Cloudy water

[ally]

Hi everyone the water in my girlfriends fish tank has been really cloudy recently so I went to the local fish shop and he said it was due to a build up of Ammonia and gave me this pond treatment powder with instructions to do a quarter tank change then a pinch of this stuff everyday, the ammonia level was 6.0-7.0(I think). I can’t give you all the fish because I only know a few of them but here goes:

2 Angels (under 4 months)
1 Angel (over a year)
1 red tailed shark
1 big catfish (8 inches long)
6 tetras
3 Guppies
3 small catfish
1 pink fish (don’t know what he is, 3 inches long)
1 Goldfish looking dude, 2 inches long
4 red tailed red sharks (red eyes)

We did a complete water and gravel change about 3 weeks ago and it was fine for a few days then it started clouding up, the pink dudes eye has started to get a little cloudy (the guy at the fish store said it was caused by the build up of ammonia). They also started to get white spot so we're treating that every four days. The tank is a fifty-litre tank, I think. Any help would be much appreciated.

 

[tstenback]

Welcome to the forum.

To start. thats way too much fish in a 50 litre tank(if that is the size) the cloudiness is most likely a bacteria bloom caused by the overcleaning of the tank. You mentioned that the water was completely changed, which shouldnt hurt too much, but the gravel was also completely cleaned which will destroy a portion of your bacteria colony. This combined with the huge fish load in the tank has caused the tank to cycle again. This will start with an ammonia spike, which is toxic to fish and must be handled with daily water changes, then a nitrite spike, toxic as well daily water changes required, and finally nitrates will be produced. You will not be out of this cycle until the ammonia is zero, the nitrites are zero and the nitrates are some positive number.

The ammonia should be kept below 1 ppm if you can get it there. it may mean a large water change to start with but for the fishes health it is required. Then just monitor the ammonia and nitrites and do daily water changes to keep the levels as close to 1 as possible. HTH

 

[ally]

Thanks alot i'll keep doing a bucket change everyday day and checking the ammonia and nitrate levels, the tank is L=2 feet, W=1 foot, H= 1.5 foot. Thanks for all you help!