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Dropsy And Possible Tank Re-Cycling?

TotallyTropical

Fish Crazy
Joined
Jan 1, 2012
Messages
210
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4
Location
Canada
Tank size: 75 gallons
pH: high range, 8.5
ammonia: 0.25ppm (one of my main concerns)
nitrite: 0ppm
nitrate: about 40ppm
kH: n/a
gH: n/a
tank temp: 78F

Fish Symptoms (include full description including lesion, color, location, fish behavior):
 
-Found my small BN pleco on his back, dead. His stomach seemed to be bulging. Could have died from stress, which could be my fault. He was seen zooming around for cover yesterday, so I'm not sure what could have happened in 24 hours.
-One female platy had dropsy. I thought she had been pregnant this whole time, but her scales were raised today. I removed her from the tank and euthanized her, since I do not have the resources to even attempt to help her, and I don't want her to suffer. She had been eating this whole time, which is good, but she was definitely starting to struggle with swimming today.
-Multiple zebra danios with enlarged stomachs. I don't think it's bloat, since they've been eating and defecating normally for the past few months. Only a few of them are like this.
-The rest of the tank members are stressed and have stringy/white feces. I treated a few months ago for parasites, but it still hasn't changed.

Volume and Frequency of water changes: Vary from weekly to monthly, depending on water conditions. Usually 25%, but I recently did a 70% w/c.

Chemical Additives or Media in your tank: Seachem Prime, Seachem Flourish, approx. 2 tbsp aquarium salt every two water changes.

Tank inhabitants: 7 Platies, 2 Gouramis (1 Fire Dwarf, 1 Snakeskin), 6 Zebra Danios, 14 Black Neon Tetras, 1 Pleco (I believe it is an albino sailfin), 4 Kuhli Loaches

Recent additions to your tank (living or decoration): 4 platies, a few days ago after a few days of quarantine. They all seem extremely healthy, and I doubt they have anything to do with this. One even gave birth while in quarantine.

Exposure to chemicals: None
 
My tank has been set up for almost a year now, but the ammonia seems to be rising again. I did a small 20% water change today to help lower it, but I'm not sure what has caused it, unless my tank it cycling again. If so, what can I do about it?
I'm also not sure what happened to the platy or pleco. Both cases were unexpected. Also, the danios have been large for multiple months, and I'm assuming it's just the females holding onto eggs. Is there anything I can do about all of this?
 
Checked the water yesterday, and now everything seems to be reading fine.
ammonia: 0ppm
nitrite: 0ppm
nitrate: about 20-30ppm
The fish also seem to be looking better, apart from the still bloated danios and a feisty male platy that I can't seem to remove do to his ludicrous speed and hiding skills. My snakeskin is also easily spooked, and decided to ram himself into some driftwood last time I tried to remove the platy. He has healed beautifully, but I don't want to risk anything again, so maybe I'll just let the platies bicker.
I think everything else is fine though, and I've kept an eye on the feces. I'm pinning it down to possible overfeeding, as no other symptoms seemed to have developed. I'm cutting back on feeding now, and will see how things go. I guess I was just used to having too many big, hungry gouramies around!
biggrin.png
 
Glad to hear your fish are doing better. When my guppies had strings of pinkish brown feces, I fasted them for about 3 days. Try that and see if it works ☺
 
Alright, I'll try fasting them tonight. I just put in some cucumber for the pleco though, so I hope they don't decide to munch too much on that instead!
 
They all seem to be doing much better now, though the platy bickering has led to split fins and other strange (presumably) wounds. I'm going to keep an eye on them to assure that nothing strange is going on, but I'll definitely have to sort things out with the platies soon. Other than that, the fasting seems to have done the trick, and I'm definitely keeping feeding more precise.
 
Cool, glad to hear that they're all better! ☺
I hope your fin-biting fish don't hurt your other fish... ☺☺
 

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