Dark Day Indeed

[crazysilverwolf]

Has Been a very bad day, Put a new filter in yesterday and got up this morning to tank death. only the comman plec survived. does anyone have any clues as to why a tank system can shut down so quickly. all tank stats are fine and fish were all swimming normally yesterday.

 

[-germ-]

Did you take out the old filter!?
Or seed the new filter with bacteria/media from your old cycled filter!?
If not and you just performed a straight swap then thats why, you now have an uncycled tank on your hands...
Sorry for your losses.

 

[Lynda B]

We keep 2 filters in our tanks at all times. That way, when we switch one out, we still have a cycled filter.

So sorry for your loss. I'm sure that's very difficult to take.

 

[Spank]

what he said^^^

A brand new filter has bugger all filtering capability, it needs time to build up bacteria. You should take the filter media out of your old filter and put it in your new one!!

 

[crazysilverwolf]

Sorry guys, my problem was not that easy to solve, old media was cut and placed in new filter. not completly new to tanks.

 

[-germ-]

No real point in doing that now though as surely all the nitrifying bacteria would be dead....
For all we know he may have kept them both running, just wondering though if he didn't? *ahem*


Whats your nitrate?
Fish can react badly to a change in environment... but any other symptoms? Theres not alot of info to go off.
What species were the fish that died?

 

[MHunt]

Sorry guys, my problem was not that easy to solve, old media was cut and placed in new filter. not completly new to tanks.

Did you do this before you swapped filters, or after you noticed the dyeing fish? If you'd used your old mature media in the new filter you would have been fine, otherwise, you've just gone through a cycle with fish. The pleco is probably your only fish hardy enough to survive it.

Once the filter media dries out that's it, the bacteria is dead.

 

[crazysilverwolf]

Just to clarify, the tank has been running for six months with very little problems, regular checks, water changes and all has been ok. nitrate and nitrite are both minimal ph has never changed as with the water hardness.
The old filter was on its last legs so i bought a new one. taking the old media from the old filter i cut it and fitted it into the new filter so it was ready to go. the fish all died in the evening so behavior is unknown. guppy, mollies, sucking loach, clown loach and pearl gourami all gone. only plec survived

 

[MHunt]

I'll be honest, changing the filter could be a coincidence, it does kind of sound like poisoning of some kind. Did you do anything else perhaps non fish related at the same time. Decorating, cleaning. Did you put a new air freshener in the room. Did you wash the new filter in anything before adding it to the tank?

I know it won't bring your fish back, but at least it will give you an idea of what might have happened so it doesn't happen again.

 

[Amunet]

Wait.. so you're still getting nitrIte readings?

 

[confusion]

I'll say this - I've swapped out filters several times, diligently transferring the media, and NOT ONE TIME did the new filter go without having to recycle. It took less time, but I got the ammonia and nitrite spikes, and the first few times resulted in some deaths like you have.

I too have at least 2 filters on all my tanks. Since doing that, I've never had a problem.

 

[MHunt]

Wait.. so you're still getting nitrIte readings?

It could be the test kits lowest reading is a small amount, not zero. I know my interpet tablet kit's lowest reading for ammonia is 0.4.

I still think there may be some poisoning going on here, i can't believe a mini cycle would kill most of the fish in the tank so quickly, unless the tank was so overstocked so the ammonia went through the roof while the new filter was getting going.

 

[crazysilverwolf]

i'd like to thank everyone, but unless the mini cycle after putting in the new filter was too big nothing else has changed.

on a journey with this tank now, five guppy fry, and the surviving plec are now enjoying a peaceful take while the tank cycles. everything was washed and cleaned so here goes again.