Dead Tiger Barb :(

[dan86]

Hey! Any help would be much appreciated, heres the specs.

Tank size: 12 gallon
pH:8.0
ammonia:0
nitrite:0.3
nitrate:50
kH:
gH:
tank temp:26C

I have had the tank set up for a month now and I have 5 Xray tetras, 3 (previously 4) tiger barbs, 1 sword tail and 1 red crab. About 2 weeks ago my tank suffered from white spot. This has since been treated with API's white spot treatment and I have put in 1tsp marine salt per gallon and increased temp slightly to help cure it.

Anyway, recently put my carbon filter back in, to wake up and find one of my tiger barbs had died! Ever since I bought them, they frequently become verticle (as if looking at the gravel) when they are not swimming around. I have read in a tropical fish book I have bought that in tiger barbs this behavior indicates nitrite poisoning. As it is a fairly new tank I did have some high levels, however I changed 25% of the water yesterday and nitrite is still 0.3 (according to API test kits I have, this is when I need to do a water change). I have been changing around 25% of the water every week because of high nitrites and nitrate.

I would like to know the best ways in reducing nitrite, and also whether you think my tiger barb died of this - I dont want any of the others to die! I thought it might be either the high-ish pH (from the salt?) or maybe whitespot itself (however this particular fish that died only had a couple of spots on him)

Please help!! Thanks, Dan.

 

[DarkEntity]

Its the Nitrate thats really high, water change would help. Tiger barbs get a little big for a tank tha small, could be the filter isnt keeping up with the waste produced by the fish.

 

[k.o.d]

Your nitrates are not that high, 50 mg/l is not too bad, speak to any ray owner and they will be please with only having 50 mg/l
Fish that have whitespot are stressed, the parasites burrow into their flesh and it irritates the Bejaysus out of them, can also leave them prone to secondary infection, this could be a factor.
Another factor is you changed the parameters of the water, not only adding whitespot treatment but then adding salt as well, so it could easily be stress upon stress.
The best way of reducing nitrite is having a fully cycled tank with a functional clean filter that is full of nitrifying bacteria.
What filter do you run in the tank??

 

[puddle_inc]

nitrite should be 0 for the best water, and your nitrate should be way down, around 30. or atleast thats what i've heard is the best number.

 

[dan86]

Your nitrates are not that high, 50 mg/l is not too bad, speak to any ray owner and they will be please with only having 50 mg/l
Fish that have whitespot are stressed, the parasites burrow into their flesh and it irritates the Bejaysus out of them, can also leave them prone to secondary infection, this could be a factor.
Another factor is you changed the parameters of the water, not only adding whitespot treatment but then adding salt as well, so it could easily be stress upon stress.
The best way of reducing nitrite is having a fully cycled tank with a functional clean filter that is full of nitrifying bacteria.
What filter do you run in the tank??

Hey,
Thanks for the helpful replies. In answer to your question, its a Juwel Rekord 60 tank and came full setup with the tank. Its a built in Juwel Filter Compact Super, so I am assuming it would be able to keep up with the fish waste.

Thanks for your help.

 

[k.o.d]

It is an adequate filter for the tank and your stocking levels are OK for the time being, to be honest are OK for the reasonable future too.
It is just my belief, but I always have 2 filters ( or more ) on any one tank, this reduces the buggeration factor when the filter goes kaput
Even something as basic as an air driven box filter would give extra filtration and aeration to your tank, you could also put nitrate removing resin in the box filter to keep your params low

 

[dan86]

ok i will try that.

thanks for your help

 

[fry_lover]

Its the Nitrate thats really high, water change would help. Tiger barbs get a little big for a tank tha small, could be the filter isnt keeping up with the waste produced by the fish.

might be a bit besides the point now and its already been pointed out but, the Nitrate reading is not too much an issue, especially for a hardy fish like a Barb

 

[Gatorbait]

Hey! Any help would be much appreciated, heres the specs.

Tank size: 12 gallon
pH:8.0
ammonia:0
nitrite:0.3
nitrate:50
kH:
gH:
tank temp:26C

I have had the tank set up for a month now and I have 5 Xray tetras, 3 (previously 4) tiger barbs, 1 sword tail and 1 red crab. About 2 weeks ago my tank suffered from white spot. This has since been treated with API's white spot treatment and I have put in 1tsp marine salt per gallon and increased temp slightly to help cure it.

Anyway, recently put my carbon filter back in, to wake up and find one of my tiger barbs had died! Ever since I bought them, they frequently become verticle (as if looking at the gravel) when they are not swimming around. I have read in a tropical fish book I have bought that in tiger barbs this behavior indicates nitrite poisoning. As it is a fairly new tank I did have some high levels, however I changed 25% of the water yesterday and nitrite is still 0.3 (according to API test kits I have, this is when I need to do a water change). I have been changing around 25% of the water every week because of high nitrites and nitrate.

I would like to know the best ways in reducing nitrite, and also whether you think my tiger barb died of this - I dont want any of the others to die! I thought it might be either the high-ish pH (from the salt?) or maybe whitespot itself (however this particular fish that died only had a couple of spots on him)

Please help!! Thanks, Dan.

If you have high nitrites, you want to do daily 10-15% wc's to keep it down, not weekly.

The salt didn't make your ph jump. What was your ph before? The nitrites alone will kill your fish but also the ph changing alone will kill them also.

How much salt did you add? 1 tsp per 300g is enough for nitrite poisoning.

Your nitrates are fine. Obviously, the lower the better but I wouldn't even worry about 50 at all. It's when it gets to 150 your fish will suffer if kept that longterm.

 

[BNyleen581]

I have had my Tiger Barbs for almost two years and have noticed that they become very agressive towards each other and other fish when stressed, especially if there are less than 5 or 6 of them.

Mine have been through it all, sickness, uncycled tank, no food for a week, power outage in subzero weather for several days... Yaya I sound horible but actualy this all happend when I was out of state and my friend had them. My point is, they servived all of it. I really have come to believe that these fish are very very hardy unless under constant stress.

I got some all in one test strips and noticed that my pH was high and my alkalinity, fixed that with distilled water and havent had a problem since. Also note that Tiger Barbs will point down when sleeping also, you should only be alarmed if they are doing it durring daylight hours.

 

[Amunet]

I got some all in one test strips

You should've stopped there Those test strips are trash and very innaccurate. We got them when we first set up our tank and they were just.. bleh. The colors from the pads would run to the others, making the color screwed up and unreadable... yeah.. not good.