New Fish Dying

[bally]

Hi Guys

I am new to the forum and fish keeping

i bought a rio 125 4 weeks ago, i did something very silly and stocked it before allowing the nitrogen cycle to run, and as a result lost half of the fish.

I learnt a lesson and I have carried out all the tests and now all the results are good, the tank is working well. In fact my black mollie give birth 2 weeks ago to 10 babies and all are doing well.

Yesterday i bought 2 guppies, male and female, as soon as i put male in he was at the top gasping for air, he had what appeared to be white bubbles on his fins, but i am sure it was not white spot.

When i got up this morning both guppies where dead, there seems to have been something going on as there was a large crater in the gravel as if something has happened, a fight maybe.The male guppie had no fin left.

I also bought 4 neons and one of them is missing, persumed dead.

All i have if a small plec, 1mollie, 6 neons, and a female guppie, plus the 8 babies which are swimming free as they are big enough to fend for themseleves.


Can anyone suggest a reason?

When i was in the pet shop, in some of tanks there were one or two dead ones, could this have something to do with it, have i just bought bad fish?

thanks for your help

 

[emmag21]

Firstly its a good idea to purchase 2 females for every male as all the chasing can tire out the females and kill them. Also id advise you to never buy fish from a tank that has dead fish in, its quite likely the fish you purchased were unwell and died due to disease.

When you bought the fish home did you add them straight to your aquarium or leave them to acclimatise? If so how long for? Fish can be sensitive and even a slight change in water temp/conditons can be very stressful. x

 

[locust267]

I would say the tank still is not ready yet, even though the tests are looking good, the nitrite stage of the cycle is most likely not complete yet and you may get a spike.

I would not buy any more fish and take your current ones back to the store if possible.

Do a water change now and as you are doing keep an eye on the results and do another W/C in a few days if the tests are ok.

Also if any of the fish looked funny when you bought them, I would take them back for a refund but if you can you may need to treat the water with meds providing you dont take the fish back.

Did you leave the new fish floating in there bags in your tank and then add some of your tank water in, this may also of killed the new fish.

Neons are also fin nippers so perhaps they attacked the male guppy, also the female may of stuck up to him if she was being harrassed.

 

[waterdrop]

Hi bally and Welcome to TFF

Can you tell us what type of test kit you have? It will be important for us to know more specifically what numerical result you get for ammonia, nitrate and pH for instance.

Can't remember, is the Rio 125 a 125L tank?

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Miss Wiggle]

yes as WD said if you can give us the exact results for pH, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate that would help a lot.

and yes WD, all the juwel tanks have a model number which is teh amount of litres it holds. the rio is a juwel tank adn therefore the rio 125 is 125litres

 

[bally]

hi

Just actually remembered, i placed the plastic bag in the tank with its sides rolled down so it could get up to temperture, what happened was the bag snagged on the the side and tipped and the 2 guppies escaped into the tank, i guess they bearly had 5 mins to becomes use to the water.

The neons were in thier bag for a good hour and i added my water to the bag over that period.

The tank is indeed a 125lts tank.

the PH ios 6.5, the ammonia reading was 0pmm, i use the test tube and the town squeezey bottles and compare it on a colour chart, cnt remember the make.

i carried out a water changed after i had added the fish, (4 hours after roughly)25% and use the stress coat and another to remove chlorine.

I think i may well of answer my own question here,,,,,,,maybe it was shock of going striaght into the new tank

 

[locust267]

Your Ammonia is 0 but what is your Nitrite reading? 4 weeks into your cycle you are likely to have high nitrite, this is still very toxic for your fish and possibly what is killing them.

The make of test you use is important too as most are very innacurate and may give a false reading.

API freshwater master kits are good

You need to test the nitrite and nitrate levels too

 

[bally]

hi

i havent tested the nitrates, i assumed these would be okay once the ammonia is right, as as the other fish in the tank including the babes are doing well, i assumed it was ok.

i use API test kit

 

[vinylman]

Neons aren't very good choices for a new tank - far too sensitive. Best to introduce them after the tank has matured (NOT the same as being cycled), a good 4/5 months. If you go for Guppies again, I'd go for a ratio of 3 females for every male.

 

[bally]

hi

i am going to buy 3 guppies tomorrow.

I cant understand how the fish that are in the tank are fine, and new ones i buy are not.

To be honest i ahve bough may 12 fish from this shop and all but 4 have died.

Should i consider met blue

 

[Corleone]

hi

i havent tested the nitrates, i assumed these would be okay once the ammonia is right, as as the other fish in the tank including the babes are doing well, i assumed it was ok.

i use API test kit

Ammonia hits zero about halfway through the cycle, nitrite may not even have peaked yet at that point.

The temperature change won't shock a fish to death, however water chemistry may. If you have nitrite in the water, especially if it's high, the fish that are currently in it may have adapated, but new fish may die very quickly.

 

[bally]

oh no, to get nitrates down then should i do regular water changes?

Or is there another way?

will these settle out what the cycle has completed

 

[Corleone]

Just like ammonia - daily water changes, and keep it under .25 ppm. It will settle to 0 at the end of the cycle.

 

[fish.com1]

If one of your neons is missing in a juwel tank, check the filter housing, because one of my lemons got in there. He was alright though. They jump in through the cutouts for the wires so i put a milk bottle top over it and it seemed to do the trick. I know someone whos'e had a neon live in the filter housing, for two years and he was fine, so check the filter housing. If he is in there he will still get food, from the filter.

 

[waterdrop]

hi bally,

Its unfortunate but two very important water chemicals, nitrite(NO2) and nitrate(NO3), have very similar names that vary only by one letter (NitrIte, NitrAte, get it?)

What Corleone was saying above is that there is a very real possibility that your tank has too much NitrIte(NO2), which suffocates the fish (their gills pump and pump but not enough oxygen gets to their cells because nitrIte is using up the spaces on their blood cells and oxygen can't be carried.)

The API Freshwater Master Test Kit has a Nitrite (NO2) test and that's the one we need to know the result number from. Nitrite(NO2) needs to be as close to zero as possible and not above 0.25ppm (just like ammonia.)

NitrAte(NO3) is a whole different story.

~~waterdrop~~