Emergency

[thad1]

Hi All,

First post so be gentle!

I bought my first tank a few months ago, it's a 60 litre one and so far all has been o.k.

For the last 4 months I have had 4 male Guppies, 2 platys, 2 corys without any problems at all!

Anyway to cut a long story short I noticed this morning two of the guppies were missing! Having found them both, one was on the bottom of the tank dead and the other one appeared to be dead on the leaf of a plant, having nudged the 2nd one he sprang into life and started swimming round the tank again. I have been watching them closely and noticed the one that was on the plant this morning is having trouble swimming and when he stops for a rest his tail starts to sink and he looks like he is going to go upside down!

The platies seem ok but are spending a lot of time on the top of the tank near the surface as are the guppies, the cories are hiding on the bottom fo the tank and not very active, one of the guppies is flicking his body on the plants like he has some sort of skin irritation, they are also spening a lot of time under the waterfall where the water comes back in the tank!

I also have 8 or 9 platy fry that are about 6 weeks old that all seem fine.

I have inspected the dead fish and can find no sign of violence or ich but he did have a couple of black spots on his tail.

I have tested the water and cannot find any sign of elevated nitrates etc but its only a basic 6 in 1 kit, having said this the readings are the same as they allways have been and have not chnaged in the 4 motnhs I have had the tank.

I am very concerned that i am going to lose all the fish as none of them seem very happy!

I have not added anything to the tank recently, the only thing I have done is quite a big water change (roughly 30%) a couple of days ago and gave the gravel a more thorough clean than usual!

Apart from that I cannot think of anything else I have dont to creat this problem!

I am on standby waiting to see what advice I get so i can rectify the situation as soon as possible!

Any help would be greatly appreciated!!

Thad

 

[Wills]

Hi welcome to the forum, sounds like a bit of a pickle. Right first thing - how long ago was it since you added anything to the tank? Even plants and or decor?

The other thing to focus on is the water change - I wouldnt really call 30% a large water change so Im just wondering what your regular water change regime is like normally? If water changes slip and the water quality goes down the fish that live in that water usually adapt - so long as its just like high nitrate not ammonia or nitrite. So what Im saying is if the nitrate rises and then plumets if say its 6 or so weeks between water changes the drop can sometimes shock them.

The other thing to check is to make sure you added dechlorinator? If not that could have bumped your cycle slightly and the rise in ammonia and nitrite have not been detected by the strip tests?

The 6 in 1 strip kits are okay ish but quite unreliable - if you can maybe get an API test kit we can rule some of the above out?

Wills

 

[thad1]

Hi welcome to the forum, sounds like a bit of a pickle. Right first thing - how long ago was it since you added anything to the tank? Even plants and or decor?

The other thing to focus on is the water change - I wouldnt really call 30% a large water change so Im just wondering what your regular water change regime is like normally? If water changes slip and the water quality goes down the fish that live in that water usually adapt - so long as its just like high nitrate not ammonia or nitrite. So what Im saying is if the nitrate rises and then plumets if say its 6 or so weeks between water changes the drop can sometimes shock them.

The other thing to check is to make sure you added dechlorinator? If not that could have bumped your cycle slightly and the rise in ammonia and nitrite have not been detected by the strip tests?

The 6 in 1 strip kits are okay ish but quite unreliable - if you can maybe get an API test kit we can rule some of the above out?

Wills

Hi Wills,

Thanks for your reply.

OK to clarify I do water changes every other week of about 25% 40% ( not enough?)

I added a couple of plants a month ago but no fish or anything else.

I allways dechlorinator the water before adding it.

I have just done a 50% water chnage and they look slightly more perky but I could be imagining it!

Thad