I made the mistake of adding fish to my tank too soon. It has been roughly 5or 6 weeks since I set it up. I have a 29 gallon tank. I have lost quite a few fish in the past few weeks. I thought maybe by adding a bacteria starter maybe things would get better. The water looks pretty clear just a little white swirling of stuff maybe just the bubble wand not sure. I bought a test kit here are the readings:
nitrate 80ppm
nitrite off the chart only goes up to 10ppm
hardness 75ppm
alkalinity 80ppm
ph 7.2
I know the first 2 have to be causing my problems. How can I fix it? I did a large water change yesterday because the results were even worse. Should I risk cleaning thw whole tank? My buddy says its probably my gravel. The gravel came from a tank I had years ago. I thought by cleaning it real good it would be ok to use. I added some white diamond to my filter hoping things would improve but they are slowly getting worse. Large water changes are slowly improving the nitrate but its getting expensive to keep changing it and adding clorine removers. I also tested my tap water to make sure it was good and it tests great. I am about to just say screw it and just give whats left of my fish away. It makes me sad but Id rather give them away than be responsible for killing them all. any help would be greatly appreciated.
losing fish fast please help! :(
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You've got a cycle blip.
Removing the gravel is not a good idea - it will make the cycle even worse.
Tank size?
#/size of inhabitants?
What type of fish?
Do you have an ammonia reading?
What conditioner are you using?
I think with nitrites at that level you will continue to lose fish. Depending on the type of fish you may be able to add aquarium salt to prevent nitrite poisoning.
Wait for an expert to come along. I think the recommendation will be 50% water changes or more every day until the numbers get back to normal.
Removing the gravel is not a good idea - it will make the cycle even worse.
Tank size?
#/size of inhabitants?
What type of fish?
Do you have an ammonia reading?
What conditioner are you using?
I think with nitrites at that level you will continue to lose fish. Depending on the type of fish you may be able to add aquarium salt to prevent nitrite poisoning.
Wait for an expert to come along. I think the recommendation will be 50% water changes or more every day until the numbers get back to normal.
I have the following in my tank
3 dojo loaches 4 brown khuli 3 clown loaches one is real small about the size of a quarter the others are about 3in 4 pearl danios. thats what I have left. the test kit I got didn't cover ammonia. I figured it covered everything till I got home. The only chems I am using is start right when I first added water, start zyme and now some stuff I think is called marplex. I thought maybe my buddy was right about the gravel. The tank it was in had been sitting in my basement for about 10 years. Also the fish that were in it died for no know reason while I was away for the weekend. Thought maybe the gravel had some sort of toxins in it but I had fish in that gravel without any big problems for a couple of years before I put it all away.
3 dojo loaches 4 brown khuli 3 clown loaches one is real small about the size of a quarter the others are about 3in 4 pearl danios. thats what I have left. the test kit I got didn't cover ammonia. I figured it covered everything till I got home. The only chems I am using is start right when I first added water, start zyme and now some stuff I think is called marplex. I thought maybe my buddy was right about the gravel. The tank it was in had been sitting in my basement for about 10 years. Also the fish that were in it died for no know reason while I was away for the weekend. Thought maybe the gravel had some sort of toxins in it but I had fish in that gravel without any big problems for a couple of years before I put it all away.
ammonia and nitrites are probably the problem. People lose fish when tanks cycle. Adding in carbon to the filter could help take out toxins if they were in the gravel but I assume you washed the gravel before putting water in.
With nitrites of the scale I assume ammonia is also off the scale.
A conditioner like Prime will detox up to .6 of ammonia. I'm still not sure of those fish if they could handle salt.
we'll have to wait for a loach expert to comment.
With nitrites of the scale I assume ammonia is also off the scale.
A conditioner like Prime will detox up to .6 of ammonia. I'm still not sure of those fish if they could handle salt.
we'll have to wait for a loach expert to comment.
I would do a 50% water change immediatly! You need PRIME for your nitrites and definantly an ammonia test kit.
Trust me, I have been right where you are. Without having those things all you can do, and is what you should do anyway, is the water change as soon as possible. If your nitrites are that high and you don't do a water change tonight there is a very strong possibility you will find few if any of them still alive.
As for the salt. I don't add it to any of my tanks with loaches, so I would avoid that. IMO Just do your water change and as soon as you can tomorrow get PRIME (to bring those nitrites down), a test kit for ammonia and ph if you don't have one, and some AMMOLOCK to handle your ammonia spikes...well PRIME works for that too.
Do the water change immediatly! Best of luck!
Let us know how you fare,
Krista
Trust me, I have been right where you are. Without having those things all you can do, and is what you should do anyway, is the water change as soon as possible. If your nitrites are that high and you don't do a water change tonight there is a very strong possibility you will find few if any of them still alive.
As for the salt. I don't add it to any of my tanks with loaches, so I would avoid that. IMO Just do your water change and as soon as you can tomorrow get PRIME (to bring those nitrites down), a test kit for ammonia and ph if you don't have one, and some AMMOLOCK to handle your ammonia spikes...well PRIME works for that too.
