Same Here... Please Help! (split from "fish dieing help

Same Here... Please Help!!!

To start off I am very new at this, I done it for my 2year old son... The same thing happen to me, I let my new 10 gallon tank run for almost 24hours, went and got 2-Fantails, and 2-Tigar Barbs, they did good the first 2 days so i went and got a chinaese alge eater and the big fat black alge eater(dont know the name), they done good, and a friend of mine heard that i got a tank so he brought 2 more Fantails, and 2 Painted Glass Tetras, I knew that was to many fish but what could i say.....But they were doing really good, I noticed with one of the fantails he brought the bottom part of the tail was gone like it had been biten off, about 3 days after all this one of my fantails died, then about a week later i noticed they were getting spots of white stuff on them so i treated them with ick away, a few days past and its getting worse so the guy at the fish store told me to put 1-1/2tablespoon of Aquarium Salt in the tank....well i did and woke up the next morning and my chinease alge eater, 1painted glass tetra, and 1-tigar barb was dead, later that day one fantail died then that night my other tigar barb, next morning another one of my fantails, then the next morning my big fat black alge eater, now all i have left out of 10 fish is 1-painted glass tetra, and 1 fantail(the one with part of its tail missing, and it looks like it has fungus or something under its tail ~its red spots & looks like its eating a hole in it~looks really bad)......But all my water is good....

pH - between 7.0 & 7.6

AMMONIA - between 1.0 & 2.0

NITRITE - 0ppm

NITRATE - 0ppm

Don't know what happen does anyone on here....And when can I put more fish in it? What should I put in it and how many? And what should i do with the Fantail?(the painted glass seems to be doing good)? I have been doing 50% water changes every other day....should I stop that????

PLEASE HELP!!! I want to keep on with them, I don't want to give up

 

Roberta...How long has your tank been set up? From what I read, you set it up and let it run for a day, and then put fish in it. Your tank still needs to cycle so your fish are going to die until all the bacteria is working correctly.

Correct me if Im wrong. I dont want to go into detail if Im not right.

 

It has been running for.....

almost 3 weeks ago

 

I made this its own thread so things don't get confusing trying to solve 2 problems in the same thread.

Your water is FAR from good. You're experiencing problems caused by adding too many fish to an uncycled tank (letting it sit for 24 hours did essentially nothing). The ammonia is poisoning the fish and killing them.

And even if it were cycled, your tank was extremely overstocked. 10 gallons is too small for any goldfish, chinese algae eater, and most plecos.

So what to do:
Option a) Start doing lots & lots of water changes and try to get that ammonia reading as close to 0 as possible. Keep checking the water every day and keep doing water changes to keep the ammonia & nitrIte at 0. You'll probably have to keep this up for 3 - 6 weeks while the tank cycles. And even then it's highly likely the fish will die or their gills will be permanantly damaged.

Once the tank is cycled, it is too small for the fish you have. You'll eventually have to up grade to at least a 20 gallon if you want to keep the goldfish.

Option b) Give your remaining fish back to the LFS. Start from scratch by doing a fishless cycle (read about it HERE). Once the tank is cycled, then you can stock it with more appropriate fish.

And just FYI, painted glass fish are injected with dye. It is a really horrible process that many of the fish don't even survive. The ones that do survive end up with shorter lifespans and weaker immune systems. (read more about dyed fish HERE)

-Chelle

 

I didn't know that....

I didn't know that the painted glass tetras where done that way untill i got them and looked them up on here....that is so wrong........

So should I do a 50% water change everyday instead of every other day??? And can I just put the fantail in the 1-gallon tank I have because I just looked at him and he is dying(he stays on the bottom and flips to his side at times, like the others was doing before they died) and just leave my green painted glass tetra in the 10 gallon, because he seems to be fine 4now....I am new at this and dont understand, i have been tring to read all that i can to help me, i even spent $20 on a book called The Simple Guide to Freshwater Aquariums...I bet I have put close to $200 in this 10gallon and fish and all the other stuff they told me to put in it to get everything right........... :x

 

Re: I didn't know that....

A 1 gallon would probably be even worse than the 10 gallon because there's even less water to dilute his waste. And yes, I'd start doing 50% daily (you'll have to be very careful to make sure the temperature and pH of the new water is the same as what's in the tank). But really, you should be basing it on your ammonia and nitrIte readings. The goal is to keep those as low as possible so the fish won't get poisoned.

-Chelle

 

The test for today .....

I tested today and the....

pH - between 7.0 & 7.2

Ammonia - 0.50ppm

NitRite - 0ppm

I also changed 25% of the water....later I am going to change another 25%.... When I change the water I put 1teaspoon of Stress Coat w/ Aloe into the tank then put the water in...is that right? I also put on another filter so now I have one w/ the Bio Wheel and the other w/ the Bio filter, do I need both? Will it help the ammonia??? :?:

Thank you so much with helping me, hopefully I will get it right and my Baby Boy can enjoy the fish!!!

 

Sounds like your on the right track with the water changes.

As for adding another filter, it probably won't help at this point (won't necessarily hurt either, though). What's the model number on those filter (they're penguins, right?)

-Chelle

 

. . . .

One of my filters is what came with my Aqua Culture 10 gallon tank, it's a Aqua-Tech 5-15 power filter with Bio-Fiber, and the other is a Penguin 100 Bio-Wheel Power Filter...

I guess I will keep both on for now, my green painted glass is doing good or i should say acting fine, but my fantail is still mostly staying on the bottom and under its mouth is turning black looking, and his behind looks awful....is there anything I can do for him? What caused that?

Thanks Alot!!!!!

 

The black mouth sounds like ammonia burn. He may also have a bacterial infection (red patches) so you could try treating with an antibiotic like Maracyn-two.

-Chelle

 

This was something posted a while back that deemed some really good information about level problems in tanks. It gives listing for different kinds of chemicals that really work.

http://www.thetropicaltank.co.uk/rev-cond.htm

 

i just wanted to bring this up is fish keeping and aquariums like chemistry

 

more like biology and Animal Science, unless you're sticking chemicals in there, it really doesn't have anything to do with Chemistry.

 

I dont think you should treat the fantail in the 10 gallon, your trying to get your tank started and the last thing u need is too pour chemicals into your water, you should quarintine the fish and then treat it if you want it to survive.

Yea you had to many fish in there.
Look into some bacteria starter to help along, and dont add too much of tht anti stress coat stuff, follow the instructions on it. If your doing daily water changes dont add the coat stuff daily, everything, no matter how benifical it is, has a limit to where it starts becoming toxic.

 

Starting over . . .

Well my Gold Fish died so all i had left was the green painted fish, so about a week ago i put a new fish in, it was a Buenos Aires Tetra, a couple of days later the green painted fish died so yesturday i went and got another Buenos Aires Tetra and put them in my 1 gallon so i dumped everything out of my 10gallon and started over, so now i have both in the 10gallon since last night...they act like they are going good, all i put in my water was stress coat to clean the water and some stuff to make my ph 7.5 because it was real high... so far theres no amm. or nitrite, or nitrate....sound good to you all, and is there anything i should be doing, and when do you think i can add more fish...and what kind????

 

Hi RobertaSue98, Please read the post by t_chelle16, Posted: Sat Jul 30, 2005 4:06 am in this thread again. I believe you are still missing the point regarding tank cycles.