Chocolate Gouramis lingering/no appetite

[Jacqueline1970]

3 days ago I purchased two chocolate gouramis which seemed to be well when I purchased them. However, within 24 hours of adding them to my tank I lost 1 bumblebee goby and 1 corydora. I did not notice any smptoms with any of these two fish and was surprised as I have not lost any fish in ages.

When introducing the new fish, as a precaution I treated the tank with Melafix and Cycle. I also have tested and retested my water parameters and all levels are fine, including water hardness.

The chocolate gouramis do not have white spot. They are hiding behind my Fluval and have no appetite. I thought this might be a parasite infestation and treated the water with Wardley's Para-ex but this has not helped. I cannot see any parasite and the gill look ok.

Tank mates are cardinal tetras, kuhli loaches, bristlenose catfish and a few other dwarf gourami fish.

I am at a loss, if anyone has any ideas I would appreciate it.

Thanks

Jacqueline

 

[Doggfather]

Chocolate Gourami are hard fish to take care of since they require pristine water quality and the corrected water paramaters can conditions. If they aren't kept in the right conditions they will fold up their fins, refuse to eat and look drab. Knowing what size the tank is could help a lot! and what the water parameter are would also be a great help.

These fish are also prone to skin parasites and bacterial infections. The water needs to be changed frequently for them to be happy and the ph should be kept between 6.0 - 6.8 at all time. Having the water at around 6.5 would be best. Hardness should also be between 2 - 4 degrees. Having the water filtered through peat would be a good idea since chocolates prefer swimming in blackwater but if you can't get hold of some peat, use some commericially avaliable blackwater treatments. Chocolates also need high temperatures and the tank should be between 27 - 28 degrees.

Feeding these fish may also be a problem. They need large amounts of live food such as bloodworm, brine shrimp, daphnia and mosquito larve, although they may accept flake food (this is a big maybe, most fish don't even bother giving it a second glance) they will still need these livefoods in their diet to keep them healthy which can get expensive for the owner.

Finally, these fish are very shy. Your other fish like the dwarf gourami have probably formed territories already and the chocolates are finding it hard to come out in the open and form their own terriotry.

The best thing to do would be to take them out of the tank and return them and since they prefer to be kept in groups of 6-8+ start a species aquarium.

Good Luck

Also, could you please post your tank size and water parameters, it will help us a great deal!!!

 

[Jacqueline1970]

Sorry I didn't post water parameters - I was typing with a screaming baby

Tank size is 200 litres, temperature is 27 degrees. Ph is 7.0. Ammonia is nil, Nitrite is nil, chlorine is nil, water hardness is 100ppm. My Master test kit which I recently purchased does not provide solution for testing general hardness and carbonate hardness so I will purchase them seperately.

To be more specific tank mates include 4 honey dwarf gouramis, 2 blue coral gouramis, 13 cardinal tetras, 2 kuhli loaches, 1 bumblebee goby, 2 gold sucking catfish, 3 bristlenose catfish, 1 panda corydora & 2 gold rams. I change the water fortnightly removing 25%. I have a Fluval 404 with carbon (which I have currently removed) and ceramic noodles. As mentioned previously, I have not had any fish deaths in a long long time. The only problem I have had in recent months was a bout of White Spot which was treated successfully and was most likely due to a water change I carried out and I was careless with the temperature of the new water. Thankfully I treated the White Spot outbreak at it's first signs and had no fish loss.

Well following your advice - I am doing several things wrong. I do not have peat moss in the Fluval, my Ph is too high and I have been feeding all of my fish on a diet primarily consisting of flakes and tablets that sink (for the ground feeders). I do have a supply of frozen bloodworm, and shrimp - will this be ok to substitute for live food?

I would like to return the fish - but unfortnately my local and only aquarium dealer does not want to know about it and figures they were alive when they left the shop. I may set up a species tank. For the record - they both look a little more lively. I have started to slowly reduce the Ph and have attempted to feed them some blood worm.

Thanks for your advice.

Jacqueline

 

[jacblades]

one of the reasons your goby died probably has to do with the fact that bb gobies are brackish water fish not freshwater (no matter what petco tells you!) if the goby got stressed, it didnt help that he didnt have all of the necessary ingredients in his water.

 

[Doggfather]

To be more specific tank mates include 4 honey dwarf gouramis, 2 blue coral gouramis, 13 cardinal tetras, 2 kuhli loaches, 1 bumblebee goby, 2 gold sucking catfish, 3 bristlenose catfish, 1 panda corydora & 2 gold rams

Well...The honey gourami MAY cuase a problem, they are territorial at times and may pester the chocolates, but then again, there may be no problem at all, same for the 2 blue gouramis, they both males if they're blue (females have little or no colour) so they may be a bit cranky towards each other and the other fish in the tank. 13 cardinals should be ok. The khuli loaches are fine but should be kept in groups of 3+...as mentioned (didn't pick up on it before) bumble bee gobies are brackish fish, so shouldn't be kept in a freshwater tank. 2 gold sucking catfish probably refers to albino plecs, they can get pretty large but shouldn't cause too much trouble for the chocolates until they get big! The b'nose will also be ok with them. The cories should be kept in groups of 3+ also and the rams may be a bit aggressive for them.

As you can probably see from above, a species tank would be ideal! they are very picky when it comes to tankmates and food! and water conditions it's either perfect, or it's not good enough for them .

I change the water fortnightly removing 25%.

Increased water changes would help the fish stay healthy and lively too. 2 25% changes or more would be great

The frozen foods should be fine, but try feed them live food once or twice fortnightly as a treat, they will love you for it!

Glad i could help

 

[ryan]

Have you got the FW species of Bumblebee Gobie?

Chocolate Gouramis are normally wild caught and for this reason find tank life hard to adapt to. They can also be infested with internal parasites. I would think the tank mates could be a problem as of yet, are there caves etc for the fish to rest/hide.

To get them feeding I would keep the light levels low and try live bloodworms and if possible I would also increase the size of the group as they are a gregarious fish that needs to be in groups of 10-12 if possible but a minimum of 6 is fine this would help to lower stress levels.