About Ready To Throw In The Towel

[missgingersnap]

I'm getting so frustrated. I try to do everything right. I'm really diligent with water changes, testing water, and researching anything and everything about fish. It irritates the crap out of me when I read about people who have these flourishing tanks and have no idea about testing water or cycling and don't do regular water changes. So here I am trying so hard and I keep losing my beautiful fish. I did a fishless cycle and I always slowly acclimate my fish to the tank. I've had several mysterious deaths. They look fine when I go to bed and I wake in the morning to find dead fish for no reason. My water params are 0,0, 10. So then I get an ick outbreak. I've been treating with meds and higher temps. Most have disapeared but there are still a few spots. Now it looks like one of my angels has something wrong with its fins. They look pretty ragged. It was hard to notice because its a white coloured one so the fins are quite see through. The other angle now has some little black specs on his side and has begun picking on the other one who is much smaller. I read they can get secondary bacterial infections from the ick but if I'm still treating for the ick I can't very well throw in another medicine. One of my cory cats looks like it has a cut on his side too. I'm ready to cry and I don't know what to do. Maybe this hobby just isn't for me. I can't take all these deaths. Sorry for the rant...

 

[greenscooby]

Don't give up, plenty of advice on here for you,

What szie tank have you got?

Whats your stocking?

Any Plants?

 

[missgingersnap]

I have a 48 gallon tall tank with 2 angels, 6 neons(there were 12), 1 guppy(there were 9), 4 cory cats, 1 BN pleco. I've had lots of other fish die on me through it all. I've only been doing this since January. I had no idea what I was doing with my first tank(10 gallon) and I had some deaths with that one since the tank wasn't cycled before I piled way too many fish in there. I thought things would be better with this one since I did things properly. I don't have live plants. My tank is very tall and I need a ladder to clean it. I can't reach the bottom unless I use tongs so I figured real plants would be hard to take care of. I might experiment with real plants in my ten gallon.

 

[greenscooby]

Sorry forgot ask, what substrate have you got? Could be your substrate is to sharp for your cory.

Did you find your neons dead or just gone? Your angels might have eaten them, also neons should ideally go into a mature tank.

Not sure about your angels, someone with more experience will be able to give you loads more advice.

 

[missgingersnap]

I have gravel but it's more of a rounded kind of gravel. It's almost like it's been coated. The neons died. My angles are juvies and don't pay any attention to the smaller fish. Most of the mysterious deaths were the guppies. A few neons died for no reason and a few got some weird fungus that I tried to treat but they died anyway. I guess I'm just frustrated because I had a lot of fish die in my ten gallon....but that was my own fault. Now I'm doing what I should be doing and they're still dropping like flies. Maybe I should just get a tank full of danios. I hear you pretty much can't kill those ones.

 

[shadowhywind]

don't give up! I know exactly what you are going threw, since I have just recently gone through what you are going though now. 3 weeks ago, my plants were thriving, and all my fish were happy and swimming around, (11 neons, 2 black neons, 2, sepia tetras, 3 white mollies, 3 red wag platies, a pleco (traded him in for a 'stick fish') and a catfish). And too many molly and platy fry to count. But then poof, an out break of ick that i couldn't get rid of! Thankfully 2 weeks after the out break, all signs of ick are now gone. And I am now down to the 3 platys, 2 sepia tetras, 1 catfish and 5 platy fry. Along with some odd looking water (even after a 50%) water change and a algae bloom. I know it can get a bit depressing, but after the "little" setbacks your tank will start to look amazing once again. I know mine is slowly getting back to normal... unfortunately, everything takes a bit of time

 

[San O Fisher]

I went through everything you are talking about, I decided to make sure I had good equipment (you get what you pay for)
- get a good heater, it is okay if your tank heats up a bit b/c it is hot outside (the fish are tropical), but they do not like the cold. my heater did not have an internal thermometer and would not heat the tank up enough when it got cold at night.
good filter/Over Filter - I run a fluval 305 and an aquaclear 70 - i prefer to use sponge filters, i think they cycle a lot better.

I have lost some fish since doing all this, but they have been few and far between. I know this stuff costs some money but they are worth it.

 

[Amunet]

Really wouldn't worry about the guppy deaths. It sucks, but just know that guppies aren't as hardy as they used to be (so I've heard).
Most if not all of us go through stuff like this though. Don't give up!

 

[mark.w.jones]

Guppies and Neons are two of the most inbred and weak species in fish keeping now IMO. Unfortunately they have become the token fish that every numpty who fancies a go a fish keeping wants to buy so the demand is huge. However, this means the quality is very poor. I wouldn't recommend either, and bare minimum you need a 6 month established tank before adding them as they don't cope at all well with fluctuations in anything. Endlers Livebearers and Cardinal tetras are far better alternatives. Maybe the LFS you're buying from is not all that great as well. They may be using a poor wholesaler for their stock and selling on fish too early after transportation. Leaving buying very weakened fish for your tank. Were they recommended to you? Your Equipment is unlikely to be the cause of your problems, whats more likely is that you've experienced a sudden overnight ammonia / nitrite spike which dropped before you could test for it. Weakened fish would not cope with this at all.

Don't give up though. Despite having done a fishless cycle in the beginning any new fish you add will now be experiencing a fish in cycle. Don't add any new fish for at least 2 weeks now. Make sure everything has settled and then stock slowly. No more than 5 small fish at a time. Leave for 2weeks and repeat. Keep a close eye on water parameters and do 25% water changes if you suspect anything is wrong. Whilst waiting though aquascape your tank. Plants will improve the water quality in the long term and are far easier to grow than people think

Good Luck

 

[tom_os]

in the wild neons are angles natural food so if the angles are big enough, thats where your neons have gone

 

[missgingersnap]

Thanks everyone. I've heard that about the guppies and neon....too late of course but it still sucks. I would love to have endlers but can't seem to find them. I never see cardinals either.
I'm starting to wonder about my LFS but there aren't many in my city. I'm going to try a new place I think. Also, my tank has been cycled since february and I tested 2x a day for a long time. All parameters were stable.
My neons bodies were all accounted for so it wasn't the angels. They really don't pay any attention to the neons. They also grew up together and I heard that way your neons stand a good chance of not being eaten as a snack.
Well, no more guppies or neons for me. I'm going to have to rethink my stocking. Maybe a school of dwarf neon rainbows and some other type of tetra.
Thanks again. Now I just need to get this stupid ick cleared up. It seems to take forever!

 

[Honeythorn]

I think treating your current stock, leaving the tank to settle for another couple of months, and then trying a different LFS is your best bet. Go with something reasonably hardy like barbs ( group of 6-8 is best )

 

[AdAndrews]

quit then

 

[missgingersnap]

Honeythorn...yes, I'm definitely going to wait until everything settles down before adding anything new.

Adandrews....wow! That's great advice! Thanks! (rolling eyes)

 

[AdAndrews]

Honeythorn...yes, I'm definitely going to wait until everything settles down before adding anything new.

Adandrews....wow! That's great advice! Thanks! (rolling eyes)

well thats all you want for people to fuss over you and say ohh please dont quit its great, if you are thinking about quitting there is no point in wasting peoples time, make the decision to quit or carry on.

good luck