Cloudy Water

[ebo100]

Advice needed please. My tank is still quite new; about three months old but in the last week has gone really cloudy. My nitrate level is quite high so over the weekend i have done two 30% water changes and the cloudyness returns. On Saturday I cleaned the foam filter in my canister filter, making sure not to let the bacteria dry out in the other side. On Sunday one of my silver sharks died and tonight I have come in from work to find a black phantom very nearly dead.

Can anyone suggest a cure?

 

[gowing238]

Do water changes. Could be a bloom

 

[helterskelter]

Keep doing the water changes and cleaning the filter with tank water not tap water. untill the nitrates drop, are u testing any other chemicals?

if the cloudy keep comeing it's an algae in the water, reducing light (and natural sun light) will also help.

If is still carried on you can get a in tank UV filter it's a simple pump and UV light that sits in a corner of the tank. As u also have an external filter you could just add a small in line UV filter to that which may be cheaper than a in tank unit.

 

[ebo100]

Keep doing the water changes and cleaning the filter with tank water not tap water. untill the nitrates drop, are u testing any other chemicals?

if the cloudy keep comeing it's an algae in the water, reducing light (and natural sun light) will also help.

If is still carried on you can get a in tank UV filter it's a simple pump and UV light that sits in a corner of the tank. As u also have an external filter you could just add a small in line UV filter to that which may be cheaper than a in tank unit.

I guess if it's an algae it shouldn't harm the fish, maybe the shark dying could have been down to stress after the water changes.

I have been testing with a multi test strip and the last test a few minutes ago showed the following results, pH - 6.8, KH - 3, GH - 7, Nitrite - 0, Nitrate 25mg/l. Do these figures look ok?

Is it enough to leave the lights off in the tank and shade the tank with the blinds at the window?

 

[sic0198]

The shark could just be a coincedence. How old was it? A few years ago when I'd get Bala's they were hard for me to keep alive, but eventually they started thriving for me. One thing that I noticed is that they need to be kept in at least a pair.

Your tank is cycled isnt it?

 

[ebo100]

The shark could just be a coincedence. How old was it? A few years ago when I'd get Bala's they were hard for me to keep alive, but eventually they started thriving for me. One thing that I noticed is that they need to be kept in at least a pair.

Your tank is cycled isnt it?

I hope it was just a coincidence and I did buy them as a pair, I think i will wait a while and then replace the dead one.

I set the tank up with water and gravel from an old tank and then cycled it with regular water changes but had to put fish in straight away and hence I have had quite a few casulties as I had abit of trouble getting the high level of nitrates down.

 

[waterdrop]

Hi and welcome to TFF, ebo100!

Since you are having elevated nitrites and never went through all the stuff that surrounds a fishless cycle, I suggest you "take a step back" so to speak and do a few things we do with newcomers that have worked quite well - this is not ignore that you have experience and that the tank has run 3 months, its just that you may have somehow missed some of the skills that go along with understanding the nitrogen cycle and how to keep up with it.

First off I think we should be worried about your use of test strips. Unfortunately these things usually turn out to not be worth the paper they are printed on. To be confident of the important readings in your tank you really need a liquid-reagent-based test kit. Many here, including myself, use the API Freshwater Master Test Kit. Another good one is the Hagan/Nutrafin Mini-Master Test Kit, the one that has a nitrate test in it. Once you get a hold of one of these, test your source/tap water a couple times (to get used to the instructions) and then post up those results here on your help thread. Then test the tank water and post up likewise. The most important readings we'll want to know are ammonia, nitrite and pH - so you can leave the nitrate until later as its somewhat harder to do usually.

Other things that may help the members analyze your problem will be tank size, fish stocking (w/numbers), filter type, media types in filter and flow rate of the filter, if you know it. Do you suspect that your filter may not be keeping up with your number of fish? Are you using any medications or chemicals in the tank? Do you have anything other than sponges and rings/pebbles in the filter?

~~waterdrop~~