Fish Dying

[Fraoch]

Ive recently finished a fishless cycle and decided to add quite alot of my population at once since the filter was supposed to be able to handle it. I went to my LFS on Sunday and bought 12 harlequins, 10 cardinals and 3 glass cats(all they had in stock). I also added 2 black neons and 3 more harlequins the day before. I acclimatised them for over half an hour slowly adding drips of the tank water. Yesterday i found 1 cardinals dead so i went to check the stats and the ammonia had shot up to 0.5 So i did a 50% WC and ammonia dropped back to 0. Later that evening i found another cardinal with lack of colour, breathing really rapidly(mouth constantly wide open) and unable to swim well. I then seperated it to a small tub and blacked it out to try and reduce stress but it died in a couple of hours.
This morning i got up and checked the tank again, 2 cardinals dead, 1 missing, 1 sufferin from syptoms andd a glass cat missing.
I now have 3 healthy looking cardinals, all harlequins look very happy and active and the 2 glass cats are active and happy. Is it the stress thats killing the cardinals and what happened to my 3rd glass cat?

forgot to say the tanks 240liters and 1 of the cardinals that died had a whitish/orange spot on the top of its head and the one thats suffering righht now has a crooked spine towards its tail end and the colouring has gone weird at the base of its tail

 

[the_lock_man]

How long between finishing the cycle and adding fish?

 

[Fraoch]

How long between finishing the cycle and adding fish?

finshed the cycle on saturday did a 100% WC or as close to then added fish that night, bought fish the next day and added them pretty much 24hrs after first fish

 

[the_lock_man]

Sounds like you've done everything right. How much ammonia were you adding to the tank during the qualifying week, in terms of ml, rather than ppm?

The only other possibility is that the acclimatisation may have been a little on the quick side, I normally take an hour or more - 20 minutes to get the temp matched, then another 45mins or more dripping in the tank water. In your case, it would depend on the difference in water chemistry (pH, GH, KH) between your water and the LFS water. If you had very similar water, then 30 mins would have been fine. If the chemistry was vastly different, then perhaps 30mins wasn't enough, and it's shock that's killed the cardinals.

 

[Fraoch]

i was dosing about 11mls ammonia and the ammonia and nitrite were back to 0 after 12hrs.
It could have been the shock with them being added too quickly but they were so stressed in the bag i thought they were going to die before they even got into the tank so i was probably too quick. Im really not sure how much difference there was in the water but im not going to buy fish from them again. Every fish i have bought from them, at least one has something wrong with it so im going to find some better quality somewhere next time

Is there anyway to try and reduce the stress on he fish so no more die?

 

[the_lock_man]

Yes, that does sound like shock, then.

Turning off the tank lights will help with reducing stress, and acclimatising for longer, with more additions of tank water will help to reduce the shock from different water chemistry.

 

[Fraoch]

Yes, that does sound like shock, then.

Turning off the tank lights will help with reducing stress, and acclimatising for longer, with more additions of tank water will help to reduce the shock from different water chemistry.

ok thank you

 

[Tizer]

Did you get carried away feeding your new fishies? I know its extremely tempting to give them a treat when they are placed into a new tank but you should really hold off for 24-48 hours, leaving the lights off. Stressed out fish can produce more ammonia than normal, especially if they have full bellies. Its quite important to check your water stats for a good week or more after you add fish. Its something people tend to forget to do once a fishelss cycle is complete. Gluck! Cardinals are notoriously bad in newly cycled tanks, not something i would have added for another 2-3 months really. Fish keeping can be a cruel learning curve but we have all been there!

 

[Fraoch]

Did you get carried away feeding your new fishies? I know its extremely tempting to give them a treat when they are placed into a new tank but you should really hold off for 24-48 hours, leaving the lights off. Stressed out fish can produce more ammonia than normal, especially if they have full bellies. Its quite important to check your water stats for a good week or more after you add fish. Its something people tend to forget to do once a fishelss cycle is complete. Gluck! Cardinals are notoriously bad in newly cycled tanks, not something i would have added for another 2-3 months really. Fish keeping can be a cruel learning curve but we have all been there!

ohh, i fed them some frozen brine shrimp the night i got them...guess i wont be doing that again! ive been checking the stats twice a day since adding them and will do untill it all settles. I thought cardinals were only weak in fish-in cycles, my bad

One of the cardinals, the one i said was suffering but not dead yet, i think has more than just stress. Ive had to seperate it into a plastic tub cause its spine is really crooked and at its tail end its gone white and its tail looks like its been cut or has bloody veins twisted through it or something, it does not look good

 

[Tizer]

Did you get carried away feeding your new fishies? I know its extremely tempting to give them a treat when they are placed into a new tank but you should really hold off for 24-48 hours, leaving the lights off. Stressed out fish can produce more ammonia than normal, especially if they have full bellies. Its quite important to check your water stats for a good week or more after you add fish. Its something people tend to forget to do once a fishelss cycle is complete. Gluck! Cardinals are notoriously bad in newly cycled tanks, not something i would have added for another 2-3 months really. Fish keeping can be a cruel learning curve but we have all been there!

ohh, i fed them some frozen brine shrimp the night i got them...guess i wont be doing that again! ive been checking the stats twice a day since adding them and will do untill it all settles. I thought cardinals were only weak in fish-in cycles, my bad

One of the cardinals, the one i said was suffering but not dead yet, i think has more than just stress. Ive had to seperate it into a plastic tub cause its spine is really crooked and at its tail end its gone white and its tail looks like its been cut or has bloody veins twisted through it or something, it does not look good

I'd probably wack it on the head

 

[Fraoch]

ahh suppose so humane way at all?
i used to put doomed fish in the freezer but ive heard that hurts them

 

[Tizer]

Your call really, i like to bite the heads off of mine.

 

[stu40]

Your call really, i like to bite the heads off of mine.

careful.that's a can of worms i hear being opened.
not everyone 'gets' your sense of humour

 

[Tizer]

Your call really, i like to bite the heads off of mine.

careful.that's a can of worms i hear being opened.
not everyone 'gets' your sense of humour

yeah true

Fish lovers everywhere will be up in arms!

I actually just chop their heads off in the same way i might prepare fish for dinner.

Oh noes!

 

[Mowbz]

Your call really, i like to bite the heads off of mine.

careful.that's a can of worms i hear being opened.
not everyone 'gets' your sense of humour

I do, these random posts crack me up!