Wow...

[NonstickRon]

So my friend wanted to give me his 55 gallon awhile back. He was ready to give up on aquariums after years of owningn them in various sizes and having waves of fish dying off. He got to the point where he'd just throw his cast net out over the big pond in his yard and whatever little fish he caught hed put in the fish tank and they'd live for half a a few months or a year and then he'd try to do a cleaning and it would all die again...

Anyway, after he told me I could have it the next time something happened and he had a die off, I bided my time. Well I mentioned it last night when I went over his house cause I've been wanting to get a bigger tank but didn't want to buy one if he was still planning on giving me his...Turns out when he told his wife, she wanted to keep it cause she liked having the fish. He told her that was fine but he was done trying to make it work and she'd have to be the one to take care of it. No problem, thats perfectly understandable and cool.

However...

No gravel cleanings...ever, no water changes...ever, the biowheel on the filter was not spinning...I gave it a push and a bunch of gook showered down in the tank and it still didn't spin. They don't own a testing kit. I think the only reason the fish are alive is because its so lightly stocked. 1 large fancy goldfish, 1 pleco, 1 emerald cory, and 2 little schooling fish from his pond. Those kinda looked like plain colored platies or mollies...I'm not sure what they were though, whatever.

I was like "Wow...how are your fish even alive?" I felt bad though cause I think it was a point of contention between him and his wife and he looked pretty uncomfortable at my friendly prodding so I tried to drop it. But then everybody else was making fun of how I was so shocked that anything managed to continue living in there. Was a wierd night.

 

[OldMan47]

First things first Ron. That tank is probably a really classic example of old tank syndrome. To safely get out of that condition takes patience. The fish that are still alive have become accustomed to terrible water conditions. To bring the tank back to normal means very small water changes over the next few weeks so that there is no large change in water condtions. A huge improvement in a short time will cause the fish a lot of stress and could kill them. Once the water quality has improved, normal water changes could start again. At that point you could help them clean the filter without destroying the biofilter. I'm thinking that about that time you could suggest they get a test kit to find out how well the water quality is coming along. Maybe with your help you get them off on the right foot. Criticism won't help them but helping them learn how to do it right very well might help.

 

[Honeythorn]

Could you offer to maybe buy the tank from her? and then help her find something more suitable ?

 

[NonstickRon]

Well, I'm hoping they'll come over soon and see how awesome my little tank is doing and maybe ask me for some advice.

What you describe OldMan sounds exactly right. In the past he always had pretty good success till he did a good cleaning after putting it off for a looong time. Thats when he'd have a die off.

 

[NonstickRon]

Took my test kit over there last night. Ammonia and Nitrite are both 0, PH was like 8.4 and Nitrate was somewhere between 60 and 180.

I told them what they'd need to do to keep the fish alive, and they both said it was too much work.

I wasn't going to press them though, my friend just lost his job yesterday.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

aye, i know our fish are super important to us but you have to understand that we represent a really small proportion of the fishkeeping population as a whole. For a fishkeeper whose on the verge of giving it up anyway and who'se just lost their job getting the tank sorted is gonna be the least of his worries.

how about suggesting in a friendly supporting way to go round and do some maintenance on the tank and ease it out of old tank sydrome. Present it like 'I'll give you one less thing to worry about by sorting it out for you' as you're doing it just gently involve his wife and with a bit of time she'll pick up from you the fishkeeping essentials.

softly softly cathy monkey

 

[backtotropical]

aye, i know our fish are super important to us but you have to understand that we represent a really small proportion of the fishkeeping population as a whole. For a fishkeeper whose on the verge of giving it up anyway and who'se just lost their job getting the tank sorted is gonna be the least of his worries.

how about suggesting in a friendly supporting way to go round and do some maintenance on the tank and ease it out of old tank sydrome. Present it like 'I'll give you one less thing to worry about by sorting it out for you' as you're doing it just gently involve his wife and with a bit of time she'll pick up from you the fishkeeping essentials.

softly softly cathy monkey

Practically perfect in every way.................

 

[waterdrop]

Yeah, I wonder how small a percentage it really is that participates in a forum. Even the big forums themselves, like ours, have a quite huge viewership compared to active posters it seems. Wouldn't it be fun to somehow know the true percentages? .. would probably be shocking

 

[Miss Wiggle]

well there are approx 780 members of TFF with a post count over 500 who have posted within the last month

clearly there's more than one way to define 'active regular members' but that's a general idea i'd say!

 

[waterdrop]

...wonder if there are any LFS industry numbers out there, like how many active hobbyists they think there are worldwide or how many new customers they expect to walk through the doors each year ..oh well, probably idle speculation to guess..

 

[NonstickRon]

Yeah...I was thinking of just taking it upon myself to do work on their tank when I go over there. The filter is operating, and the bacteria on the filter cartridge must be doing all cycling of waste without the biowheel since the biowheel isn't spinning. I could buy them a new wheel and rinse out their filter cartridge in a bucket of tank water at the very least...and do a small water change every time I go to their house. We visit them 1 or 2 weekends a month usually. Its probably been a year since that tanks been vacced. I doubt they'd mind if I entertained myself with it.

Supposed to go over there for a cookout this coming monday.

 

[NonstickRon]

I don't have a siphon big enough for a 55 gallon. I wonder if he has one...

Regardless, I should probably get the nitrates down first I imagine. If I'm going to do this...how many gallons at a time would be a small enough water change? Should I do several over a period of a few hours?

I have an extra Penguin 125 I can throw on the back of his tank to help with filtration too.

 

[rabbut]

I'd go with about 10% preferably daily for the first week, then 20% daily for another week, then into normal waterchanges, assuming the levels are returning to normal. A sudden change is what will kill off the tank, so go slow with the waterchanges. Change little and often to gently nudge the levels back to where they should be Re-fill as slow as practicle for the first three days of the 10 and 20% starting dates respectively.

If you can't make daily changes, it would probibly be worth adding plenty of plants to soak up mess, and only doing small waterchanges for a few months whenever you are round The trick is to ease into it gently.

HTH
Rabbut

 

[Miss Wiggle]

I'd go with about 10% preferably daily for the first week, then 20% daily for another week, then into normal waterchanges, assuming the levels are returning to normal. A sudden change is what will kill off the tank, so go slow with the waterchanges. Change little and often to gently nudge the levels back to where they should be Re-fill as slow as practicle for the first three days of the 10 and 20% starting dates respectively.

If you can't make daily changes, it would probibly be worth adding plenty of plants to soak up mess, and only doing small waterchanges for a few months whenever you are round The trick is to ease into it gently.

HTH
Rabbut

yup what he said ^^^

 

[NonstickRon]

I'd go with about 10% preferably daily for the first week, then 20% daily for another week, then into normal waterchanges, assuming the levels are returning to normal. A sudden change is what will kill off the tank, so go slow with the waterchanges. Change little and often to gently nudge the levels back to where they should be Re-fill as slow as practicle for the first three days of the 10 and 20% starting dates respectively.

If you can't make daily changes, it would probibly be worth adding plenty of plants to soak up mess, and only doing small waterchanges for a few months whenever you are round The trick is to ease into it gently.

HTH
Rabbut

He's got a full grown fancy goldfish in there. Will it eat the plants? Alternatively, if it comes to it...goldfish make good pond fish don't they? Hes got a pretty huge (~2-300ft across) natural pond in his yard. (I need to find out if theres anything big living in it first of course..) Its where he caught (castnet) the wild Killifish he has in the tank right now.