Do the water change immediatly! Best of luck!
Let us know how you fare,
Krista
Have you loved your loach today?
GREAT! I am so glad you got the post, I was afraid you wouldn't get it tonight. This will buy you some time to get the Prime. Be sure to let me know how you are doing and if you need anything else please let me know. Oh, and don't forget the ammonia test kit.clutchxr wrote:ok thanks Im going to change the water right now
What you will have to do is test that water very frequently (if it were me I would test in the am and pm) and then you have the prime to eleminate the ammonia and nitrite when you need it. It's a pain, you just have to stay on top of it. Oh, and lots of small water changes when you get these levels down some.
Good luck!
Kris
Have you loved your loach today?
Just in my experience ammonia will spike and then drop...then you will get the nitrite spike, so you may no be having a problem with your ammonia right now but it won't hurt. You just don't want to put too many chemicals in there if it's not necessary.clutchxr wrote:I got the water changed. Im about to go see what the local 24 hour meijers has to offer. They don't have a whole lot of pet supplies but maybe I can find something. Just waiting on my buddy to get back over here. any kind of ammonia detox has got to be better than nothing till tomorrow.
I have learned to let my fish tell me when something is wrong and you will get to this point too. How were they acting before you did the water change? Are they acting differently now?
Anytime there is an issue with my water my fish let me know by either getting agressive with one another or loosing color (this is a good sign of stress) or however at the top of the water. As time goes by you will pick up on this. Just check out how your fish are acting now vs before the water change.
Wishin you luck,
Kris
Have you loved your loach today?
BIO SPIRA choice number 1
if not choice numbers 2 n 3
do you have any friends with fish tanks that har cycled?
if so get some of there SubStrate and maybe some filter media ie sponge or gravel stuff
fish stores often sell gravel but only as a last resort
if you add either of them to your tank you will be ok
you really need some bactiria
and any of the 3 choices will work
prime aint gonna do a dam thing
its like cycle (theres and additive called cycle)
it does nothing
the bactiria in it is so miniscule its a loss of money at best
people get all freaked out when starting a new tank
and it kills me everytime an old fishkeeper says
oh no you didnt cycle right yada yada blah blah
i like cheating
i bought a 75gal a few years ago
and everyone told me to cycle it
so for 2 weeks i worked and worked till i said
fuck that
i went to 3 diffrent friends houses and took media
dirty water
and substrate
and added my fish the next day
and it worked fine
my 75 gallon cycled my 180
and when i broke down my 180 to move it
i tryed biospira
dam that stuff worked great
expensive but great
so b4 you kill any more fish
please try this advice
if not choice numbers 2 n 3
do you have any friends with fish tanks that har cycled?
if so get some of there SubStrate and maybe some filter media ie sponge or gravel stuff
fish stores often sell gravel but only as a last resort
if you add either of them to your tank you will be ok
you really need some bactiria
and any of the 3 choices will work
prime aint gonna do a dam thing
its like cycle (theres and additive called cycle)
it does nothing
the bactiria in it is so miniscule its a loss of money at best
people get all freaked out when starting a new tank
and it kills me everytime an old fishkeeper says
oh no you didnt cycle right yada yada blah blah
i like cheating
i bought a 75gal a few years ago
and everyone told me to cycle it
so for 2 weeks i worked and worked till i said
fuck that
i went to 3 diffrent friends houses and took media
dirty water
and substrate
and added my fish the next day
and it worked fine
my 75 gallon cycled my 180
and when i broke down my 180 to move it
i tryed biospira
dam that stuff worked great
expensive but great
so b4 you kill any more fish
please try this advice
I recommended Prime as an option because it does bind a small amount of ammonia on top of dechlorinating. It won't speed up a cycle.
I agree with the approach of using cycled media if you have access to it. This will speed things up.
If not daily testing, daily water changes until numbers get below toxic levels and don't over feed.
I hope they all make it through.
I agree with the approach of using cycled media if you have access to it. This will speed things up.
If not daily testing, daily water changes until numbers get below toxic levels and don't over feed.
I hope they all make it through.
the store I went to last night didn't have much bought some stuff made by jungle. Here are my new results 12 hours after adding it and the water change.
nitrate 40
nitrite 3.0
alkalinity 80
ph 6.8
everything seemed more active after the water change the khulis were all racing around. good thing because I havent seen all of them in a few days. What is good for ph? I know its lower than it should be. Havent lost anything else so thats good. Do I need further water changes at the moment to lower the nitrate and nitrite or is it safe enough?
nitrate 40
nitrite 3.0
alkalinity 80
ph 6.8
everything seemed more active after the water change the khulis were all racing around. good thing because I havent seen all of them in a few days. What is good for ph? I know its lower than it should be. Havent lost anything else so thats good. Do I need further water changes at the moment to lower the nitrate and nitrite or is it safe enough?
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