What Is Going Wrong Here?

[tabitha]

Hi, I am sure there are a hundred things wrong with the scenario I am about to lay out but if someone can tell me what to do to move forward, I would appreciate it.

Last August, a friend gave my daughter a tank. Since she is four, that means I got a tank in reality. The tank is a 20 gal high. I went out and got gravel, chemicals, hood, heater, food, live plants, the works. I DID NOT CYCLE the tank since I had no idea what that meant at the time. We set everything up and added fish. The original fish were various kinds of gupppies and mollies. Later, we got a snail. Around Christmas, two guppies died. So we replaced them with some silver tetras that have black marks.

Shortly after that, I was unexpectedly hospitalized. While I was in the hospital the filter died. I came home to a tank full of algae and nothing left alive except the snail and two tetras. I took everything out except the gravel and bought a new filter and also a bubble rock thing. Also, new live plants as well as two plastic plants. Put the survivors back in the tank. Everything seemed okay, so I bought some tequila sunrise guppies (2) and added them. Everything died within a week except one tetra. Went to the fish shop with my water, they tested it and said they saw no problem so they gave me new fish. They died. Went to a different shop and bought mollies this time. They died. At this point, I am thinking the lone tetra is killing the other fish (maybe it is lonely?) so I bought two more like it. Dead the next morning.

At this point, I am tired of dead fish and no explanations (plus I feel awful for the poor things that have no chance in this tank of death). In a fit of aggravation, I took the lone tetra out and put him in a bowl and took EVERYTHING out of the tank and cleaned it with boiling water (since I know enough to know bleach is a bad idea). I bought new gravel and put everything back together and added water.

When I went in to buy gravel, the fish guy said the tetra would not survive the night in the bowl. Poor thing is probably better off at this point. Since I expect it to die while I try to fishless cycle the tank, I didn't do any testing, etc. Just fed him a pinch of food once a day and waited. Lo and behold, it lasts four days in the bowl. I am admiring the things where with all at this point so I decide to try saving him and put him back in the tank (fully expecting him to die any second.) Instead, the thing gets a new lease on life. Color is great, he is active, eating, etc. Last night, my tank all of a sudden went milky white. This morning it was suddenly clear. I now know this is a bacteria bloom. Tetra seems happy than ever. I have named the #40## thing Lazarus at this point.

So questions: what in the world could kill every fish from three different stores but this guy? How am I going to know when it will be safe to get Lazarus some friends? The fish guys insist tetras are nice fish and don't bother other fish. But they also said an empty snail shell means SOMETHING ate the snail. Which was pretty big compared to the fish. What can I put in there with the tetra? How many fish can go in the tank we have? Lazarus seems happy as a clam, but I am somewhat worried I have made this poor fish suffer at a crazy level at this point. I dunno how to tell though. Do fish feel pain/emotions?

Thanks for any suggestions.

 

[manxjason]

Hi Tabitha,

Sorry to hear of your troubles, but you've come to the right place.

I'll start by saying that fish do of course feel pain, like any other living animal.

To start with, the single Tetra will not do well by itself as they should be kept in shoals of 6+ (15+ for best shoaling effect). If I were you, I'd return him to the pet store - they'll take him off your hands, but don't expect a refund. After all, it'll be better off there for the time being.

Now don't add any more fish. You've got a good opportunity now to do a fish-less cycle. You'll need:

- A liquid testing kit. I recommend the API Freshwater Master Test Kit. (also test your tap water and post your Ammonia, NitrIte, NitrAte and PH readings)
- House-hold ammonia (it should say that on the bottle) - but not, it will likely say '10% ammonia'

Then perform the cycle by...

- Get your tank set up, if it isn't already. Turn on the filter and heater etc
- If it's 20 UK gallons then that's 91 litres of if US gal, 75 litres - with gravel and decorations call it 80 / 65 respectively. So, with a syringe: for 80 Litres add 4ml ammonia / for 90 Litres add 3.25ml. Doing this will increase your Ammonia to 5ppm. Confirm this with the liquid test kit (ammonia).

- Now leave it for a week..
- Test the Ammonia. If it's still 5ppm, leave another week.
- If ammonia has dropped, then a nitrIte test will show as positive. Re-dose Ammonia back up to 5ppm. But only dose, what's been used.
- Continue testing daily once nitrIte is being produced, until eventually both Ammonia and NitrIte read 0, 24 hours after dosing.

- When and only when both read 0 after 24 hours, you're ready to replace 100% of the water (or as close to) to remove NitrAte. Don't forget to use de-chlorinator.

It's at this point where you can now add fish. Because you've cycled your tank to deal with 5ppm, you can fully stock your tank in one go.

Any questions please ask!

 

[Gilli]

Your problem is an uncycled tank - and yes fish do feel pain. In an uncycled tank they are slowly being poisoned by toxic water because there is no good bacteria to nutralize the toxins the fish produce. Read up on cycling a tank, setting up a new aquarium, stocking advise and general advise on this link on this forum -

Beginners Resource Center

 

[tabitha]

Thanks for the advice, Manx. I called the pet shops and none of them want the guy. They all say I have had him too long. So, basically he is going to live out his life in a mansion of a tank and then I will start over with the fishless cycle? Or is there a safe way to cycle with him in there? Going to get my test kit on Friday and start the chemistry experiments this weekend :_)

 

[webbie]

Thanks for the advice, Manx. I called the pet shops and none of them want the guy. They all say I have had him too long. So, basically he is going to live out his life in a mansion of a tank and then I will start over with the fishless cycle? Or is there a safe way to cycle with him in there? Going to get my test kit on Friday and start the chemistry experiments this weekend :_)

You could try Seachem Stability ,Iv,e used it in the past to do a fish in cycle and had success with it,sounds like you have had quite a start to your fish keeping experience

 

[tmiller]

Thanks for the advice, Manx. I called the pet shops and none of them want the guy. They all say I have had him too long. So, basically he is going to live out his life in a mansion of a tank and then I will start over with the fishless cycle? Or is there a safe way to cycle with him in there? Going to get my test kit on Friday and start the chemistry experiments this weekend :_)

Just follow the fish in cycle method. It involves allot of partial water changes. Once cycled add only 1-2 inches a week and all will be good in the end.

 

[OldMan47]

Welcome to our forum Tabitha.
I am afraid that you have been the victim of typical pet shop thinking. You now have a single small fish in your tank and if you do enough water changes it will cycle with him in it. Pet shop folks simply do not "believe in" the methods we use here. If you were to try to describe a fishless or fish-in cycle to them, they would typically deny that any such a thing was possible.
I have a link in my signature area to a fish-in cycling thread that should help you out. The essence of fish-in cycling is that you do enough water changes to always keep both ammonia and nitrites below 0.25 ppm. Once you no longer need to do water changes to maintain those parameters, you have cycled the tank's filter enough for the biological load in your tank. After that you can start to slowly increase the population of your tank and let the filter adjust to each change before you continue to the next level. That last bit will seem familiar to your LFS since they will typically tell you to gradually increase the fish population in a tank.