Unknown Killer

[kribensis12]

So, this has happened 3 other times now.

Last Instance: Say It Aint So

Previous time: Killer Tank Strikes Again

Previous time: Poisoned?

I have a 10g (one of many tanks) which has the exact same care routine of all tanks. 30% water change once a week (with gravel vac). Feed 2x daily. Temp is 78F. Healthy diet.
This exact same tank has had 4 spurious "deaths" and I can't figure out what it is or successfully treat it.

Current stocking:
1 female betta
2 swordtails
2 mollies

Symptoms: Lethargic --> then erratic behavior --> white film on edges of fins and small spot bumps (not ich) that look a bit fungus like and then within 24 hours they die.

I just did a water change and have begun treatment for a bacterial infection, but I am not hopeful that it will work. In most situations, the fish are never "sick enough" visibly to get a good picture. I think that this time I can get a good picture and will post it later. FYI: No changes. have been made to the tank at all concerning decor, chemicals etc.

Other tanks have: Koi angels, F1 Kribensis "Moliwe", EB Ram Cichlids, WC Ram Cichlids, Swordtail Fry
None of those tanks have any illness whatsoever. (thankfully).

Any thoughts?

 

[Ichthys]

What fish have died?

10g btw is nowhere near big enough for Swords or Mollies.

 

[Deleted member 149562]

Agreed with above regarding the aquarium size...far too small which will inevitably induce stress (especially with the Betta...females can be just as bolshy as the males, so some aggro should be expected, which adds to the stress of confined lodgings and very few areas that cane be used to escape any aggressive behaviour)

When you had your initial and then subsequent deaths, how did you prepare the aquarium tween each re-cycling/stocking?

Did you completely clean it out, bin the equipment/decor/substrate, sterilise the aquarium and then re-dec/re-equip it....or did you just remove the dead, do a big water change and restock?

If you did the latter and did not do a full tear down, bin and sterilise, there is every chance that whatever killed the first fish is still lurking within the aquarium, festering away ready for its next victim.

 

[kribensis12]

What fish have died?

10g btw is nowhere near big enough for Swords or Mollies.

This 10g is temporary housing. Only been in there for a month. I was actually planning to move them to 30g this week... Obviously not now since they are sick.

Agreed with above regarding the aquarium size...far too small which will inevitably induce stress (especially with the Betta...females can be just as bolshy as the males, so some aggro should be expected, which adds to the stress of confined lodgings and very few areas that cane be used to escape any aggressive behaviour)

When you had your initial and then subsequent deaths, how did you prepare the aquarium tween each re-cycling/stocking?

Did you completely clean it out, bin the equipment/decor/substrate, sterilise the aquarium and then re-dec/re-equip it....or did you just remove the dead, do a big water change and restock?

If you did the latter and did not do a full tear down, bin and sterilise, there is every chance that whatever killed the first fish is still lurking within the aquarium, festering away ready for its next victim.

Thankfully, this female betta is non-aggressive. I've raised her since she was 1/8 inch and she is very placid. I do not believe bullying to be an issue.
Between "extinction events", I completely drained the tank and started over; I did not sterilize it as there were many suggestions from the other threads that maybe a contaminant made it into the tank. I reseeded the aquarium with established biological media from one of my other tanks and just added a pinch of flake daily for several weeks until I was "confident" that the tank was "through" it and then started by adding a single, hardy fish and slowly built the biological filter. It's been almost a year since the last series of deaths.

At one point, after the death, I literally threw the tank away (it has minuscule leak) including the gravel and started over completely.

The tank is in the same location as the "new" tank, on a double stand with a 10g below it full of live Daphnia.

If, as could be possible, that it's some sort of bacteria waiting for its next victim - how do I treat it? My iPhone with a good camera is broken, so I used an old iPhone to take a video. I'll post it promptly.

 

[Deleted member 149562]

OK......if I have this right, the aquarium that had the original 3 sets of death has been binned and you have a new aquarium in its place, same position in the room etc?

This might sound a bit strange but please bear with me....

You mentioned having other aquariums that are not affected. What is different in this one's position in the room to the other aquariums?

