Help - Fish Suddenly Die

[Marclau]

I have an established tank of just over 2 years..........and only lost 2 fish in that time.
Now suddenly, 7 fish have died in the past fortnight.
1 x Gourami, 2x Swordtails, 2 neons, and or 2 others........

Nitrate and Nitrite are perfect 0 - 20, PH 7.0, Ammonia 0 but water a little hardness to which i have added bic sod..........

2 x Clown Loaches , 3 x Bristlenoses seems fine, 1 Swordtail etc and all other fish seems fine .........in fact Bristlenose breeding like there is no tomorrow..... 20 Neons.........

I have done 2 30% water changes weekly but today lost my big Gourami.........

Any advice would be fantastic.........

 

[LauraFrog]

Firstly, why are you adding bicarb to the tank? All this will do is raise the pH, and it might stress the fish. From your other topic (for those who haven't read it the pH is 7.2 and hardness 90ppm) your pH and hardness are fine. There's no need to add any bicarb.

Swordtails and gouramis are not long-lived fish. Three years is average for a livebearer (like swords) in a tank, four years is considered exceptionally old. Gouramis lifespan varies, but three or four years is about normal for them too (although it's more common for those to live a long time). So it's possible that your fish simply died of old age.

What did they do before they died? Did you notice anything like weight loss, lethargy, stringy white poo or pooing mucus, lack of interest in food, loss of balance, slowing down? Or anything odd like finrot, lesions, mouth rot? It's common for older fish to lose weight suddenly, become lethargic, sometimes lack balance or lose interest in food, and then die within a month or so of these symptoms appearing - that's often how it goes at the end of the natural lifespan of a fish.

I must say it seems odd that a heap of old fish would suddenly cark it at once. Do you have any other pets? Threadworm can be passed through dogs and cats, some birds, humans, some livestock, and fish, so the reinfestation cycle can be very complex (ie cat has threadworm, it licks its backside then licks its fur, you touch its fur, you put your hands in the tank, the fish get threadworm, you leave a bucket containing fish water on the floor, the dog drinks it...) A dose of parasites at the wrong time can knock off old fish. Symptoms of intestinal parasites are pooing mucus or long, stringy, white poo, losing weight usually despite good appetite although sometimes refuses to eat in the later stages, and always drastic weight loss.

 

[moritzbuesch]

There might have been something in the water when you made a water change. Bloody water companies!
I did that once and lost all my blue rams (4) in one night..

 

[Marclau]

Firstly, why are you adding bicarb to the tank? All this will do is raise the pH, and it might stress the fish. From your other topic (for those who haven't read it the pH is 7.2 and hardness 90ppm) your pH and hardness are fine. There's no need to add any bicarb.

Swordtails and gouramis are not long-lived fish. Three years is average for a livebearer (like swords) in a tank, four years is considered exceptionally old. Gouramis lifespan varies, but three or four years is about normal for them too (although it's more common for those to live a long time). So it's possible that your fish simply died of old age.

What did they do before they died? Did you notice anything like weight loss, lethargy, stringy white poo or pooing mucus, lack of interest in food, loss of balance, slowing down? Or anything odd like finrot, lesions, mouth rot? It's common for older fish to lose weight suddenly, become lethargic, sometimes lack balance or lose interest in food, and then die within a month or so of these symptoms appearing - that's often how it goes at the end of the natural lifespan of a fish.

I must say it seems odd that a heap of old fish would suddenly cark it at once. Do you have any other pets? Threadworm can be passed through dogs and cats, some birds, humans, some livestock, and fish, so the reinfestation cycle can be very complex (ie cat has threadworm, it licks its backside then licks its fur, you touch its fur, you put your hands in the tank, the fish get threadworm, you leave a bucket containing fish water on the floor, the dog drinks it...) A dose of parasites at the wrong time can knock off old fish. Symptoms of intestinal parasites are pooing mucus or long, stringy, white poo, losing weight usually despite good appetite although sometimes refuses to eat in the later stages, and always drastic weight loss.

Thanks Laura,

As you will notice, that was an earlier post when I was still losing a few fish...........tank seems to have settled with no more deaths past 36 hours..........after my last water change and cleaning canister and filters etc etc.........


Nope, all fish seemed perfect until water change, new plants and new fish.........20 Neons and 2 sharks...........added some liquid plant food and then the fun started.........
so far 3 or 4 water changes of 30% each time and all seems to be better..........fingers crossed........

