Danio Disaster!

[kakihara]

Hi,

I had 3 Zebra Danios in my tank up until about a week or so ago and then one of them mysteriously disappeared, I searched the tank and the filter and found nothing. Then I saw another one behaving strangley the other day. I have cories in my tank and it looked like the Danio was mimicking them by rummaging in the gravel for food. Then I noticed yesterday that the danio was barely moving, lying on the gravel or on a plant. Whne I tapped the glass it swam away, or at least tried to, cos it was swimming at an angle (head down and tail up across the gravel which is what made me think it was acting cory-ish) and then stopping and staying still.


Can anyone tell me what this is? Is it dying and does it have a disease which the other fish can get?

K

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

Can you give us your recent stats for ammonia, nitrites and nitrates please first ? How many gallons does the tank hold and what and how many fish does it have in it including ones that have died recently?

 

[kakihara]

Hi, Thanks for replying

I've got a 60 litre hex tank (about 13 gals) and the inhabitants are as follows.

1 Neon Tetra
3 Zebra Danios (well that's what I had 2 weeks ago)
3 Platties (+ 1 baby platy only a week old)
3 Corys

I'm in work at the moment, so I can't give you the water stats unfortunately. I regularly do a water change every 4 - 5 days (about 20 - 25%) cos the filter aint the best.

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

The danios are too big for the 13gal either way, so you should really upgrade your tank or rehome them, the neon tetra also needs at least 4 more buddys as they are schooling fish, does the danio appear not to be able to maintain balance in the water even though it wants to?
When you get back home i would test your tank water asap

 

[kakihara]

I know that the Danios need a bigger tank, but unfortunately I haven't got one to re-home them. The sick danio looks like it's lost all balance and is nose heavy (if you get me), it can barely get an inch of the gravel. I reckon he'll be belly up when I get home.

It's kind of weird actually, a platy fry was born and a danio disappeared, now the female platy looks like she's gonna give birth soon and another danio is on the way out ...

As for the Neons, I realise that they're schooling fish but I think that they are very succeptable to disease which would endanger the other fish in the tank. My friends parents bought 2 lots of them over the period of a couple of months and both times they contracted whitespot and kiiled off a large portion of the rest of the fish in the tank. I don't really want to take that chance.

 

[Lynz781]

It's kind of weird actually, a platy fry was born and a danio disappeared, now the female platy looks like she's gonna give birth soon and another danio is on the way out ...

Hate to say it but it's not wierd. You said yourself the filter is not the best therefore a possible reason your danios are dying could be that the water is bad . You need to sort out your filter, what exactly is wrong with it? Do you need to rinse it out? You say your tank is 13 gallons? What are the dimensions? And what kind of filter is in there?
Ususally most of the problems in tanks is bad water. It sure aint easy being an aquarist sometimes. Hope you get things sorted.

 

[kakihara]

Hi

I tested my water last night and the results were:

PH: 7.2
Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 5 to 10

The Danio is still all over the place, I tried to take it out of the tank after the Platys tried to take a bite out of him (he was just lying in plant leaves). But amazingly I couldn't catch the little bugger, his erractic swimming was hypnotising.

The only thing I can think of is keeping him in a breeding unit with the platy fry until he gets better (if he will at all), but I don't know if that would be safe for the fry.

I feel sorry for the poor thing, but I am wondering as to whether or not to leave him to his devices and if he gets eaten alive by the others then so be it. It's the laws of nature anyway ..! Then another part of me thinks that's cruel.

I have checked out anotehr post in this forum about SBD and it talks about changing diets. I htink that the problem may have been due to the fact that he was constantly eating the cory food pellets and that could have messed up his insides.

I have read about using vegetables and stuff (peas, cucumber etc) but I put cucumber in my tank before and it was there for a day or two untouched. I can't envisage fish eating their greens for some reason.

Can anyone tell me more?

K

p.s. I'm buying a new filter today, the fish shop I go to only stocks interpet ones though, does anyone have any knowledge of these? are they any use?