Is there something that might be causing a psychological effect on the fish.......such as a draught or a piece of loose flooring that they can sense knocking the stand that jolts them or does this aquarium get more natural light than the others or does it get overshine from its own light and those aquarium lights close to it?

Stand where the aquarium is and have someone else walk into and out of the room, turn on/off the main lights......is there anything that could add to stress levels outside of the aquarium that they pick up that maybe you didn't realise was there?

For example, my 53 is almost directly opposite the lounge doorway (no door fitted) and at night if I go on a fridge raid for munchies and turn on the kitchen light next room over, I have noticed that the fish in the 53 reacted to it even though the lounge where they are is completely dark....it jolted them awake and a few of them went into the zoomies. So this week I have finally sorted a replacement for the missing door that will close off the lounge and the kitchen light will not disturb their sleep and create stress.

My dad used to have trouble with loose floorboards many many years ago...even the slightest shimmy of a floorboard would make the fish stress out...so he ended up on hands and knees nailing every floorboard down and the issues ceased.

Little things that you would never dream of causing a fuss with the fish can sometimes trigger a response.

I know it sounds positively weird but it might be worth checking for cos to have fish go in a similar way, several times over for no immediately apparent reason....then you need to start looking at the obscure, weird and downright strange reasons.

And in relation to sterilising....Miltons liquid (used to sterilise babies bottles) is my own preference or a weak mix of bleach/water...both air dried.

 

[kribensis12]

Hey! Thanks for your feedback.

All of my tanks are in a fish room (3 20g, 1 30 g, 1 15g tall, 3 10g) and they are all side-by-side.

They all get water changes the same day, get fed the same food assortments etc.

The room is carpeted and gets 0 foot traffic; I'm the only person who comes down there and it's 2x per day; that's it. With that in mind, I can't imagine that there would be an external factor that is bothering them but no one else. Then again, obviously something is wrong.

Here is my video:

 

[Colin_T]

A cream, white or grey film on the body and fins is excess mucous caused by poor water quality or chemicals in the water. Something is poisoning the fish.

Cream, white or grey patches on part/s of the body is an external protozoan infection (Costia, Chilodonella, Trichodina).

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BASIC FIRST AID FOR FISH
Test the water for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH.

Wipe the inside of the glass down with a clean fish sponge. This removes the biofilm on the glass and the biofilm will contain lots of harmful bacteria, fungus, protozoans and various other microscopic life forms.

Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for a week or until the problem is identified. The water changes and gravel cleaning will reduce the number of disease organisms in the water and provide a cleaner environment for the fish to recover in. It also removes a lot of the gunk and this means any medication can work on treating the fish instead of being wasted killing the pathogens in the gunk.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it is added to the tank.

Clean the filter if it hasn't been done in the last 2 weeks. However, if the filter is less than 6 weeks old, do not clean it. Wash the filter materials/ media in a bucket of tank water and re-use the media. Tip the bucket of dirty water on the garden/ lawn. Cleaning the filter means less gunk and cleaner water with fewer pathogens so any medication (if needed) will work more effectively on the fish.

Increase surface turbulence/ aeration to maximise the dissolved oxygen in the water.

Post clear pictures and video of the fish so we can check them for diseases.

With livebearers, add some salt.

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SALT
You can add rock salt (often sold as aquarium salt), swimming pool salt, or any non iodised salt (sodium chloride) to the aquarium at the dose rate of 1 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres of water. If there is no improvement after 48 hours you can double that dose rate so there is 2 heaped tablespoons of salt per 20 litres.

If you only have livebearers (guppies, platies, swordtails, mollies), goldfish or rainbowfish in the tank you can double that dose rate, so you would add 2 heaped tablespoons per 20 litres and if there is no improvement after 48 hours, then increase it so there is a total of 4 heaped tablespoons of salt per 20 litres.

Keep the salt level like this for at least 2 weeks but no longer than 4 weeks otherwise kidney damage can occur. Kidney damage is more likely to occur in fish from soft water (tetras, Corydoras, angelfish, Bettas & gouramis, loaches) that are exposed to high levels of salt for an extended period of time, and is not an issue with livebearers, rainbowfish or other salt tolerant species.

