Black Moor Goldfish Help Needed :_

[RedTiger]

hi! yes, i am in USA. i will keep checking craigslist.. thanks!

his tank is kinda hot (80-F). wish they had coolers for the tanks, like they have heaters. i put an ice pack on the back of the tank (outside), hoping it will help. i'm freezing more ice packs now. could i put them inside the tank, if sealed in plastic or is it better to just keep them on the outside?

 

[Sunny_Bee]

I know people who freeze plastic bottles of water and float those in the tank to gradually cool it, but that's a short term solution. Are you just going through a warm peroid or do you think it will be that warm all the time?

 

[RedTiger]

I know people who freeze plastic bottles of water and float those in the tank to gradually cool it, but that's a short term solution. Are you just going through a warm peroid or do you think it will be that warm all the time?

it's summer so it's hot out. i have on the a/c but even with the window unit, the internal room temperature never falls below 78-F. i'll just keep using the ice packs.

i am concerned about the winter bc we will have the heat on but i keep it in the low to mid 70s only when home bc it costs a fortune to run. when we're not here, i turn it down to around 60-F.

 

[Sunny_Bee]

You can put a heater in for the winter and just set it to the ideal tank temp, that way if it drops the heater will kick in. As for the heat right now, you may be better to just leave it rather than having to constantly add bottles of ice, otherwise it may fluctuate too much (but I'm no expert on this...living in eastern Canada means my tank rarely gets hot ). You could try it warm but just do your best to ensure there is a lot of oxygen in the water with an airstone and as much surface disturbance as possible.

 

[liqourish]

u shoudnt have ice on the outside, u might cause the glass to crack(do wut that one guy said, float it in the tank. its kinda late but ur prolly better off with a aquatec Hex 5 (marine elclipse 5 off brand lol), has everything u need to start a tank specialy biofilter. black moors and fantail goldfish do fine up to about 80 degrees so dont sweat it. i have one and it has ich for abit now lol. curing.

 

[RedTiger]

You can put a heater in for the winter and just set it to the ideal tank temp, that way if it drops the heater will kick in. As for the heat right now, you may be better to just leave it rather than having to constantly add bottles of ice, otherwise it may fluctuate too much (but I'm no expert on this...living in eastern Canada means my tank rarely gets hot ). You could try it warm but just do your best to ensure there is a lot of oxygen in the water with an airstone and as much surface disturbance as possible.

hi! thanks!! i did read this when you posted. i'm sorry that i did not respond, i thought that i had. i doubt that i'll need the heater here. with the apt heat on, it wont get below 60-F, unless there's a power outage and then a heater won't help anyway. (unless do they have ones that are battery operated?)

i realized that ice packs on the outside might be a problem so i've been using them on the inside.

u shoudnt have ice on the outside, u might cause the glass to crack(do wut that one guy said, float it in the tank. its kinda late but ur prolly better off with a aquatec Hex 5 (marine elclipse 5 off brand lol), has everything u need to start a tank specialy biofilter. black moors and fantail goldfish do fine up to about 80 degrees so dont sweat it. i have one and it has ich for abit now lol. curing.

i think that the 5-gal would be too small for him. i'm all set up now anyway but thank you!

yes, you are right -- i could have cracked the glass!!! someone pointed that out to me, SCHWEW! sorry that i missed your msg before, i did not get the auto notification for some odd reason. the temp was going above 80-F so i did need to do something. its cooling off so probably wont have that worry for another year. WOO HOO!! i am not fond of the heat...

thanks for your message.

 

[RedTiger]

HI!! The pet stores are telling me all kinds of different things !! All of you were so helpful last time, I thought that I'd come back here.

Swimmey seems to be doing well. He digs around in his gravel a lot, ate the second plant that we bought him and is now working on eating the first plant. He has not touched plant #3 yet. Since it was so hot here, I've been adding ice packs in his tank to keep it from going above 80-degrees. I bought a tank divider and put the divider about 4" away from the edge so I could place the ice pack in horizontally and not take up a lot of the surface air. It's starting to cool off so I shouldn't need that much longer! Anyway, he looks pretty healthy and does not show any signs of sickness.

I still have the Jungle Sticks but discovered that their Nitrate/Nitrite levels are a little off. So I'm not really using them but will use them to check the chlorine or for a quick check mid-week. I bought the API Freshwater Master Test Kit and used that to check the levels tonight. I also have syringes for accurate dispensing. I have not changed any of the water for 7 days and am planning on doing that the next morning. The last time that I used the gravel cleaner was about 2 weeks ago and that's near when all these problems started. (Perhaps I cleaned it TOO well?)

HERE ARE THE LEVELS

pH: 6.8. (I added 0.70ml of API pH increaser, since goldfish prefer 7.0-7.4. Last week, it was at 6.2 but increased after I added 1.0ml of the pH increaser.)

Nitrite: 1.0-1.5 (it's in between the two colors on chart. This is the same as last week.)

Nitrate: 10-15 (it's in between the two colors on chart. It was 160 last week!)

Ammonia: 0.0 (this is the same as last week.)

What do you recommend to get the Nitrite levels down? Should I put the Nitrazorb back in the filter?



Background Info, if you want it:


After PetsMart's recommendation, I used some AmQual Plus to bring down the Nitrate/Nitrite levels but that did not help. I got an in-tank monitor for the Ammonia levels and that showed the Ammonia was at Zero. (I also have the in-tank pH monitor and both of the in-tank monitors match what the API test kit reads.)

I tried large water changes (waiting 2 days between each: 70% then 50%) but that did not help.

I went to Petland Discounts because the clerks seem more knowledgeable. The clerk said that the tank could still be cycling but when I told him how high the Nitrate/Nitrtire levels read, he recommended adding Nitrazorb in the tank's filter. (He told me to do a 10-20% water change before adding it but not another one for a week bc I am removing the beneficial bacteria.) After 3 days, the Nitrite/Nitrate levels still showed high on the dipstick. So, I brought the water to a local Pet Store and PetsMart. Both stores had similar readings and showed lower Nitrite/Nitrate levels than the dipsticks had. The guy at the local pet store told me to remove the Nitrazorb. When I got home with the new API test kit, I tested the water myself and it was pretty close to what they got in the stores so at least there is consistency!


THANK YOU IN ADVANCE!!