Help! - issues in tank and with fish

[Fishmandamo]

Morning everyone,

I hope you can help me.

I woke this morning and have to gone to feed my tropical fish and discovered all the fish close to the top of the tank. I instictively knew this was likely a lack of oxygen and did a one third water change, to which the fih seem to have settled. However i have studied the tank to look for problems as to why this may have happened (i only did a fortnightly water change on wed - 20%) and discovered a few things:

• Some of the fish seem obssesed with nibbling the gravel in one corner specifically, made me wonder if perhaps a fish has died and they are eating the body - no signs of a body though, perhaps this caused contamination and thus the fish at the top of the tank?
• I noticed one tetra seems to look ill. few white spots, one large and his body is a little enemic
• Another tetra seems to have almost a blood stained belly

I attach pics of the fish in question

Other things to note:

• Tank is well established
• tank was seemingly healthy until this am
• Fortnightly 20% water changes, the last of which was wed. i use bacto start and a dechlorinator every change
• Additional gravel was added a week ago - not lots, just a few handfulls as the tank had become a little bare in areas (pump/cleaning). Gravel was cleaned as normal.
• Tank contains approx 18 tetras, 3 zebras, 2 of the little orange fish (see pics, apologies i forgot the breed) and a cleaner fish.
• Tank has live plants

Thanks all

 

[Colin_T]

it looks like physical injuries on the fish.

Wipe the inside of the glass down with a clean fish sponge. This removes the biofilm on the glass and the biofilm will contain lots of harmful bacteria, fungus, protozoans and various other microscopic life forms.

Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for a week. The water changes and gravel cleaning will reduce the number of disease organisms in the water and provide a cleaner environment for the fish to recover in.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it is added to the tank.

Clean the filter. Wash the filter materials/ media in a bucket of tank water and re-use them. Tip the bucket of dirty water on the garden/ lawn. Cleaning the filter means less gunk and cleaner water with fewer pathogens.

Increase surface turbulence/ aeration to maximise the dissolved oxygen in the water.

Add some salt, (see directions below).

If there's no improvement after a few days of salt, post more pictures.

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SALT
You can add rock salt (often sold as aquarium salt) or swimming pool salt to the aquarium at the dose rate of 1 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres of water. If there is no improvement after 48 hours you can double that dose rate so there is 2 heaped tablespoons of salt per 20 litres.

Keep the salt level like this for at least 2 weeks but no longer than 4 weeks otherwise kidney damage can occur. Kidney damage is more likely to occur in fish from soft water (tetras, Corydoras, angelfish, Bettas & gouramis, loaches) that are exposed to high levels of salt for an extended period of time, and is not an issue with livebearers, rainbowfish or other salt tolerant species.

The salt will not affect the beneficial filter bacteria, fish, plants, shrimp or snails.

After you use salt and the fish have recovered, you do a 10% water change each day for a week using only fresh water that has been dechlorinated. Then do a 20% water change each day for a week. Then you can do bigger water changes after that. This dilutes the salt out of the tank slowly so it doesn't harm the fish.

If you do water changes while using salt, you need to treat the new water with salt before adding it to the tank. This will keep the salt level stable in the tank and minimise stress on the fish.

 

[Fishmandamo]

Thanks fpr taking the time - ill let you know how i get on

 

[itiwhetu]

What are the parameters of your tank, pH etc.

 

[DoubleDutch]

I'd seperate the two BTW

 

[Fishmandamo]

I'd seperate the two BTW

you'd remove the fish i mentioned (one white spots/enemic looking), 1 with a red belly) ?

 

[DoubleDutch]

you'd remove the fish i mentioned (one white spots/enemic looking), 1 with a red belly) ?

Yes I'd seperate them both.
The one with the white spots certainly isn't well and I doubt it is reversable.