Hey,

I am new to this website and I need some help!
I have had a tropical fish tank for ~ 6 years and all of a sudden my fish have been dying like it is going out of fashion! The tank is ~ 50 l and housed 10 neons, 3 glowlight tetras, 2 zebra danios, 2 swordtails, 1 pleo, 1 black red tailed shark, and 1 male fighting fish. I have been away for 2 weeks and my flat mate was feeding them for me. I did a water change before I left and when I got back. I have lost all fish except for 2 zebra danios. 2 swordtails, the fighter and the pleo. The fighter and the pleo look to be on deaths doors but the other 4 look healthy and active. According to my flatmate there were no signs of disease/tailrot etc on the fish that died but there is a fungi type disease on my pleos fins which looks as if it is bleeding, he is jsut sitting on the bottom and not moving. The fighter is lying on the bottom with his head up. Does anyone have any suggestions please or treatment options? I have tried water change, a salt shock treatment in the early days i was away and a tailrot chemical treatment. The pH of the tank is neutral to slightly acidic.

Thanks and much appreciated!

Lydia

[quote name='Lydz' date='Jul 12 2008, 06:25 PM' post='2062393']
Hey,

I am new to this website and I need some help!
I have had a tropical fish tank for ~ 6 years and all of a sudden my fish have been dying like it is going out of fashion! The tank is ~ 50 l and housed 10 neons, 3 glowlight tetras, 2 zebra danios, 2 swordtails, 1 pleo, 1 black red tailed shark, and 1 male fighting fish. I have been away for 2 weeks and my flat mate was feeding them for me. I did a water change before I left and when I got back. I have lost all fish except for 2 zebra danios. 2 swordtails, the fighter and the pleo. The fighter and the pleo look to be on deaths doors but the other 4 look healthy and active. According to my flatmate there were no signs of disease/tailrot etc on the fish that died but there is a fungi type disease on my pleos fins which looks as if it is bleeding, he is jsut sitting on the bottom and not moving. The fighter is lying on the bottom with his head up. Does anyone have any suggestions please or treatment options? I have tried water change, a salt shock treatment in the early days i was away and a tailrot chemical treatment. The pH of the tank is neutral to slightly acidic.

Thanks and much appreciated!

Lydia
[/quote/]
about the pleos fins, it could be fin rot or nipping. the others probably died because the fungi from the pleo got to them and because they are small, it overcame them and died. Before you buy other fish, i would isolate the pleos to another tank until they get better. i would visit the pet store on what to do about it after. I would clean out the entire tank; wash every plant, decoraton everything WITHOUT soap and replace the water. I hope this helps

I would say your flatmate overfed the fish while you were away and this caused an ammonia spike. This in turn killed one or two fish and they produced more ammonia killing the rest of them. The stuff on the pleco's fins could be excess mucous caused by poor water quality.

If you can get the water tested for ammonia & nitrite and post the results, that would help.

Try doing a daily 50% water change and gravel clean for the next week and see how they do. Cut the feeding right back and if the fish aren't interested in food, then don't feed them. They won't starve.

Thanks guys for your help, they are hanging in there which I guess is a good sign. I am treating the tank with melafix and will be doing a full tank clean. I had the water tested on Mon (after the water change fri) and everything was fine with the water so still un-sure what happened but hopefully will get it sorted soon.
What do you think of an ammonia level indicator?

"Fine" can mean a lot of things - numbers are really necessary.

To illustrate the problem with the word "fine," I took water prepared to be toxic (ammonia over 2 ppm, nitrite over 10 ppm) around to fish stores and found two that told me it was perfectly fine and another that said my only problem was my pH (which was the only thing not wrong with the water).

Don't do a full tank clean, you will only make the problem worse. Just do daily partial water changes and gravel cleans. This will clean the tank up but won't wipe out the filter or stress the fish as much.

As far as water testing is concerned, I found buying my own tests to be a good idea. I bought API dropper type tests just for ammonia and nitrite. These are the ones with a test tube and a colour chart. The dip in stick type test I found to be inaccurate, also my LFS uses this type of test so yours may also. Then you can test the water daily if you are concerned and that will help you decide how long to keep up the water changes.