Lost second fish

[Country joe]

I lost my second Harlequin Rasbora today.
Both have shown the same systems they leave the shoal staying in one corner of the tank, and not eating, there is no sign of disease. My tank is cycled, and the fish have been in for a fortnight, as well as the Harlequins I put in 10 Neon green tetras at the same time, and have lost one.
I know some on here will say get a hospital tank, but I'm not going to, so I suppose its something I will have to put up with, I was going to buy a couple of Harlequins, but I'll be better waiting to see if I lose anymore, idid a 25% water change last Sunday, and a water test today. Ammonia nil, Nitrites, nil, nitrates nil, and PH 8.

 

[TNG]

For small fish like rasboras, it's not uncommon to lose a few during the first few weeks. But you shouldn't lose anymore after that. That said, pH 8 is a bit high for them.

 

[10 Tanks]

Hello. Small water changes do very little to maintain a steady and healthy water chemistry. You need to remove and replace a lot of water and do it every few days. Feeding should always be minimal. Fish don't need much food. They sure don't get it in their natural environment. They're lucky to eat once a week, so you don't need to feed much more often than that. A slightly hungry fish in near pure water conditions is going to be a healthy fish.

10

 

[Colin_T]

pictures and video of the fish?

 

[Country joe]

 

[Country joe]

That's it up top, it died the next day

 

[Country joe]

For small fish like rasboras, it's not uncommon to lose a few during the first few weeks. But you shouldn't lose anymore after that. That said, pH 8 is a bit high for them.

Don't fancy aquarium peat to bring down ph, but looked at envii aquarium equaliser says, buffers ph for fresh water fish, and can't overdose, but I thought a ph of 8 wasn't to bad

 

[gwand]

The higher the pH the more ammonium NH4 is converted into ammonia NH3 which is far more toxic.

 

[Colin_T]

Any chance of a video of them?

What does their poop look like?
Are they eating normally up until they separate from the group and sit in the corner?

The fish looks fine in the picture apart from some white stuff on the tail, which could be air bubbles in the background.

Separating from the main group and sitting alone is a symptom of an unwell fish. Not eating is another sign. If there's no external symptoms then it's probably internal. If they are doing stringy white poop when they separate, that would be an internal bacterial or protozoan infection. If they do normal poop when this happens, it could be something in the water.

We have had members on here that had glolight tetras in hard water with a high pH and their fish used to die off every now and then and didn't show any symptoms. The fish would be fine one day and dead the next. When they reduced the GH and pH, the fish topped dying. Scotland should have soft water with a pH below 7.0 but maybe you don't. Pretty sure I have asked you previously, but any idea what the GH is?

 

[Magnum Man]

I've not had good luck buffering Ph, from our "rock hard" water... too much calcium in the water, which acts as a buffer, & makes changing the Ph difficult... I even added Peat beads in mesh bags to my hang on back filters, enough to turn the water, the color of coffee, with literally no change in Ph, had several large pieces of drift wood also...

I ended up adding an RO unit, just for my aquariums... once enough water changes were done ( I did this over time, & it took a long time to get my Ph, to go down to about 7.0 Ph, then I started adding some of the Peat beads to the ceramic filter media, that I put in my pots that I've been growing terrestrial plants in, out of the top of the tanks, & adding a few dried Almond leaves, & water is now in the mid 6's for Ph, on the tanks I've been trying to lower...

 

[Country joe]

Any chance of a video of them?

What does their poop look like?
Are they eating normally up until they separate from the group and sit in the corner?

The fish looks fine in the picture apart from some white stuff on the tail, which could be air bubbles in the background.

Separating from the main group and sitting alone is a symptom of an unwell fish. Not eating is another sign. If there's no external symptoms then it's probably internal. If they are doing stringy white poop when they separate, that would be an internal bacterial or protozoan infection. If they do normal poop when this happens, it could be something in the water.

We have had members on here that had glolight tetras in hard water with a high pH and their fish used to die off every now and then and didn't show any symptoms. The fish would be fine one day and dead the next. When they reduced the GH and pH, the fish topped dying. Scotland should have soft water with a pH below 7.0 but maybe you don't. Pretty sure I have asked you previously, but any idea what the GH is?

I've tried to do photos and video. But it's not letting me there's no stringy white poop, they are sitting alone and not eating, only the two that died, the rest look okay today
But will have to see if any more.
Just did these two tests GH 8 and KH 6.

 

[Colin_T]

No stringy white poop is a good sign.

The water isn't too hard for them so that's not it.

The pH might be too high for them, depending on where they came from and what the pH of their previous water was.

Isolating from the main group is a big concern.

Have you added any medications for the blue green algae yet?
That might be affecting them if they are wild caught, or it could be a combination of medication and high pH.

Basically monitor and see if there is anything that might be causing this (lights coming on suddenly, chemicals getting into the water, etc). This is going to be one of those issues where they probably keep dropping off one at a time until they all die or you work out why. Sorry, not helpful I know. From an external appearance they look fine. No stringy white poop is good but not eating and isolating is bad.

 

[Country joe]

No stringy white poop is a good sign.

The water isn't too hard for them so that's not it.

The pH might be too high for them, depending on where they came from and what the pH of their previous water was.

Isolating from the main group is a big concern.

Have you added any medications for the blue green algae yet?
That might be affecting them if they are wild caught, or it could be a combination of medication and high pH.

Basically monitor and see if there is anything that might be causing this (lights coming on suddenly, chemicals getting into the water, etc). This is going to be one of those issues where they probably keep dropping off one at a time until they all die or you work out why. Sorry, not helpful I know. From an external appearance they look fine. No stringy white poop is good but not eating and isolating is bad.

The first one died when I had added nothing to the water, the second one, a after using g slime out.its funny how the tetras are fine. The thing is I really like harlequins, but if I lost them would I get others the fish are from my local shop who are top class, there fish are well looked after and they know their stuff.

 

[Colin_T]

It might have been a bad batch of rasboras, which are normally more sensitive to changes and chemicals than tetras, especially if they are wild caught rasboras.

Can you contact the shop and see if they have had any issues with theirs?
Maybe find out what the shops pH and GH are, and see if the shop can find out what the pH and GH of their supplier's water is. They might even be able to find out if they are wild caught.

 

[Country joe]

My aquarium shops ph is 7, the manager said mine at 8 is to high, he said for me to test my tap water which I did and ph was 7, he says there must be something in my tank that causing it, and for a start to do 10% water changes every two days and see if that brings it down, then if that doesn't work to use waterline acid buffer ph 6.5 or 7.2
My aquarium has small pea gravel, shop bought, bog wood and shop bought rock, live plants, and the filter is filled with sponges and one box of juwel Cirax a biological filter medium, and that's it, so can't understand why 5 mins from me there ph is different.