The salt will not affect the beneficial filter bacteria but the higher dose rate (4 heaped tablespoons per 20 litres) will affect some plants and some snails. The lower dose rate (1-2 heaped tablespoons per 20 litres) will not affect fish, plants, shrimp or snails.

After you use salt and the fish have recovered, you do a 10% water change each day for a week using only fresh water that has been dechlorinated. Then do a 20% water change each day for a week. Then you can do bigger water changes after that. This dilutes the salt out of the tank slowly so it doesn't harm the fish.

If you do water changes while using salt, you need to treat the new water with salt before adding it to the tank. This will keep the salt level stable in the tank and minimise stress on the fish.

When you first add salt, add the salt to a small bucket of tank water and dissolve the salt. Then slowly pour the salt water into the tank near the filter outlet. Add the salt over a couple of minutes.

 

[GaryE]

It seems I am repeating myself a lot with this incoming advice, but . Here, I would suspect an external parasite, as Colin suggested. Velvet sounds likely. Hit the google and look up Oodinium, the freshwater version. It used to be a catch all for non Ich skin parasites, and there are numerous similar creatures. Mollies and swords are hardwater fish, and if your source is soft, but not extremely soft, it can take advantage.

As I grew up as a fishkeeper, Ich and velvet were the two big diseases we were taught to watch for. In time, velvet fell off the radar as a parasite in discussions, but I have cured it in 2 tanks in the past 3 weeks, triggered by a little net carelessness from some bought Corys that died in QT.

 

[kribensis12]

Thanks for your replies!!
I am thinking that it could be parasitic and/or bacterial. I went to the store last night and picked up Tetracycline to dose the tank. I did a 50% water change before treating and have increase aeration. The bacterial medicine I was using before is out of date (I did not realize that until yesterday).

If I do not see an improvement in the next 12 hours, I will treat for parasites as GaryE suggested. I do have salt and have added it to the tank and I did wipe the glass down as Colin suggested.

My pH is around 7.8 but the hardness is 350, so that should not be a problem for these livebearers.

 

[Colin_T]

DO NOT ADD TETRACYCLINE TO THE AQUARIUM. It is an antibiotic that will wipe out the filter bacteria and do nothing to treat this problem.

Antibiotics should only be used on known bacterial infections that have not responded to normal treatments. Improper use and mis-use of antibiotics has lead to drug resistant bacteria that kill birds, fish, reptiles, animals and people all around the world.

Bacterial infections usually appear as red patches over part of the body or fins. Minor bacterial infections can be treated with salt or broad spectrum liquid medications that contain formaldehyde or acriflavine.

External protozoan infections can fish to develop cream, white or grey patches over part/s of their body and or fins. The fins are often clamped down and the fish act irritatated and sometimes rub on objects in the tank.

The fish in the video do not appear to have a bacterial infection but do look like they have excess mucous and clamped fins, which is either poor water quality or an external protozoan infection.

 

[kribensis12]

DO NOT ADD TETRACYCLINE TO THE AQUARIUM. It is an antibiotic that will wipe out the filter bacteria and do nothing to treat this problem.

Antibiotics should only be used on known bacterial infections that have not responded to normal treatments. Improper use and mis-use of antibiotics has lead to drug resistant bacteria that kill birds, fish, reptiles, animals and people all around the world.

Bacterial infections usually appear as red patches over part of the body or fins. Minor bacterial infections can be treated with salt or broad spectrum liquid medications that contain formaldehyde or acriflavine.

External protozoan infections can fish to develop cream, white or grey patches over part/s of their body and or fins. The fins are often clamped down and the fish act irritatated and sometimes rub on objects in the tank.

The fish in the video do not appear to have a bacterial infection but do look like they have excess mucous and clamped fins, which is either poor water quality or an external protozoan infection.

Thanks for your advice, sorry for the delayed reply.

I did apply tetracycline and after 24 hours, there was no change. After having kids, not seeing a change in 24 hours is a bad sign.

I stopped, did a 50% water change, applied carbon and afterwards treated with an anti-parasitic medication.

I did lose a swordtail, but the betta and mollies have recovered completely.

I work very hard to have excellent water conditions, but perhaps 10g is just too small. In a week my 10s will be replaced with (2) 55s and the smallest tank I'll have is 20g so hopefully this does not happen again.