3 day weekend away disaster HELP

[Admiral4fish]

Status 4th week of tank 29 gallon

14 days in added 2 panda mollys and 2 sword tails.

5days later to mickey mouse floaties Pilates. 1 had nibbled tail fin.

Fish were great community looked good. Nibbled hidding a bit. 4 days later add 3 snails 2 tiger 1 zebra. Nitrles. Added 1 clump java moss.

Everything thing good 3 days got and added one 3 day feeding pro balance feeding star for weekend went on vacation.

Got back to find 4 dead fish. 1 panda is perfectly fine. Other lathargic being nipped by other. Tail fins on other 4 nipped eaten. Ammonia level .5. Did 20% water change vacuumed gravel removed stupid star food.

The fish I can return to petco but. What to do with aggressive female. Nipping other female. Both panda mollies.

Ugh.....

 

[Admiral4fish]

I'm sure with the food and dead fish gone my small increase in ammonia will go down. I did a weekly dose benifitial bacteria after water change

 

[Admiral4fish]

OK closer inspection.. lathargic fish has white stuff on its scales..fins blochey

 

[Ch4rlie]

Can you describe in more details what the white stuff on scales look like?

i.e wooly/cotton looking or perhaps like grains of salt on scales?

And did you cycle this tank before adding your fish?
Cycling Your first Freshwater Tank

 

[Admiral4fish]

Yes cotton wolly string like growth over molly that was distressed almost dead. Removed from tank in a ice cream pail right now. Other molly showing no signs atm. Only fish left in tank 3 snails left.

Yes tank was fully cycled.
80 gh
120 kh
7.3 pH
0.5 not
10 no3
.5 ppm total ammonia

Run swimming pools year round I know my water testing. I have aquatic antibiotics and tetra lifeguard tabs arriving tomorrow via mail. Please advise treatment

 

[Ch4rlie]

Any tests that shows 0.5ppm ammonia, 10? Nitrite usually tells me that the tank was not cycled correctly am afraid.

How did you cycle the tank and filter?

A successfully cycled tank will show 0ppm ammonia, 0ppm nitrite and a reading of nitrate.

 

[Admiral4fish]

I did the fish less cycle using food to create ammonia. The tank came up to 1.5ppm and lowered it selfor to zero by end of week two. I used api bacteria dossing to speed the process. Once my nitrite reading hit zero. I added 4 fish for a week saw no increase in ammonia added 2 more fish. 5 days later the snails. Saw no increase in ammonia until I added the dam dissolving weekend vacation feeder. Then I came back to now 5 dead fish and half dissolved rotting star food clump. Used the vacuum to clean the gravel after I removed dead fish and dumped 5.5 gallons or 20% ish and added 5.5 gallons new water balanced. Single fish is fine snails fine ammonia level dropping.

 

[Ch4rlie]

Am afraid that does not sound quite correct really.

One, these bottled API bacteria brands tend to have the wrong type of bacterias you need, you would be far better with Tetra Safe Start or Dr Tim's One and Only Nitrifying Bacteria, has the correct bcteria types, both designed by the same scientist, tried and tested and proven to work 9 times out of ten really.

Second, using fish food is a poor source of ammonia as this can be messy, detrimental to your tank water and guessing dosage is near impossible. You'd be far better with a bottle of ammonia which can be easily obtained online or from certain hardware stores. Once you have this bottle, you then can start a fishless cycle much more successfully and usually take 4 or 5 doses with water tests regularly to get through the cycling process. But of course, now you have fish in your tank, this now becomes more difficult.

Third, fishless cycles tend to take at least 4 - 8 weeks unless you happened to have a good bottle of bacteria starter or better yet, some established media from another tank that has been running for some time.

OR its possible you did cycle your tank if you were lucky, but the use of the weekend vacation feeder is the second choice of the cause. I have heard bad reviews of this feeder and more often than not its negative to your water quaility for various reasons. So take as much of this stuff out of your tank and do a nice big water change, at least 75% imho.

So am afraid it sounds like it was the water quaility that has been detrimental to your fish's health.

FYI, healthy fish can very easily cope without food for a week, so the next time you go away for a few days, just ensure the fish has been fed a few consecutives days and do a 50% water change before you leave, this way your fish will be in clean water and will forage for foods amonst your plants and decor.

 

[Admiral4fish]

Thanks. Have removed all decaying matter. Hopefully 30 gallons to one fish will allow the cycle to occur again. I'll try wait until I see ammonia drop before adding replacement fish

 

[Essjay]

80 gh

Your water hardness will also have had a part to play. 80 ppm, or 4.5 dH, is pretty soft and the fish you chose all prefer hard water. Mollies in particular cope poorly with soft water. While the hardness, or lack of, didn't kill the fish by itself it does mean that the fish were outside their comfort zone and would be much more likely to be adversely affected by any ammonia in the water.

 

[Byron]

Essjay raises a very important issue, that of your water hardness. Mollies will never last long in water this soft, regardless of any other factors. Livebearers in general also will not do well. When the time comes to consider new fish, look at soft water species, there are many to consider that would do fine in a 29g tank. Many of us could help with options.

While I'm here, I will also suggest that you never use automatic feeding blocks or similar. These are prone to fail, and the excess of food means excess organics, something you do not want occurring when you are not there to deal with the issue. I'm not saying this was the only problem, in line with what others have posted, just that these things are not wise ever.

Edit addition: I was going to mention (but forgot) that except for fry, healthy fish can manage for several days without feeding. A 3-day weekend away would in future be better without any form of feeding during the time away.

Byron.

 

[Ch4rlie]

Indeed, i concur with the water hardness issue, I must admit I dropped the ball on that one, seems I was more concentrating on the cycling side of things.

This is one reason why this forum is a good one, others will pick up or suggest things that may have not been thought of.

Teamwork

 

[Admiral4fish]

Thanks what level of hardness do you all suggest. One thing I've found in my research is there are lots of ideal opinions.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

Thanks what level of hardness do you all suggest. One thing I've found in my research is there are lots of ideal opinions.

There is no single ideal set of water parameters for freshwater fish. The answer depends on where the fish come from, as different rivers have different parameters. South American cichlids come from Amazonian tributaries which is very soft water, whereas African cichlids come from 'liquid rock' Rift Valley lakes with very high hardness.

So, the easy answer is to find fish suitable to your tap conditions. Seriouslyfish.com is a very reliable source for many different species and their preferred parameters.

 

[Essjay]

It is much easier to keep fish that prefer your tapwater parameters than to alter the parameters to suit particular fish. With your soft water, hard water fish like the livebearers you bought will suffer unless you 'harden' the water. This is not easy to get right, certainly not for a beginner. You'll have much more success if you go for fish from soft water areas.
As eaglesaquarium mentioned, cichlids from south America like soft water as do most other types of fish from that area - tetras, corydoras etc. A lot of Asian fish also like soft water - gouramis, harlequins and so on.

I too use Seriously Fish to research fish before buying. FishBase is another good site for water requirements though It has a lot less info on fish behaviour than SF.