My poor corys!!!! Floating corys!!!

[Madisonkeug]

I woke up this morning turned all my tank lights on and when I walked into my office and turned the light on in my 29 gal I noticed all my corys are having a hard time controlling their buoyancy!!!!! I have no idea what caused this it must have happened over night as they were fine yesterday!!! I haven’t had any issues with these guys in the past so this was a shock! Please help.
Checked my water parameters:
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 5ppm
Ph 7
GH 60
KH 40

A few days ago I added three Ottos from the quarantine tank they were in there for two weeks and have been eating blanched cucumber well and algae so I added them to the main tank and have been increasing the amount of algae wafers

yesterday it got stormy and thundery so I turned the temp down ~2° over the whole day to simulate their natural habitat and they were all over each other (breeding activity)

I have 6 bronze corys and two spotted corys they’ve been in this tank for over a month and I’m not sure what could have caused this. They’ve been swimming up to the surface to try and fix this I imagine and so far the three smaller and one of the larger bronze corys have been fine mostly effecting the larger Cory females and the two spotted but I worry the rest will follow!! What caused this and how can I fix/prevent now!

 

[Fishfinder1973]

Are they swimming up to the surface or floating up?
My corys like to lay their eggs on the glass near the surface,possibly where the water is most oxygenated.
Keep a look out for eggs in this area.

 

[Madisonkeug]

Are they swimming up to the surface or floating up?
My corys like to lay their eggs on the glass near the surface,possibly where the water is most oxygenated.
Keep a look out for eggs in this area.

No I’ve had them breed before in this tank and it’s not the same, they were floating up uncontrollably and had to fight to swim down. I’ve cranked the heat up to 80° over the six hours and I’ve seen an improvement but not sure they all are. My pepper corys are still not doing well had to remove one and put them in a separate tank that’s shallower since he’s still young and seemed to be really struggling to get to the bottom and was just exhausted. My larger corys it’s unclear if they’ve gotten better or if they’re still swimming to the surface for gulps of air I presume because they’re still uncomfortable with their swim bladder but they are able to stay at the bottom of the tank and rest without having to fight to stay down now. I can’t find two of my corys but I have the lights off to kee their stress down and I’m sure they’re just hiding in some of the caves/decore/plants

 

[Fishfinder1973]

could they have been gulping air at the surface during the pressure change due to the storm,and when you turned the temperature down it would have increased the dissolved oxygen level in the water.In other words they’ve had too much air in their swim bladders???All just plain bad luck that you could never have predicted.
I could,and most likely am wrong,but it’s a feasible explanation.
Turning the temperature back up could reverse the problem

 

[Madisonkeug]

could they have been gulping air at the surface during the pressure change due to the storm,and when you turned the temperature down it would have increased the dissolved oxygen level in the water.In other words they’ve had too much air in their swim bladders???All just plain bad luck that you could never have predicted.
I could,and most likely am wrong,but it’s a feasible explanation.
Turning the temperature back up could reverse the problem

It’s possible. I’ve got the temp turned up to 80°F I don’t want to crank it up too high though as they’re probably pretty drained and exhausted from constantly trying to swim downwards... it looks like it’s helps a bit but I’m not sure. Could it also be a combination of that and constipation just making for a really bad day for these guys?

 

[Dajuyu]

Perhaps a picture will describe it all ...

 

[Madisonkeug]

Perhaps a picture will describe it all ...

Thanks, they’re all actually fully recovered now! I just raised the temp up to 82° slowly and they started to be able to fix the issue by gulping air from the surface. I didn’t grab any photos but they were otherwise in perfect health and are doing great now!

 

[Fishfinder1973]

That’s great.one of life’s little mysteries.

 

[Byron]

I've been following this thread, but won't guess as to what may have started this issue. The temperature is an issue now, however. I don't know the species of the "spotted" cory, and the "bronze" I will assume is Corydoras aeneus (?). This latter species has a temperature range of 21-27C/70-80F, optimum around 24C/75F. This means the increase to9 80+F is fine for treatment, but not permanent. There are no cory species, including ones like C. sterbai, that should be permanently maintained in temperatures above 80F, and most if not all will be healthier below that. Treatment periods for ich or similar is a different matter.

Cories do regularly breach the surface for air...is this what you have been seeing and perhaps assumed to be a problem? An increase in the surface breaches can sometimes indicate problems in the water, but a normal pattern is to be expected. What exactly is "normal" is difficult to say; my group of 40 cories rarely breach--if I sit in front of the tank for an hour (I sometimes do, without dozing off even!) I may not see any of them breaching. I used to see it in the early morning just after the light went on over the tank, along with obvious increased rate of respiration, and I was able to pin this down to the lack of oxygen/increase of CO2 from the plants overnight; I increased the surface disturbance from the filter (permanently, day and night the same) and no longer see this.

