First Death In New Tank

[gunman]

Last weekend I moved up from a 160l tank to a 210l tank. I moved from an internal to external filter (fluval 4plus to fluval 305). I used the mature media in the new filter to seed it.

Last night I found my fist dead fish, a dwarf gourami. It seemed to be stuck to the filter out-take. I'm not sure wht happened it but I did notice it was hanging about at the top corner of the tank for a couple of days before.

I have tested the water and got:

ammonia 0ppm
nitrite 0ppm
nitrate 25ppm

So it seems like the new filter is doing the job OK. Question is, should I be worried about the other fish? They all look health, swimming freely and no fin damage etc.

 

[the biffster]

what did you test your water with
was it with test strips or liquid

 

[gunman]

ammonia - Liquid, nitrate and nitrite - test strips.

I know the next statement - 'you need to use liquid', which is fine, but I haven't got liquid tests for nitrate and nitrite at the moment.

 

[elisew]

ammonia - Liquid, nitrate and nitrite - test strips.

I know the next statement - 'you need to use liquid', which is fine, but I haven't got liquid tests for nitrate and nitrite at the moment.

You`re right, you do need to be using the liquid test for testing your water, obviously the cost of such tests comes into it at times but I would advise you to get yourself the API Mater test kit as soon as you can. The test strips are very unreliable and you could find your levels are actually much higher than your test strips are showing.

Anyway, I have always been led to believe that if a fish doesn`t have the strength to swim away from a filter then it`s likely to be because it`s poorly anyway
It may well have been the stress of being moved, it may just have already been a bit poorly. There are any number of reasons why but you could drive yourself daft if you keep looking for reasons. Personally I think it`s just a case of keeping an eye on the other fish and put losing this gourami down to experience