I thought platies were supposed to be tough.

[FerrisWorld]

I have an 80 gallon tank with platies, guppies, lemon tetras, and 2 cory cats. All the fish except the platies seem happy. The platies are lying around on the bottom or hiding under the plants most of the time with their fins folded back. I got a heater, no change, added salt, no change, and 2 of the platies have died, one adult female, and one adolescent one. Ok so, the people at the fish store said to do a ph test and that it should be around 7 - 7.2. So I did that, and mine was 8.2. Then I got the ph down stuff, and it said to put 2 drops per gallon, so I put about 160 drops. It also said to only do it .2 at a time every 24 hours, but after doing the 2 drops per gallon it went down to 7.4, a whole .8 in ph at once! What the hell is that?! At least the guppies, cories, and lemons are ok. The platies don't seem to have changed from their previous gig of lying around and hiding under plants. It seems like nothing I do works, it just seems to get a little bit worse everyday. Maybe the platies need to recover from having the alkaline water, but non of the other fish had a problem with it. I've always read that platies are supposed to be tough, and whenever I've had them, a bunch of them always die. I've never had that trouble with any other fish that I've had.

 

[cutechic]

First of all, DON'T mess with your pH. It's better to find fish that suit your water parameters than to try to get the fish to adapt to the parameters. From what you've written, it's only the platies that are acting abnormally, so you don't want to cause the other fish any more stress or shock by adjusting the pH, since they've already adapted to the pH of 8.2 ppm. And trying to adjust the pH may just cause it to flucuate (become unstable).

The platies are lying around on the bottom or hiding under the plants most of the time with their fins folded back.

Your platies are most likely stressed. I'd move your platies to an isolation/ quarantine tank (make sure the pH and temperature are the same in the isolation tank as they are in your 80 gallon) so you can observe them better. This will also make them more at ease/ less stressed. Add aquarium salt to the isolation tank if you can.

If you decide to leave them in the 80 gallon, make sure there are enough hiding places for them- all those other fish are probably intimidating.

Do frequent water changes in your 80 gallon.

 

[FerrisWorld]

Well there's plenty of places for them to hide, and I don't have a place to set up another tank. I thought they were supposed to be easy to take care of, and you make it sound like a hell of a lot of work. I don't have time to do all that stuff, there has to be something easy to do, otherwise they're probably all going to die or something. Why do all the books say they're so easy to keep? I don't have to do anything to keep the guppies, lemons and cory's happy except feed them.

 

[Angry_Platy]

I have had reasonable success with platies....that said, I have had one die of finrot, on ie of dropsy and another from suspected organ failure....ALL MY FAULT>> I over fed the poor things!

I do however have 4 platy fry netted and many more in the tank (my yellow platy gave birth today, I think...she was fat and is now thin!!!).. They eat everything I give em and most of them survived the cycling where my nitrite hit 20ppm!!! (one died

All is OK with my current lot of platies....my pH is around 7.6...I was also told never to adjust pH.

With your sick platies....it would be handy if you had a quarantine tank....it could be the start of ich or finrot...I would recommend turning your heater up to 30degC (sorry, not sure what that is in F) and possible getting some ich medications as a preventative measure.

Goodluck with it and let us know how it all goes

Cheers

Angela

PS....It may look like I am a newbie but I actually had 130 posts before the whole site debacle thing.....but YAY...it is back and thats all that matters!!! I love this site!!

 

[FerrisWorld]

Well, overall today the platies look better. Two of my oldest ones, at least the only 2 left out of the first 9 that I bought, which are both tri color males, (flesh-red-black fins), look the worst, but sometimes they look better, and sometimes they don't. The only adult that looks really good is a red wagtail female, and I only see a couple of adolescent ones that are lying around, so I guess things are better, but we'll see. I plan to get rid of some guppies because there are more in there than I want, so maybe that will help too. BTW, whats the best way to get rid of fish you don't want, take them to the petstore?

 

[cutechic]

Platies aren't particulary hard to keep, if you follow some simple rules. Newbie No-nos and 10 Rules for Healthy Fishkeeping have some good advice.

whats the best way to get rid of fish you don't want

Some lfs' let you return unwanted, HEALTHY, fish; others don't. If they don't, ask aroound to see if your friends or family know of anyone who may take them. You can also post the fish you want to give away/ sell in this forum: Buy Sell and Swap!

Hope your platies keep recovering