 

[Fishfinder1973]

I've been following this thread, but won't guess as to what may have started this issue. The temperature is an issue now, however. I don't know the species of the "spotted" cory, and the "bronze" I will assume is Corydoras aeneus (?). This latter species has a temperature range of 21-27C/70-80F, optimum around 24C/75F. This means the increase to9 80+F is fine for treatment, but not permanent. There are no cory species, including ones like C. sterbai, that should be permanently maintained in temperatures above 80F, and most if not all will be healthier below that. Treatment periods for ich or similar is a different matter.

Cories do regularly breach the surface for air...is this what you have been seeing and perhaps assumed to be a problem? An increase in the surface breaches can sometimes indicate problems in the water, but a normal pattern is to be expected. What exactly is "normal" is difficult to say; my group of 40 cories rarely breach--if I sit in front of the tank for an hour (I sometimes do, without dozing off even!) I may not see any of them breaching. I used to see it in the early morning just after the light went on over the tank, along with obvious increased rate of respiration, and I was able to pin this down to the lack of oxygen/increase of CO2 from the plants overnight; I increased the surface disturbance from the filter (permanently, day and night the same) and no longer see this.

 

[Madisonkeug]

I've been following this thread, but won't guess as to what may have started this issue. The temperature is an issue now, however. I don't know the species of the "spotted" cory, and the "bronze" I will assume is Corydoras aeneus (?). This latter species has a temperature range of 21-27C/70-80F, optimum around 24C/75F. This means the increase to9 80+F is fine for treatment, but not permanent. There are no cory species, including ones like C. sterbai, that should be permanently maintained in temperatures above 80F, and most if not all will be healthier below that. Treatment periods for ich or similar is a different matter.

Cories do regularly breach the surface for air...is this what you have been seeing and perhaps assumed to be a problem? An increase in the surface breaches can sometimes indicate problems in the water, but a normal pattern is to be expected. What exactly is "normal" is difficult to say; my group of 40 cories rarely breach--if I sit in front of the tank for an hour (I sometimes do, without dozing off even!) I may not see any of them breaching. I used to see it in the early morning just after the light went on over the tank, along with obvious increased rate of respiration, and I was able to pin this down to the lack of oxygen/increase of CO2 from the plants overnight; I increased the surface disturbance from the filter (permanently, day and night the same) and no longer see this.

Yes I raised the temp to help with treatment and have been slowly lowering it a few degrees a day. They usually didn’t breach often throughout the day like you said early in the morning a bit and maybe the odd evening after I feed but I would see one breaching every 10-15 mins (their tank is in my office so I watch them a lot lol!! ) the water perams were perfect at 0 ammonia 0 nitrite ~5 ppm nitrate and I have pretty powerful air pump with an air stone so it shouldn’t be that!!! I thought that maybe I didn’t quarantine my new ottos long enough (had them for just over two weeks before adding them to tank) turns out that one of them is now showing early symptoms of ich with one possible spot on her tail, that could be a contributing factor?

 

[Byron]

Yes I raised the temp to help with treatment and have been slowly lowering it a few degrees a day. They usually didn’t breach often throughout the day like you said early in the morning a bit and maybe the odd evening after I feed but I would see one breaching every 10-15 mins (their tank is in my office so I watch them a lot lol!! ) the water perams were perfect at 0 ammonia 0 nitrite ~5 ppm nitrate and I have pretty powerful air pump with an air stone so it shouldn’t be that!!! I thought that maybe I didn’t quarantine my new ottos long enough (had them for just over two weeks before adding them to tank) turns out that one of them is now showing early symptoms of ich with one possible spot on her tail, that could be a contributing factor?

Introducing something with the otos is one possible, yes. However, before jumping in with "x" or "y", leave well alone and see what occurs. If it is ich, raise the temp back up to 30C/86F for two weeks. This, plus avoiding any stress from so-called medications will deal with ich.

I have many times had new fish show one or two spots, or more often flashing (ich first attacks fish in the gills where we don't see it but the flashing is the cue), and even without any temp raising it clears up. Sometimes I increase the temp, depends upon the fish's actions. But also my QT for new fish is a permanently running 20g tank, planted with floating plants, so new fish are into a "comfortable" environment even though in QT. This does make a big difference.

 

[Madisonkeug]

Introducing something with the otos is one possible, yes. However, before jumping in with "x" or "y", leave well alone and see what occurs. If it is ich, raise the temp back up to 30C/86F for two weeks. This, plus avoiding any stress from so-called medications will deal with ich.

I have many times had new fish show one or two spots, or more often flashing (ich first attacks fish in the gills where we don't see it but the flashing is the cue), and even without any temp raising it clears up. Sometimes I increase the temp, depends upon the fish's actions. But also my QT for new fish is a permanently running 20g tank, planted with floating plants, so new fish are into a "comfortable" environment even though in QT. This does make a big difference.

Yes mine is a 15gal that runs permanently with some plants but my floating plants melted away since there was too much flow when I had my neons in there compared to my gourami. They seemed fine and I was excited to put them in to the main display and only waited 2 1/2 weeks