New And I Did It All Wrong...

[OhMyFish]

I did the 30% water change yesterday. Prior to that I had not done one since Thursday/Friday. Prior to that, I was doing one each day.

The fish guy from PetCo just called. He said I could get some medicine to put in the tank and hope that maybe one fish survives. He said that it would be just best if I let the tank run, continue to add baking soda until the pH reaches 7 and do no more water changes. When all the fish die, I'm to go see him and he'll give me some water conditioner for the tank. He does not suggest emptying the tank and beginning again but rather go forward.

Everyone's help is so much appreciated. The encouragement is needed, especially as I do use your words to encourage my son not to give up (although he barely spends any time now at the tank).

 

[OhMyFish]

Ok...I'm now TOTALLY confused...

I've been very busy today and never had time to put more baking soda in the tank. I just went to do so and, of course, tested the pH prior. The pH is now 6.8!!!!!!!!!! Then...I thought, oh my the ammonia must be lethal. I tested it...0!!!!!!!!!!

Please tell me how the pH could be 6.6 at about 9:30 last night, 1/4 tsp. baking soda added at midnight, 6.2 at 9:30 this morning, and 6.8 at 2:30 this afternoon?

On the downside, the albino has remained in one position all day. Thinking he'd died, I went to take him out of the tank...only to find out he's still alive. He can't swim well...only a few inches before landing.

The emerald green cory has more fuzz but, even though he appears disoriented when swimming, he still fights to swim to the top and come down--landing whereever he may without any sense of direction.

I will continue to test the pH every couple of hours.

 

[waterdrop]

Does not seem confusing to me. You've now scattered the coral in the gravel and continued to add baking soda. Probably the carbonate hardness has continued to rise slowly. Both these things will continue to raise carbonate hardness and then finally at some point they will also slowly start to raise pH, so hopefully you've reached that point. On the other hand it may still be the testing. Currently I'm thinking you had an API liquid based test kit for ammonia only and are using strips for the other readings (I'm therefor assuming strips for pH and nitrite, but let me know if that's wrong) If that's the case then the readings could still be fairly random, although pH is one of the only tests that strips can sometimes do fairly well.

I'm hoping some of the experts will take another look at this thread but until then I'll continue to say what I can. It may be, if we're lucky, that the hardness really has reached the turning point where pH can begin to rise a little and it may be that the stalled colonies have immediately responded a little and are processing some ammonia. Its down around pH=6.2 that cycling activities seem to stall, so getting up to 6.8 may be bringing back some activity.

I'm still afraid what has been happening to the fish is just that they were greatly weakened by either the ammonia and nitrite or by the extremely low pH, or both. The weakening has left them vulnerable to common infections, like the mouth fungus and it will be wait and see as to whether they recover.

At least something seemed better this time, it will be interesting to see what happens to the stats overnight.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OhMyFish]

Thank you, waterdrop, for replying. I'm afraid to be encouraged but...am ever hopeful!

I'm using a Junior Liquid pH Test kit (Junior so my son can do it himself--basically, the test bottle is plastic!), an API liquid test kit for the Nitrites and an API liquid test kit for the Nitrates. I do have test strips since that's all I could get for the water hardness. The strips also test nitrite, nitrate, alkalinity, chlorine and pH. I've only used the test strips twice--first to test the hardness of the water in the tank and second to test the hardness of the water in my tap water (although I reported all readings on the strips). Basically, though, all the other readings are from the liquid test kits. The 6.6, 6.2, 6.8 readings have all been from the liquid tests.

The tank water, by the way, is cloudy. Not foggy but cloudy. No change in the activity...or lack thereof...in the fish.

 

[waterdrop]

Oh, ok then, that's great, I stand corrected. I trust the numbers a lot more now.

Did you rinse the gravel a long time in tap water back when you were setting up? I still assume the cloudiness is a bacterial (heterotrophic) bloom but never hurts to ask about the gravel.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OhMyFish]

Yes, I did rinse the gravel very, very well for you see it was my second purchase of gravel.

My son and I went first to PetSmart and purchased the gravel. While I was rinsing it, I thought, gee...there's so much dye in it (DS chose a blue/turquoise mix). I rinsed and rinsed and rinsed. I put it in the tank and began filling it with water. Ah...the water began turning blue...not light blue either! I took the gravel out of the tank and put it in a cooler and rinsed and rinsed and rinsed...and left it. I recleaned the tank, sun & air dried it again. I took the gravel back to PetSmart--no one had seen such a thing happen. I left PetSmart and went to PetCo and purchased their gravel. I rinsed, rinsed, rinsed, rinsed. I put it in the tank and filled it with water. I let it sit overnight, a couple of days--no change in color. I conditioned the water. I added liquid bacteria. I added a plastic ornament. We purchased our fish (6 blood fin tetras and the emerald green cory) and our story began..."I did it all wrong..."