 

[Athena]

I think you may just have too many fish for that size tank - and perhaps adding 20 new neons in one go created an ammonia/nitrite spike.

I was reminding someone else earlier about that old rule of 1inch of fish per gallon - I know it's just a guideline and a lot of people poo-poo the old rule (and yes, I know it's possible to stock over that guideline amount depending on the type of fish you have and how often you are prepared to do water changes etc) - but it's always worth bearing this in mind.

So your tank is a 59 gallon and using that guide would allow you approx 59inches of fish. You have 40+ fish (you say there are others but didn't list them). If we allow just 2inches per fish in size that equals over 80 inches of fish!

Obviously, some of your fish measure more than 2inches so it could be even higher than the amount given above. You don't say how large your clowns or plecs are but in time those clown loaches will reach over a foot in length. The plecs will reach 5 or 6 inches.

What I'm trying to point out is that stocking your tank on the high side is likely to create problems of ammonia/nitrite spikes, stressed fish, unexpected/unexplainable deaths. Also, adding too many new fish at one time can also cause the same problems as it puts a sudden extra burden on your filter bacteria which struggles to cope with the extra load.

For an easier life, I always tend to understock slightly as this reduces the chances of problems.

If you are going to keep the stock of fish at that level I would recommend doing regular water changes (twice weekly at least) and weekly gravel vac - and definitely don't add any more fish to the tank. Perhaps give some thought to either returning some of the fish to your LFS or setting up another smaller tank to house some of them.

Regards - Athena

Sorry - just noticed that this is a duplicated thread of yours - bit confusing having two threads covering the same question really...

 

[bronzecat]

Nitrate and Nitrite are perfect 0 - 20

Hi

Dunno whether this is a typo, but if your nitrItes are anything but zero they're not really perfect and could be causing the problems??

 

[CrItIcaL]

hey everyone im new to the site so plz have patience with my noobisim and the few days im online lol


unknown and unexplained mass guppy death...


about November last year some very nice guy said i could have his guppys, was a 45L (10gal) with +- 35 happy 2-3cm fishies males + females. he has had them a long time and had a lot of experience with guppies. the transfer of the tank from his house to mine went well and i kept as much of the old water as possible cleaned it with a paper towel (i knew any cleaning substance would kill them so i didnt use anything, just paper towel)... i had to top up about 25% of the water in the tank... (didnt have a big enough bucket lol). after about just under a month,

i noticed 1 female guppy with clamped fins, very lazy, not eating and looked like she was turning black... so i placed her in a separate tank (or glass flower pot with tank water in this case), with medication and in the main tank to prevent whatever it is from spreading ... a day or so later she died. and i saw several others showing the same symptoms ... knowing that this is a lil bit more complicated than a case of "black spot" i performed a water change, had my water tested at a pet shop, (and did pH tests myself to know they are not cheating me, i couldn't find a nitrate test thingy though), got different medication, showed the pet shop people photos (which i don't have anymore, sorry), red books, searched on the net and found absolutely nothing. i lost about 15 (that i know of) and several others just disappeared, i could do nothing but wait and see what happens...

things eventually calmed down a bit but it still was not over... I had about 12 2.5cm - 1.5cm guppies left, and was removing passed on guppies out of my tank and filter daly.... the biggest one was a pregnant guppy (which gave birth, but the fry became lunch) that also vanished in thin air later on... fish were still disappearing like mad, so i consulted my pet shop again... he said add a few of the cheep fish to check if its the water... so i did (2 long fin danios) they were perfectly healthy and are still alive 2day ... i went back (thought it might be a guppy thing, with only 7 of them left). i added a green snakeskin male. and he is still a ok and swimming in my tank as im typing : ... only 3 guppies survived... they were so young (+- 1cm), but they became food (i think, because they just disappeared)

iv never had any problem since then.. i now have a community tank with swords gourami molly guppy danio, all happy and healthy

hope you don't mind reading the novel above. can anyone give me an answer on what happened so that it doesn't happen again... I would greatly appreciate it a lot.

thanks

 

[Athena]

I think the tank was way overstocked! Caused stress and bacterial infection - hence the clamped fins, darkening of body colour and death.

guppies are at least an inch in length - so 35 of them in a 10 gallon tank goes way over the recommended inch per gallon rule. Even if you doubled that rule to 2inch per gallon you shouldn't have had more than 20 x 1" fish.

Regards - Athena

 

[CrItIcaL]

thanx but when i added the other fish why didnt they die but the guppies kept dieing?