I Dont Know What Happened

[smooth_bourbon]

I cam home from work and all my fish are dead or very close to it What do I do ahhhhhh.


80 gallon
Jack Dempsey -- too big for hospital tank
7 cories all but two dead-- moved the two to a hospital tank
4 ottos all but one dead -- also into hospital tank
3 bala sharks 2 dead -- other in hospital tank
1 severum young -- in hospital tank
One large leopard spotted sailfin pleco too big for hospital tank.

I did a water change yesterday about 40 percent

ammonia 0
Nitrite 0

cant find my nitrate test in my panic sorry



The dempsey looks like this the fish in the hospital all look normal tho one corie is kinda rigid.

Help quick please I really dont know what happened

oh I did a 50% water change, raised the temp 2 degrees to 80 and added a little salt

 

[smooth_bourbon]

Any advise or suggestions I am gonna run out to the LFS to pick up some meds but not sure what I need . I have had most of these fish for at least 5 years. Never had anything like this happen.

 

[*Fishkies*]

Have you sprayed any chemicals near the tank? Such as perfumes/deoderants/air freshners.
Have you lite any candles in the room where the fish tank is?
Have you added anything new to the tank?

Did you remember to add the water conditioner after doing the water change yesterday?

 

[smooth_bourbon]

I was worried maybe I added too much chlorine remover I am using Jungle ACE and poured in 5 caps full. But no I havent sprayed anything in or near the tank. I got some stress coat, and some Melafix thinking it might help with is skin??

The most recent thing I added was the Ottos and I added them a little over two weeks ago.

 

[smooth_bourbon]

my nitrates are 0

I bought a new kit while at the store. My old one only had one bottle this one has two kinda odd.

I am just in shock. I really didnt do anything different to the tank, and I have had the Pleco and some of the cats for almost 8 years now. . And Jack looks so bad when he was beautiful and healthy looking yesterday.

 

[Christine1014]

do you have a lot of plants in your tank? Otherwise, it's very odd to have a 0 reading for nitrates... although you say you just got it, so it shouldn't be old.... it's not one of those strip-tests, is it?

I can't imagine the water conditioner being the problem, especially in a tank as big as yours. I think you'd have to dump in a couple of bottles to do any harm to the fish. Regarding the conditioner, though, is that one that, like Prime, will help control nitrites & nitrates? Maybe the extra ammount can account for the non-existant nitrate reading? Anyway...

Not sure about fish meds, though... sorry. Wilder's probably one of the best people to ask, but I'm pretty sure she's in the UK... have to wait til morning to hear from her.

 

[smooth_bourbon]

No its an aquarium pharmaceuticals Nitrate NO-3 test kit.

I did a 50 percent water change before I went to the store. Before the change I had a very very pale amonia reading somwhere between 0 and .5, and o Nitrite. After water change o's all around.


hmm I just tested my PH and its at 6.0 would the meds have done this?

 

[rdd1952]

The dechlorinator definitely shouldn't be an issue. I think it is impossible to ovedose a tank. Have you recently added any new plants, decorations, etc. to the tank? Have you used any chemicals that you hadn't used before? Anything in the house that could have gotten into the tanks? Could you have had something on your hands when you did the water change the previous day?

What does your pH normally run and what is it from the tap? If your pH normally runs higher, it could hae been the problem if it suddenly dropped. Of course, something would have to cause that. It wouldn't just crash on it's own. Do you use CO2 for your plants? Could you have had a problem with the CO2 that caused the crash or drove all the oxygen from the water?

As mentioned, Wilder is good with diseases. I know absolutely nothing about them but I do know that you need to know what type disease you're dealing with before you medicate. Otherwise, you could just be wasting your money.

Unfortunately, sometimes you never figure out what caused the problem. About 2 years ago, I did a normal cleaning on my 29 gallon tank one night. At the time it had 6 red-eye tetras, 6 X-ray tetras and 5 corys in it. I got up the next morning to find all 6 of my red-eye tetras dead and and all the other fish were fine. I never figured out what happened.

