Pufff! Smelly tank!

[freshy]

Hi everybody,
I have a question. Yesterday I began medicating my sick platy for external bacteria in the community tank. I added some salt and the recommended dose of acriflavin. Today when I fed the fish I noticed the tank smelled! Ughhhh! I'm not sure if it's because of the meds, thesalt, some rotting plant.

Any ideas?
Would you guys recommend waterchanges?

 

[skimpy]

Hi freshy,

Please do not take offence to this but fish do not get ill for no reason, and bad smells from a fish tank can only be if something is wrong. You have an ill platy that you are treating, is there a history leading up to this ??? What are your water parameters ??? It is soooooooooooooo hard to help or offer advice with so little detail.

I know bad smells can come from bacteria if it had died, and I believe that (I think it is nitrItes) can give off a smell when it is too high. If it were me the first thing I would do if I had a bad smell is test my water to see what (if anything) may be happening.

Can you post more details, help us to help you What type of smell is "Ughhhh".

I do apologise if I am sounding hard today, but I really do enjoy helping others where I possibly can and without any details to go on it can be really frustrating.

Thanks (I am friendly really)

 

[freshy]

Hi, non taken. You're right.
It goes like this:
Saturday morning BEFORE my weekly water change my params were: ammo 0, nitrites 0, nitrates 25. AFTER the water change params were: ammo 0, nitrite, 0 nitrates 12ish. Fish were fine until then. That's when the platy started acting strange, staying in one corner of the tank, not eating. Yesterday I bought medication for bacterial infection (cause she developed red spots and tiny streaks) and added the recommended dose to the tank, and 2 tablespoons of aquarium salt. Last night water was cloudy from meds but not smelly at all. This morning I lifted thelid of the tank and the water gave off a kinda salty, ... man I don't know how to describe it...

And I would test my water right now it has an orange color from the medication (the LFS lady said it would taint the water) has a dark orange color and I think the color of the tested water would give the wrong readings but I'll try testing nontheless.

Ahhh! one more thing. Last night I dug out the active carbon (to put the meds in the tank) which was well buried in the gravel and I may have stirred things up from the very bottom of the UGF. What do you think?

 

[skimpy]

Thanks for not taking offence.

This morning I lifted thelid of the tank and the water gave off a kinda salty, ... man I don't know how to describe it.

Have you checked with your lfs could the smell be a combination of the meds and salt???

I am now just stabbing in the dark, I hope someone else will be able to give you some help.

I have never used Acriflavin but I have just looked it up and unless i am mistaken it is methylene blue- I have read here that it can kill off beneficial bacteria. Could this be anything to do with the problem. (sorry that I am not being more helpful but I can't think of anything else)

One thing I am sure of though is that you asked about water changes, well yes the water changes will certainly help to reduce any smell, but of course if you have just medicated it will also reduce the medication so it's a catch 22.

I hope someone can come up with something more that I have but i'm as stumped as you right now.

Good luck

EDIT: If it is just a salty smell, surely having added salt that would be normal, is it just salty or is it BAD./??

EDIT2: sorry webpage above not working so I'll copy paragraph for you

A word of warning with using medication: Obviously people want to save their fish, so they go and buy a product, and sometimes these can be quite effective. But a word of warning - some meds can be very detrimental in the long term. Treatments whitch use Malachite Green and Methylene Blue can be useful treatments for parasites and Fungus, unfortunately they can destroy our beneficial bacteria, and then you can get a Ammoni/Nitrite peak for some time. Also some meds demand it that they remove Carbon/Zeolite for the duration of the treatment - this can effectively start up a mini-cycle as the Carbon/Zeolite have lost their bacteria.

EDIT3: sorry brain not working - question: you say you dug the carbon filter out from deep in gravel, how long has it been in their

 

[freshy]

EDIT3: sorry brain not working

LOL!

Thanks a lot for taking the trouble of looking up the info. I really appreciate it. I set up my tank around August 8th and kept it fishless cycling for over a month. The carbon had been in the gravel since then. I started adding fish around Sept the 15th.
Well, I called LFS lady and she thinks the stirring up may have caused the unpleasant smell since before my finger went digging deep into the gravel the tank was smell free and water params were fine.

 

[skimpy]

Hi again freshy

You have had the carbon in since August 8th. I question this.

I have never used an under gravel carbon so if they are different then ingor my answer.

I have a filter box which houses my bacteria sponges, then my carbon filter then a white (change weekly) mechanical filter that gets rid of the big bits. With this type of carbon it is very important that it is replaced every 4 weeks (they say 4-6 weeks but I like to play safe). If the carbon filter is not replaced then it will start to leak the chemicals that it has removed back into the tank which can be harmful for the fish.

My question is, could this be the reason that your platy has become ill, check out the carbon filter you have and how often it should be changed. As I said in my first post - there is always a reason if fish get ill.

A lot of people on here do not agree with using carbon filters for anything other than removing meds and in some cases, don't use them at all. Some people have even quoted that they do not work after 2 weeks. I have done a lot of research into the carbon I use and feel confident that as long as I change it regularly and do not lapse or get lazy it is a good thing. But certainly in my case to go over the 4 weeks would not be good for the fish, and may even be harmful.

Check it out and let us know, it could the answer to your illness even if it has nothing to do with the smell.

 

[Dubby]

If your fish look happy then nought to worry But if the smell is like rotten eggs then you need to do a clean up.

 

[freshy]

Yes, I made a couple of small water changes (10-15%) and smell is almost gone. I tried to get as much of rests of food as I could with the syphon. The fish don't seem affected by it, but sadly my platy girl didn't make it.

 

[skimpy]

Sorry to hear your platy did not make it Freshy but hopefully you have dealt with the problem in time to save the rest.

How did you get on with the carbon - Did you check it out???. It would be interesting to know if this was the cause of the problems that you have experienced. As I say there is always a reason fish get ill and it can be reassuring if you end up finding what it is. (That way you can ensure that you do not repeat it in the future).

Best of luck to ya

 

[freshy]

Hi skimpy,
I checked with my LFS today and asked them about the UGF and the carbon. They usually recommend to change the active carbon every three months, but they don't think it had anything to do with the platy illness. I'm thinking it might have been 3 new guppys I got as a gift. They came from my Mom's boss' tank. Either that or the tubifex worms I fed them cause I've read that sometimes they can cause trouble.