Dead Fish, Should I Be Worried?

[PhilH]

I picked up some fish last Saturday for my cycled tank.

2 Kuhlis
4 black neons
2 honey gourami (I asked for one male one female but can't see a lot of difference)

In the tank already were 1 kuhli, 2 neons, 1 black neon.

There are also like 10 guppy fry which I'll be rehoming when they're a bit bigger.

yesterday I got back from work to find one of the new black neons had died. Couldn't see what the cause might have been as the other fish had been picking at it!

All fish are feeding normally. I did a water test on Sunday, ammonia/nitrites were at 0 and nitrates were around 20 so did a 20% water change.

Was I just unlucky or should I look out for anything in particular?

Thanks

 

[attibones]

Might have been an unlucky batch, but it may also have been a mini-cycle. Even though you had cycled the tank, when you add more fish, the bacteria colony may not be large enough to cope, but it will quickly recover. Did you quarantine the new fish at all?

 

[PhilH]

Hi thanks for the reply.

Sadly I don't have room for a quarantine tank right now, the rest of the black neons looked ok so I'm hoping it was just one stressed/weaker fish.

Just hoping I haven't introduced something nasty to the tank...

 

[stanleo]

I had the same trouble of losing new fish in a new tank. I am dosing Melafix for a week to combat any diseases that might have gotten in the tank with the fish.