Now...don't think we didn't read prior to beginning our journey. We did--on-line (hadn't found this site) and pamplets in the pet stores. I don't think I really understood what I was reading and it certainly wasn't as detailed/informative as the information everyone has given me on this site. I'm more a "paint by numbers" person--give me step by step (as in Monday do this, Tuesday do that, etc.). I'm beginning to understand what I read were "crib notes." Never pays to cheat...

 

[waterdrop]

ok, excellent, so its not the gravel and you are a good writer!

I suppose the other factor that could be a significant difference here is the underground filter. Not many of us here use them and so our expectations about the symptoms we see of the cycling stages may not fit as closely with the UG symptoms. You've seen my post that I used them long ago, but back then I wouldn't have observed and remembered the kinds of things I would now, so my own knowledge of what to expect from a UG is limited.

It may be that a UG is slower to get through the early stages of cycling but then sets up quite a strong biofilter once it turns the corner, don't know. So I'm thinking it could be that bacterial bloom clouds get cleared faster in a tank where a fast traditional pump filter is moving the water around more, don't know.

Hey, here's a question. I think you said the tank was between the bath and laundry doors without much room (1.5"?) on either side. How about behind it, much room there? How about under it? Is it on furniture of some sort, such that it doesn't have a cabinet area of its own below it? Just curious.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OhMyFish]

Thanks for the compliment...I do try to provide all the details for one never knows which fact is important.

It's on a cabinet that came with the tank. We put it as close to the wall as possible so there would be more room to walk (we walk down the steps--the laundry door is straight ahead and we turn right--puts tank on left--to go into the family area) and less chance of it being hit. Since DH said we wouldn't need any other filter, I didn't think about needing room on the back of the tank.

My thoughts, assuming the fish die, are to reduce the water in the tank so it wouldn't be so heavy and possibly move it out from the wall an inch or two. I do think we're going to need another filter especially if DS wants to keep tetras and feed them. Since DS wants many fish, we can't afford to give up the space an in-tank filter takes. The undergravel filter won't be sufficient to handle the waste but that's just my opinion, based on my limited "new" knowledge.

I'll post the readings later tonight and again in the morning.

Thanks so much for sticking with me through this, waterdrop!

 

[OhMyFish]

Current readings: pH 7 and ammonia is between .0 and .25 (slight rise). I have not added baking soda all day. Fish are about the same. Here's hoping the pH stays stable overnight!

 

[waterdrop]

Yes, if you start over, the first thing to think about will be the filter. Very interesting to find out you have a cabinet that goes with the tank. So does that mean it has a little shelf and holes in the back where tubing can go in and out? I have a 28 gallon and use an Eheim 2222 Professional filter, I think it was about $150. I believe a Tetratec EX700 is another cannister filter you could research and you would find it available for less. A filter should have about 5x turnover, meaning the entire volume of the tank passes through the filter 5 times in an hour. For your 29G, that means a flow rate of 145G/Hr or 550L/H. My cannister filter is a square based box that sits on a shelf inside the little cabinet below the tank. It has an intake hose and an output hose going up behind the tank background and over the back edges of the tank. The intake pipe goes way down to the bottom back right of my tank and the output hose connects to a spray bar that shoots little streams of water across the surface to aid the oxygen exchange.

Filters have three functions: mechanical, biological and chemical. We can review those if you'd like.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Mr Bliss]

Awesome to hear that the pH is at a healthy level now. It may continue to rise until an equilibrium is reached, because you now have both the dissolving coral sand and the added baking soda in the water. This is not a problem (people over here have - mostly unwittingly - kept Discus in pH 8.2 water this summer due to a temporary change in our tap water; Discus are generally considered sensitive, acidic-water fish) as long as the ammonia stays under control, so watch that and do water changes as necessary.

After the pH has reached its peak it'll probably drop a bit again before settling at a stable level, because the coral sand won't dissolve at a steady rate; the smallest particles, the "coral dust", will have dissolved first. The bigger bits dissolve much slower.

It seems your tap water must have a low KH so you'll have to be mindful of your pH in the future too. But now you know how much baking soda you need to adjust your pH to a desired level, and in time you'll develop an idea of the effect the coral sand has on your water, so you'll learn to "wing it" and won't need to test as often.