 

[Amunet]

Maybe too much salt added?
Or could've been something in the tap that did this. Surprising that that many healthy fish would just suddenly up and die when nothing had been wrong before.
Are you the only one in the home? If not, are you sure no one else sprayed anything near the tank or added anything to it?

So srry you lost so many though Hope the ones remaining pull through.

 

[smooth_bourbon]

just me and mu husband in the house and I quized him first thing. I did not add the salt till after the whole problem started just cause I am so in shock I have no idea what to do.

 

[smooth_bourbon]

wow when things go wrong they go really wrong. I still havent figured out what happened, but I think something killed off my filter bacteria because the nitrate was 0 yesterday, and reads 20 today. This is with just the Dempsey, and the Pleco in the tank. I am continuing with the Stress Coat and lots of water changes. If anyone has advise I would love it. The fish that I transfered to the hospital tank all look fine, as does the Pleco, Jack is swimming around normal, but still looks horrible. I have sat at home all day staring at Jack and hoping my moral support will help him pull thru this.

I really just want to know what I did so this never happens again. Does anyone else use Jungle ACE to remove chlorine?

 

[smooth_bourbon]

Ok so more fish died again right after the next water change. Not just in my 80 gallon but in my 29 gallon tank as well. So I waited a couple days bought Jungle Start Right which is what I used to always use, only used this Jungle ACE maybe the last three weeks. I did another water change in both tanks using the Start right today, and all the living fish came out of hiding and ate for the first time since Friday.

If anyone else uses the Jungle ACE I would really be interested in knowing if it effects the hardness of your water. I have tested and tested and my water at tap has a ph of 6.8 add ACE and it jumps to 7.6, but then after in the tank for a day it drops to 6.0. PH is not something I test regularly tho I will be from now on.

I have my pleco, 1 cory, 1 platy, 1 otto, 2 amano shrimp, and I believe 1 rafeal I dont want to shock him any more then I have already by dragging him out of his hiding.


I have been testing everything daily since Saturday, and the only bad reading I had was the Nitrate the day after I added some Melafix, which I added hoping it would help with Jacks open wounds.

 

[Christine1014]

You mentioned up higher that you changed the water right before your nitrate test; I think for an accurate reading you're supposed to wait a few hours. My guess is you actually had more nitrates but just didn't get an accurate reading on the test. But nitrates of 20 aren't bad. That's actually pretty good for a non-planted aquarium! If your filter bacteria had been killed off, you'd be getting ammonia and nitrite readings. Have you checked your tap water at all? My local water system had a freak ammonia spike one weekend. The LFS lost their entire stock of fish.

 

[NEONCORY]

I'm sorry to hear your loss. I am no expert of diagnosing the fish illness and problem. But here is a thing or 2 came to my mind.

First what kind of filter system do you have. Is it possible, sometime during the day you are gone filter lost power and stopped for a while and killed all the bacteria. I know sometime power outage happen. Here I am in old apartment and I know whenever me or my roommate jiggle the cord from plugged in at one of the outlet, they just shut everything off from TV ,computer, power filter and most annoyingly the powerhead and those thing is plugged to different outlet. And everything else restart by themself but powerhead and I have to stick my hand in the water to restart. After the few time, I open the outlet cover to see if any lose wire touch each other when we plug something in but I didn't see anything wrong. And I am not crazy about electricity so just close it up and told my roommate to not to use the outlet anymore.
Anyway, my point is are there any wire or such is not perfect that they shut it off sometime perhaps.

There is another long shot I heard it before. Sometime the toxic chemical get into the aquarium from the filter which disolve it from the air. Like earlier person mentioned, air spray, perfume and such. But the story I heard was, the person lost many fish because her/his neighbior was painting. It was not inside the same house but the next house was painting. Obviously it must be some kind of strong paint which was toxic to the fish.

Since your tank seems maintained ok and no new addition or much symptom of the sick fish but they just drop dead all of a sudden. It sounds like either some kind of malfunction of filter or toxic reaction.
I hope you can find the cause so you can prevent it to happen ever again.

 

[smooth_bourbon]

Thank you for your sympathy and suggestions.

Have you checked your tap water at all?

I have tested it for everything I can, was thinking of calling the company to see if they had changed anything tho.