Completely And Utterly New!

[angeldleight81]

I am completely and utterly new to keeping fish, but do "fish sit" for a friend of mine - I ended up buying myself a V.small 10l tank, put in the water, water purifier and safe start stuff as per instructions. Today I added two white cloud mountain minnows, two golden tailed ones and two zebra danios. Two things seem strange to me - one, they are all swimming near the surface. The filter is on the lowest setting, so thinking they were there for air, I turned it up a bit, but that almost blew them away, so I turned it back down. Secondly, one of my WCMM is acting rather strange. We put the fish in as we were told to do - ten mins in bag to allow for tmp adjustment, ten min with addition of tank water, then ten min with a little more then let in. The WCMM which is now acting odd was noticable from the start by the way he was zomming up and down the tank from top to bottom over and over whilst the rest had a leaisurly explore. He is now struggling to keep balance in the corner of the tank.

1) Have I done something really wrong here!? Can I help him?
2) Why are they all hell bent on staying at the surface!?

 

[Davo86]

Hi, i'm afraid the tank is too small, Also as it is not cycled the fish will be suffering

 

[angeldleight81]

Hi, i'm afraid the tank is too small, Also as it is not cycled the fish will be suffering

Hi, thanks for your reply. We did go to a specialist (sp?) fish shop today for advice before buying the fish and the guy said that instead of cycling it, the sure start stuff could be used, then the fish could go in today - he also said no more than six fish of this size due to the size of the tank.

 

[frida]

Hi, i'm afraid the tank is too small, Also as it is not cycled the fish will be suffering

Hi, thanks for your reply. We did go to a specialist (sp?) fish shop today for advice before buying the fish and the guy said that instead of cycling it, the sure start stuff could be used, then the fish could go in today - he also said no more than six fish of this size due to the size of the tank.

Oh no, it sounds like you've got completely rubbish advice (it seems like a common problem...) But the good news is you're in the right forum to ask for questions. My first impulse would be to return some or all the fish to the shop you got it from and start to cycle your tank. There are some very good articles in the beginners section of how to do that. Also, remember that because your tank is tiny, you really are limited to small fish, or shrimp (although having said that, shrimp are sensitive to water purity so I don't think you should add them until your tank is mature). I'm still a newbie myself so that's all I can say for now but I'm sure the more knowledgeable on this forum will come to your rescue!

 

[Curiosity101]

I'm afraid the person you spoke to was incorrect. Sure start, along with 99% of the other instant cycle bacteria products do not work. They either contain no live bacteria, or the incorrect types of bacteria.

The ammonia will now slowly be increasing and it seems has already begun to affect one of the WCMM. Effectively poisoning it.

The tank is far too small for any fish I'm afraid
The fish you have chosen are actually all quite active species naturally, so although they don't create alot of waste they should really be kept in 40l+ tanks to allow them room to swim properly.

Also they all naturally swim at the surface, so that in itself is nothing to worry about. Only worry if they are also gulping air at the surface. If they are gulping it means they don't have enough oxygen so you need to pop the filter up a little bit to create a bit more surface agitation.

 

[angeldleight81]

Hi, i'm afraid the tank is too small, Also as it is not cycled the fish will be suffering

Hi, thanks for your reply. We did go to a specialist (sp?) fish shop today for advice before buying the fish and the guy said that instead of cycling it, the sure start stuff could be used, then the fish could go in today - he also said no more than six fish of this size due to the size of the tank.

Oh no, it sounds like you've got completely rubbish advice (it seems like a common problem...) But the good news is you're in the right forum to ask for questions. My first impulse would be to return some or all the fish to the shop you got it from and start to cycle your tank. There are some very good articles in the beginners section of how to do that. Also, remember that because your tank is tiny, you really are limited to small fish, or shrimp (although having said that, shrimp are sensitive to water purity so I don't think you should add them until your tank is mature). I'm still a newbie myself so that's all I can say for now but I'm sure the more knowledgeable on this forum will come to your rescue!

Oh how dissapointing I have a friend with a mature tank - she has some of these fish already - do you think they would be ok going with her until I sort this tank out?

 

[Davo86]

Hi, i'm afraid the tank is too small, Also as it is not cycled the fish will be suffering

Hi, thanks for your reply. We did go to a specialist (sp?) fish shop today for advice before buying the fish and the guy said that instead of cycling it, the sure start stuff could be used, then the fish could go in today - he also said no more than six fish of this size due to the size of the tank.

Just to check what temperature do you have the tank set at?

It will be worth purchasing a test kit, as without this it is hard to know what is happening in the tank, However with the tank being such a small size, the parameters are going to be very unstable and therefore will very quickly swing from one end to the other, which is very bad for the fish.

With regard to the one fish you may have just purchased one bad fish, however that being said danios are an extremely active fish so definitely need a tank about 20 times bigger