poppaloony
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Hi
I'm new here and hoping someone may be able to help me with sick fish. I'll be as brief as I can, but a quick hisory may help!
I kept freshwater tropicals many years ago, but since moving about 15 years back haven't had any. Recently a local business my husband visited as part of his work went into liquidation. They had a 3ft tank in reception which had been seriously neglected and there was only one fish remaining - a 6 inch albino plec. My husband was told no-one wanted the tank and that the liquidators deemed it of no value so the plec was destined for the toilet - obviously when I heard that, it meant I had acquired a tank and a plec.
Due to the truly disgusting state of the tank and hood I bought another smaller tank, put some gravel from the original tank in it together with the internal filter from that tank and filled it with 50/50 old tank water and fresh water.
The plec lived quite happily in there for the next three weeks while I completely cleaned and sterilised the 3ft tank and set it up with new filters and lighting and then cycled it without fish using ammonia. Bizarrely, though in a smaller tank the plec grew 2 inches and his colour improved dramatically in the first month after I got him. Once he was settled in the main tank I gave the gravel in the small tank a good vacuuming, made a large water change and kept it cycled with ammonia so I could quarantine new fish in it.
A week ago I visited a local fish supplier and bought 10 neons, 6 zebra danios and 4 swordtails (1 male and 3 female) - all small, young fish. I was concerned at the time as the lad who served me was very rough catching the fish and managed to kill 2 zebras in the process. When we got home, one neon was dead in the bag, and two of the swordtails had red patches/streaks. All were released into the quarantine tank and since then there have been a number of further deaths. Three more neons died in the first 24 hours, then the male swordtail went very red/purple around his head with strong red streaks on his body and died the next day. A day after that I lost one of the female swords. The remaining fish seemed healthy apart from one of the 2 remaing swords who has a large reddish purple sore on her side and red looking gills.
I started treating the water with Melafix, assuming a bacterial skin infection was the problem and over the next few days the sore on the sword seemed to be improving and her gills were less inflamed. This morning, the other female swordtail died (she showed no signs of sickness) so I'm at a loss as to what the problem is, and don't know when it will be safe to move these fish to the main tank.
Currently all 6 neons and all six zebras look fine. The last swordtail still has a sore on her side and gills that look too red, although both have improved considerably since I started adding Melafix. She also seems to keep her dorsal fin flattened, but is eating well and lively. None of the fish are "flashing" so I don't think there are external parasites and I can't see any signs of fungus or white spot on any of them.
Water parameters are identical in both tanks : PH 7.4, KH 7, GH 11, Ammonia 0, Nitrite 0 and Nitrates 12 ppm with temp at 25C. Water changes are carried out when nitrates get to 40ppm.
Can anyone tell me what's wrong and what I can do to put it right?
Thanks
I'm new here and hoping someone may be able to help me with sick fish. I'll be as brief as I can, but a quick hisory may help!
I kept freshwater tropicals many years ago, but since moving about 15 years back haven't had any. Recently a local business my husband visited as part of his work went into liquidation. They had a 3ft tank in reception which had been seriously neglected and there was only one fish remaining - a 6 inch albino plec. My husband was told no-one wanted the tank and that the liquidators deemed it of no value so the plec was destined for the toilet - obviously when I heard that, it meant I had acquired a tank and a plec.
Due to the truly disgusting state of the tank and hood I bought another smaller tank, put some gravel from the original tank in it together with the internal filter from that tank and filled it with 50/50 old tank water and fresh water.
The plec lived quite happily in there for the next three weeks while I completely cleaned and sterilised the 3ft tank and set it up with new filters and lighting and then cycled it without fish using ammonia. Bizarrely, though in a smaller tank the plec grew 2 inches and his colour improved dramatically in the first month after I got him. Once he was settled in the main tank I gave the gravel in the small tank a good vacuuming, made a large water change and kept it cycled with ammonia so I could quarantine new fish in it.
A week ago I visited a local fish supplier and bought 10 neons, 6 zebra danios and 4 swordtails (1 male and 3 female) - all small, young fish. I was concerned at the time as the lad who served me was very rough catching the fish and managed to kill 2 zebras in the process. When we got home, one neon was dead in the bag, and two of the swordtails had red patches/streaks. All were released into the quarantine tank and since then there have been a number of further deaths. Three more neons died in the first 24 hours, then the male swordtail went very red/purple around his head with strong red streaks on his body and died the next day. A day after that I lost one of the female swords. The remaining fish seemed healthy apart from one of the 2 remaing swords who has a large reddish purple sore on her side and red looking gills.
I started treating the water with Melafix, assuming a bacterial skin infection was the problem and over the next few days the sore on the sword seemed to be improving and her gills were less inflamed. This morning, the other female swordtail died (she showed no signs of sickness) so I'm at a loss as to what the problem is, and don't know when it will be safe to move these fish to the main tank.
Currently all 6 neons and all six zebras look fine. The last swordtail still has a sore on her side and gills that look too red, although both have improved considerably since I started adding Melafix. She also seems to keep her dorsal fin flattened, but is eating well and lively. None of the fish are "flashing" so I don't think there are external parasites and I can't see any signs of fungus or white spot on any of them.
Water parameters are identical in both tanks : PH 7.4, KH 7, GH 11, Ammonia 0, Nitrite 0 and Nitrates 12 ppm with temp at 25C. Water changes are carried out when nitrates get to 40ppm.
Can anyone tell me what's wrong and what I can do to put it right?
Thanks
