Cardinal Tetra's Dying Every Day

[michaelwgroves]

I purchased 50 Cardinal Tetra when I first set my tank up 6 months ago, lost one in the first week, but since then all fine.
Two days ago I found two dead in the morning along with a recent Angel.
Yesterday morning I found five Cardinals dead.
Today I have found another three dead Cardinals and an Otta.

I tested my Nitrate last week and it was about 50ppm.
Yesterday I did a massive 70% water change, today Nitrate is about 10ppm
Ammonia is Zero, Nitrite is Zero, PH is about 8.
During the water change yesterday, the temperature dropped to almost 20.

Although my PH is high, it's always been 8. Not sure what my GH and KH are as I do not have the ability to test these, I guess I should get a test for them?

When I have taken out the dead fish there was no obvious signs of disease. However, whilst typing this I noticed a distressed cardinal at the top, he had a white'ish area around the base of his top fin. He is now also dead!

Last week I purchased a few more Clown Loaches and Angels, apart from that fairly constant for the last month.

All other tank inhabitants look happy, I put the Angel down to being smaller and being chased by my larger Angel. Not sure what to put the otta down to. But there is something going on that only affects my Cardinals. All my other Tetra's are fine. Please look at my signature for tank setup.

Not sure if this has any relevance, but I decided to catch my Silver Dollars while there was not much water in the tank and take them back to the LFS as they are eating all my plants, did not know they were veggies when I bought them. Put them in a bag yesterday and left open and floating in tank to take back today. They both died overnight. I thought this might be down to stress and also one of them jumped out of the net and landed on the floor.

Thanks in advance
Michael

 

[discus dreamer]

A spreading white area, really a loss of colour rather than something covering the colour could be like neon tetra disease, cardinals are supposed to be resistant to this but I don't know if that means they never get it. It would be worth checking it out there are lots of pics on the web. I think cardinals like it on the warm side and low Ph soft water so they might have been coping with your Ph 8 but stressed by it and that mixed with a drop in temperature might have been the problem.
I hope you save the rest and it isn't NTD because that will spread.
DD

 

[michaelwgroves]

UPDATE...........

Another 4 dead since my post, the only thing I can think that has changed in the last week is I have reduced my feeds from 3 a day to only 2 as I thought this might be increasing my nitrates.
I have also just noticed the Cardinals seem to be off thier food. Although I'm sure they were feeding okay during the week.

Is there anything I can do, or do I just wait for the inevitable?

Thanks
Michael

 

[michaelwgroves]

SECOND UPDATE.............

I'm losing Cardinals by the hour, apart from 2 that had a white'ish area around the top fine, the rest look fine.
Lost about 8 today, the rest of the population look fine.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks
Michael

 

[WILDER]

Any signs of the fish flicking and rubbing against objects.
Never do large water changes it stresses the fish, and the temp altered while doing it so that's not good news.
Added any new fish or live plants in the last week.
The patch on the fin did it look bleached out or fluffy.

 

[WILDER]

On the base of the fin, does it look like a saddle shape where it comes down the sides of the fish as well.

 

[michaelwgroves]

I've lost a heck of a lot of fish now, in addition to my last post I've now lost another 4 Cardinals, 1 Harlequin, 1 Bristlenose (Really Gutted...), 1 Ota.

I did the water change after things started going wrong, thought it might help, although I can see how that would stress the fish, you learn from your mistakes, thanks for that tip.

I've lost about 20 Cardinals, most looked fine when I pulled them out, although 4 had a bleached out affect, 1 looked a bit washed out all over, the other 3 had what you described "Bleached saddle from top fin" but no fluffy spots.

I'm hoping that the Bristlenose and Ota's died as they ate the Cardinals and caught something nasty that way. I did catch the Bristlenose sucking the guts out, yuk....... and there were a few I found in the mornings this way, although I managed to scoop a lot out before they actually died.

I'm gonna look up Neon Tetra Disease now, but any additional help would be appreciated.

Thanks
Michael

 

[michaelwgroves]

Just been looking up Neon Tetra disease, looks likely this is what I might have. The bad news is it is un-treatable. However it does say it is passed around by the other fish eating the dead one's. Which was my thoughts on how the Bristlenose and Ota's died.
On the bright side, if there is one, if you can get rid of the dying fish before the other have a go, you might get rid of it. However, from what I read you are likely to lose the lot..........
Bit of conflicting information, which was pointed out earlier in the post, is Cardinals are supposed to be resistant to it. So maybe a wrong diagnoses.

I don't know..............

I'm a bit lost at the moment, I'll let you know how it turns out.

Keep the suggestions coming.

Thanks
Michael

 

[WILDER]

I would treat it as a bad strain of columnaris first, myxazin and pimafix.
And turn temp down two degrees.

 

[michaelwgroves]

It looks like if it was NTD, it might have cleared up on it's own as per an article I read.
The deaths have got fewer, I had only 1 mollie die yesterday.
Although today I have 2 sick fish, an Angel and Harlequin. They both appear to have popeye, from what I can see from another post. I followed a link that describes popeye and it does say this can be caused by water nitrogen supersaturation, which is normally found in a new aquarium, well considering I did a 70% water change, I think this problem is self inflickted.
I've ordered some WATERLIFE PROTOZIN and API MELAFIX, just in case I need it.

 

[Marshall..]

Cardinals and Angels prefer acidic water and although your fish survived in alkaline water for a while it will have stressed them and left them open to disease.
Add some bogwood to gradually bring the ph down.I would also give your filter sponges a clean in aquarium water to keep the water in tip top condition.
oh and check for dead fish that may be hidden and polluting your water.I don't think a small drop in temperature when doing a water change is a problem as fish in the wild swim between hot sunshine and cooler shaded areas. Good luck.

 

[michaelwgroves]

Thanks for the comments, I ordered an RO unit today, that should help bring the PH down.

 

[Marshall..]

Great piece of equipment.