 

[waterdrop]

Yes, good comments bliss, except that she's flying blind using only the strips to measure KH. If ever there was a household that needs to have a good KH kit, its the OMF/DH/DS household. We should send them one for the holiday . Seriously, any of the good online sources will have one or more choices. The API GH/KH kit is fine I'm sure and the one I use, the Tetratec KH kit has worked perfectly for me and is easy to use. Once you get a feel for what happens to KH in your tank, its a much better leading indicator than pH. Most people on this forum don't need to think about this much because there are far more places that draw their water sources from places that have already put plenty of carbonite buffering into the water, so their water is stable to begin with and gets re-stablized every time they do a water change. At the OhMyFish location, the water gets de-stabilized with every water change, so having a good handle on KH will be key (if indeed all our work here is correct, and we must remember that the diagnoses are still not absolutely for sure yet I'd say, there could still be some unknown, but hopefully we're getting closer.)

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OhMyFish]

Oh my...DS turned on the aquarium light to discover the emerald green cory (Kitty) had died...as had the albino cory (Bunny). He buried his tears in unfinished homework this morning. The pH level has dropped to 6.6 overnight. I will test for the ammonia shortly.

I will be near PetSmart this evening. I'll stop in to see if they have a KH test kit although I really don't understand YET how knowing the numbers will help me to resolve the problem.

The cabinet has no shelves unless you count the bottom as being a shelf. It is open in the back. I know whatever filter I get, it will have to be inexpensive or on sale. The canister type seems out of my reach. I think I'll begin looking now and see what I can find on sale. Thanks, waterdrop, for explaining why to buy one larger than one for a 30 gallon tank.

I would prefer to take the entire tank apart and go through the gravel and just see if I find something foreign. I really don't want to go through all this again--with or without fish.

 

[OhMyFish]

Ah...the pH is now at 7.4 (if not higher but that's as high as my chart goes) and the ammonia is at .5. Hopefully, this is the peak pH mr bliss said I'd see. What a change in just 3 hours!

Ok...before I do this...would someone (waterdrop, mr bliss, and others reading) tell me if I'm thinking right or wrong...(step-by-step...that's me!)

30% water change
verify pH before adding baking soda (e.g., add baking soda if ph is below 6.4--thinking 1/4 tsp.)
check ammonia again (am assuming it'll be .25 or under...what to do if it's not?)

 

[waterdrop]

OK, I will tell you my personal feeling is that all along I've felt that your water changes are too "wimpy." I've been reluctant to say that because I'm still only a "Re-Beginner" myself (many years of aquariums years ago but had no real skills to speak of back then, so now for the last year I've been trying to learn "real" skills from the very experienced folks I've met here on TFF) and yours is a complicated case, meaning mainly that there can be information misunderstandings when trying to diagnose and take actions from a distance through words.

My approach to water changes is that first you should know your tap water parameters. In your case, the one time you've reported them, they sounded excellent. They were Amm=0, NO2=0, pH=7.4 and NO3=0 (although your son measured some NO3, but we'll assume zero, since we're not particularly worring about nitrates at this point anyway.) We also assume (and have loose reinforcement from a strip test) that KH=(some really low number.) Conclusion: Each time we do a water change we will be improving the tank water with respect to ammonia, nitrite and pH but we will be taking away the hardness and will potentially have to restore that part.

Next, in my approach, is that seeing ammonia or nitrite in the water "trumps" all other worries, especially, especially(!) if its above 0.25ppm. If you get a reading of .5 or above on ammonia or nitrite then the fish are in danger of dying regardless of the kinds of protections that come from "small" water changes. So, to take your current example, if I saw ammonia of 0.50ppm I would immediately change out 50 to 70% of the water, putting back in conditioned water that is roughly temperature matched (judged merely with my hand) and in your case I would have put at least a teaspoon of baking soda in the return water. Then I would wait at least an hour for the tank to settle and measure again. If the ammonia was only down to 0.25ppm I would repeat the procedure with another 50% water change. It takes a significant chunk of water being changed to get the numbers to go down!

My own feeling is that you've been overly influenced by the LFS or by some of our early advice here out of concern about the pH to think that you need to be "careful" of the fish by doing wimpy water changes, when in fact you need to act decisively whenever ammonia or nitrite readings go up. (This, by the way, is the H**L of fish-in cycling, in spades!)

~~waterdrop~~