Help! What Are We Doing Wrong?

[Lilac07]

We bought a BiOrb back in the summer and have had real trouble with our fish. We've stocked it slowly as per instructions. It's a 30L BiOrb and we started with one fantail who died almost immediately. The fish shop man suggested we get some danios instead to get the water nitrogen levels right. They're still whizzing round happily (had them since August). We got a white fantail in September who was doing fine. Then in October got a calico fantail which died in days. We replaced him with a very vigorous orange fantail who seems fine - but now the white one is just drifting around. I've taken it out of the tank and put it in shallow water, but I think it's had it as well. One of it's front fins is very tight together, almost paralysed, which doesn't look right. And it's tail is very raggedy. But I haven't atually seen any bullying going on - although it wouldn't surprise me as the orange one seems a bit of a bruiser.

So what am I doing wrong? I've mangaged to kill 3 fish in as many months. I feel like Darla from Finding Nemo... I'm finding it quite upsetting as I get attached to them and feel that it is my fault that they are dying. We've never kept fish before and our kids love them and get very sad when they die.

I don't think I'm over-feeding - I'm putting in a couple of pinches of flakes between the 4 danios and 2 fantails every 2-3 days. We're siphoning 1/3 the tank every week and replcaing with clean water. The BiOrb has an inbuilt filter... and the danios are absolutely fine.

Please Help!

 

[Miss Wiggle]

oh dear i'm afraid the bi-orb's instructions are terrible and the advice the fish shop has given is poor as well.

rest assured this is not your fault, you've just acted on the advice given, the people who gave you the advice were wrong though.

the initial deaths will be because the tank was not cycled before adding fish meaning the water levels were toxic. if you read the link in my signature 'whats cycling' this will explain it all to you and what to do to prevent it.

the second issue is that the fish you have chosen are not suitable for the tank, this causes stress and can then lead to disease, if the fish are stressed and having poor water quality issues then this would very quickly lead to ill health or death.

the 30 litre tank works out to 8 gallons, we usually say you can stock to 1" of fish per gallon of water, but because of the shape of the bio orbs they can actually hold less fish than that, you can only have about 5" of fish in the tank.

The danio's are very active fish, they need a lot of swimming space and should be in nothing less than a 20 gallon tank, the fantails are high waste producing fish and again need a tank around 15 gallons for 1 fish, 20-30 gallons to keep more than one.

So sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings, but at least you now know whats gone wrong and we can help you to put things right.

Because the fish are not suitable for this tank you have a choice now, either return them to the fish shop and swap them for something more suitable, or get a larger tank suitable to keep them in. Obviously you can't make that decision instantly but start thinking about what you want to do and when you decide we will tell you how to proceed from this point.

Do you have a water testing kit? If so then can you please test the tank water and the water from your tap and let us know what the readings are?

 

[chesterscot]

also do you dechlorinate the clean water before you put it back in the tank?
regards scot

 

[waterdrop]

yes, agree with MW and chesterscot.

The initial problem is all summed up in the second sentence: "We've stocked it slowly as per instructions."

Instructions were wrong! MW will get you started on the right path.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[vinylman]

You know, it REALLY p****s me off when the manufacturers of small tanks and BiOrbs plaster photos all over the packaging that show around half a dozen Goldfish in the tank. It's SO misleading, and they know it. As everyone else has said, chester, it's not your fault but you're in the best place now you've found us. FWIW, I think that for what you get, the BiOrbs are hideously expensive, especially when you can get something like an Aquacube 40 for around £35. There, rant over.