CL illness or water poisoning?

[Shadowsong]

Three days ago I’ve bought five clowns, that are in a quarantine tank for now. Four of them are active and looking for food, but one is hiding most of the time and seems to have trouble swimming. Usually it is either lying on its side or plastered against the inner side of an upturned coconut half. It seems to have trouble getting up and sometimes swims on its side, when it manages to get up, it swims normally. It is also moving its gills rapidly. Its appearance is normal, no ich or any other obvious sign of disease, gills are neither dark nor red. Dark stripes are black, fins spread, but not overly so.
Is it ill and in need of treatment? Or is it reacting badly to new water conditions? And most importantly, how can I help it?

Temperature - 27°C
GH - 14°d
pH - 7,5
NH4 - 0 mg/l
NO2 - 0,05 mg/l
NO3 - more than 1mg/l less than 5 mg/l

[ClownLoachSharky]

You have to get rid of your NO2 aka nitrites and maybe lower the hardness. The nitrites might be stressing him.

[Shadowsong]

Thank you for your answer.
Now I'm positive water condition is causing problems. Overnight nitrites rocketed to 0,15ppm.
I've made a water change, but its not exactly a solution. I can't figure out why a tank that was running without fish for a little over a month became so unstable now. Should I move the fish to the main tank and hope for the best, or is it better to keep them where they are and change water twice a day?

[ClownLoachSharky]

I think you should move the fish from your tank with nitrites. It is probably the worst killer in fish. Lucky for me my nitrites stay 0 and my nitrates are never higher than 5ppm.

[Shadowsong]

Looks like something really hates me. I intended to follow your advice, when the little guy decided to sit right in front of me. He's more active today and swims upright most of time. Unfortunately, now he has ich. I'll try raising temperature combined with frequent water changes. Hopefully it will be enough.



EDIT: I've added some anti nitrite liquid, and the parameters seem to stabilise. Unfortunately, the little one died this morning.

[ClownLoachSharky]

i guess that will do for ich. have you tryed ichaway. I used it on one of my neons and it worked well.

[loachlover77]

Looks like something really hates me. I intended to follow your advice, when the little guy decided to sit right in front of me. He's more active today and swims upright most of time. Unfortunately, now he has ich. I'll try raising temperature combined with frequent water changes. Hopefully it will be enough.



EDIT: I've added some anti nitrite liquid, and the parameters seem to stabilise. Unfortunately, the little one died this morning.

I am sorry you lost your clown loach. There is ich medicine that you can get. Clown loaches are very susceptible to ich, that is probably what was happening to your loach, he was stressed somehow and the ich set in. Watch your other clowns closely and at the first sign of ich, I would treat for it. Do test your fishtank water every day or even weekly to make sure your water parameters stay normal, that way if your clowns get sick you can treat them.

[Shadowsong]

Thank you for help. The smallest one got a mild case of ich, just a few spots. I went for temperature treatment, although I've bought medicine just in case. All traces of the parasite are gone now, but I'll keep the water warm for a few more days. All loaches are happy, so everything should be all right now.

[ClownLoachSharky]

Thats great. Have you been able to fix the water in your quarantine tank?

[loachlover77]

That is great! I hope that they stay healthy and you won't have to treat them for any illnesses.

[Diana]

A tank with no fish will not have a thriving population of the bacteria necessary to process fish waste. No fish = no waste, so the water parameters look good in the uninhabited tank. Add fish = add waste, and without bacteria (they died because of no fish waste while the tank was empty) the fish waste will show up as ammonia for a few days or longer, and as nitrite when the bacteria start growing. Nitrate will not show up until there is a larger population of several species of bacteria, and this takes a couple of weeks. The nitrite can skyrocket in a tank that has a small but growing population of bacteria. (Test results showing .05 ppm one day and .15 ppm the next are a sign that there are some bacteria, but not enough to fully process the fish waste)

Here is what I would do:
If you have a thriving tank, separate from the quarantine tank, take some of the filter media from the established tank and add it to the quarantine tank. This will jump start the bacteria population. You will still need to monitor the water conditions, and do water changes, but the bacteria from the established tank will grow much faster than waiting for nature to take its course (and the fish to die).
You can also add the missing bacteria from any product that specifies Nitrospira species of bacteria. Do not waste your money on any other cycling products, they have the wrong species of bacteria.
If you have any live plants in the main tank, trim them and let the trimmings float in the quarantine tank. They will continue to remove nitrogen (Ammonia, nitrite and nitrate) and will bring in more nitrifying bacteria on their leaves.
Keep up the water changes, emphasizing vacuuming the floor of the tank. This will remove the fallen Ich organisms, hopefully before they reproduce. Daily water changes are best both for water quality (Keep the nitrogen level as low as possible) and to remove Ich. Ich falls to the floor (mostly) to reproduce, and can produce hundreds of babies in 24-48 hours. Remove the Ich as often as possible.
Add salt. 1 teaspoon per 20 gallons is enough to protect the fish from brown blood disease, which is caused by nitrite in the water. This is a very low level, fine for even sensitive fish. Not enough to kill Ich.
Maintain a therapeutic level of Ich medication until at least 3 days beyond the day you saw the last spot on any fish.

[Shadowsong]

Ich was gone a while ago, and on the 22nd December I moved the little ones to the main tank. Everything was fine until a few days ago. I noticed one of them breathing rapidly, moving from one hiding spot to another. It passed away next day. No sign of disease, water parameters stable. Now another youngster is showing the same symptoms. All other loaches are looking and behaving normally.

Water parameters:
pH 7,3
Total hardness (GH) 12°d
Carbonate hardness (KH) 7°d
Ammonium (NH4) 0 ppm
Nitrites (NO2) 0 ppm
Nitrates (NO3) 1-5 ppm
Temperature 27°C

I make weekly 25% water changes. I made an additional one when the last one was feeling off, and another one today. It did not help then, and I’m afraid it won’t do so now. Am I forgetting something important?

[ClownLoachSharky]

hey i reckon your hardness is roo high. my hardness is like 0.2dkh and 3dgh. or you got bad clowns from the store

[Shadowsong]

You've got such soft water! I can't do anything about mine, unless my family finally agrees to an RO filter.

[ClownLoachSharky]

its because i have a big rainwzter tank round back and have peat in the depths of my substrate. Im very happy about it because my tap water is the hardest in the country. I think 220ppm gh! And my ph is 6.6 from lowering stuff and for some reason nitrates were unusually high today so did an extra water change. although high to me is 20ppm