure what the problem was, but I've learnt a lot during the process.

I contacted the shop that sold me the fish. Basically they said they went and tested their water and checked the other fish from the same tank and it all looks ok. They don't think it was the sharks, but they are willing to replace them for free, and also to replace the other fish that died at cost. I'll leave the tank a couple of weeks to settle down before getting them - but I can't complain about their service!

I suppose I should really quarantine the new fish when I get them before putting them in the main tank. If I set up a small tank with heater, filter, gravel, and a rock or two to hide in, and then use some filter material from the main tank then would this be sufficient to get enough bacteria up before the fish suffer?

After reading some of the other threads I think I'll also start poking the sand about to make sure there are no gas pockets building up...

 

[deftuch]

have you rang the water compnay? ask them if they did indeed tamper with the water? are you certain the hose you attached to the tap has been kept clean and safe away from danger ( chemicals and children ect ) the tap you connected it to, had it been subject to any cleaning with the use of chemical before you connected the hose to it?

 

[the_lock_man]

have you rang the water compnay?

You could always try reading the entire thread and see?

 

[deftuch]

have you rang the water compnay?

You could always try reading the entire thread and see?

ok so i missed it.

have you rang the water compnay?

You could always try reading the entire thread and see?

ok so i missed it.

are you happy now or.......

 

[the_lock_man]

I'm always happy, me.

 

[Ginge2010]

Hi im new to this forum i wonder if anyone can help me i have got a tropiquarium 68 not sure of size, i have lost three silver dollars ( 1 adult, 2 young ) today and also my pictus catfish seems to be on way out aswell and showing same symptoms aswell not swimming properly and lying at the bottom of the tank it would swim side ways or on its back and the silver dollars was doing exactly the same i was thinking if it was swimmers bladder i have had tank over 8 months and have had no problems till know its a gravel bottom with a large cave ornament and a few little caves for other fish to hide in i have checked the levels in tank and they seem to be fine the tank is cleaned out once a month where i do a 25% water change and hoover out the gravel and i also add stress coat in and tape water safe so the fish arent affected.

In my my tank are
One silver dollar left out of four
2 plecs
3 mollys
1 black red tipped shark
2 silver sharks
1 glass cat fish
2 gourami
1 pictus catfish ( on way out)

Help would be appreciated thanks

 

[balajake]

Corkscrewing, losing control/unable to swim or huddling in the corners like they are cold says poison to me. It could be the water or an air freshener, deodorant etc. it could even be a buildup of toxic in Your sand. My advise would be to strip that tank down, fish in buckets of fresh temp matched decholinated water, every last drop of water removed even if you have to soak the remainder up with towels. and get everything rinsed. If the sand is black underneath and stinking, get rid of it. Rinse the tank down, wash all ornaments, plants and refil it.

I know it will be a big job, I've had to do this once myself to save a the remainder of my fish when it happened to me.

 

[Essjay]

From what I can discover on google, the tropiquarium 68 is 68 litres - that's 18 gallons if you don't like metric.
 
Could you answer a few questions, then we'll be able to help better:
 
Can you measure your tank with a tape measure and post the dimensions, then we'll know if it really is 68 litres.
How are you testing the water? You say the levels seem to be fine but what are the actual numbers for ammonia and nitrite? Anything above zero is not fine, and if you are using strip testers rather than liquid ones, they could be giving you inaccurate readings.
Changing a quarter of the water once a month is not very much. I do about a third a week on my tanks. What is your nitrate reading? I know this is not the most reliable of tests but they can give a ball park. A nitrate of the level in your tapwater plus 20 is the highest it should be allowed to get.
 
 
 
If it turns out that your tank really is 68 litres, it is very overstocked and this, combined with the infrequent water changes, could be the cause of the problems.
On the other hand, if the tank is much bigger there could be other reasons.
 
The more info you can give, the better we'll be able to help.

 

[byork]

Sorry for your loss. I learned the hard way to always quarantine! Even from trusted sources, and plant too. Call me paranoid but if I can avoid the problem that's what I want to do. Plus if I do have to treat it is a lot less expensive to treat a quarantine.