Fresh Water Turns Yellow

[Luvmygeetars]

Hi, I am recent convert to tropicals after having kept a community tank of mainly cichlids for nearly 6 years. Recently our large Parallelus went nuts and killed nearly all the other fish within 2 nights. We decided to try tropicals as our our local aquarium said they were more placid. We restocked our 220L tank with tropicals and everything has been going well for the last month or so until I decided to do a regular water change on Wednesday night. I added the same chemicals I always do, but when I came out on Thursday morning, the tank had a very obvious yellow tinge to it. The fish were all fine though. I did another larger water change this morning, which included cleaning both filters and by tonite the water colour is starting to change to yellow again. The fish are all fine though. I'm wondering what the problem is with the water. Any ideas would be much appreciated.

My tank and community are as follows
220L
Fish
3 Marble Angels
4 Halfback Angels
3 Pakastani Loaches
3 Clown Loaches
2 Spotted Catfish
2 Green Algae Eaters
3 Siamese Algae Eaters
1 Yellow Gourami

All the fish are relatively small as they are new.

Filtration
1 x 3 cannister in-tank sponge filter
1 x Eheim external filter (complete tank filtration in 3 hours)

Water Treatment
Prime chlorine remover
PH Neutral Powder

Plastic plants only
1 large piece of driftwood (6 years old)

I've read numerous articles on the net about overstocking, too much bacteria, too high nitrates. I'm not sure where to start.

FYI, our water is a normal clear colour. It's not like rusty pipes could be causing it.

The fish are all perfectly happy, I just want to know why the water is yellow.

Thanks very much.

Brad

 

[soybean]

PH Neutral Powder

Any particular reason you're messing with it? Fish will adapt to a wide range of phs. A swinging ph will cause them more issues in the long run than adapting to one a bit higher or lower than 'preferred'.

That might be the cause of the yellow...never used ph alterers myself tho, so maybe not.

And I know you didn't ask about stocking, but your tank isn't big enough for all those fish. Especially not the clown loaches, they get very large indeed and need to be in larger numbers. This could be contributing to poor water quality if your filters can't cope.

Test kit readings?

 

[Luvmygeetars]

PH Neutral Powder

Any particular reason you're messing with it? Fish will adapt to a wide range of phs. A swinging ph will cause them more issues in the long run than adapting to one a bit higher or lower than 'preferred'.

That might be the cause of the yellow...never used ph alterers myself tho, so maybe not.

And I know you didn't ask about stocking, but your tank isn't big enough for all those fish. Especially not with the clown loaches, they get very large indeed and need to be in larger numbers. This could be contributing to poor water quality if your filters can't cope.

Thanks for the reply. I was doing a water change cos I was told when I first stared keeping fish way back when, that you should change 1/3 of their water every 3-4 weeks.

I was thinking it might be a stock problem, but when I purchased the fish I did tell the aquarium people how big my tank was. They said it should be fine. I'm wondering now if it was just so they could make a bigger sale.

Thanks for your reply

 

[soybean]

You need to do water changes once a week.

And yes, sadly, many fish store staff will sell anything to anyone, sometimes to get more sales, sometimes through simply their own lack of knowledge.
Do you have a test kit for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and ph?

 

[hanny93]

Not doing enough water changes for a start, should be 20% every wekk to two weeks.

I'd say that yellow tinge is tannins from the bogwood you have in there. Completely harmless to all fish, and is beneficial to some.

 

[soybean]

I'd say that yellow tinge is tannins from the bogwood you have in there. Completely harmless to all fish, and is beneficial to some.

Possible, but unlikely if it's 6 years old. Has it always been in use, OP?

 

[Luvmygeetars]

You need to do water changes once a week.

And yes, sadly, many fish store staff will sell anything to anyone, sometimes to get more sales, sometimes through simply their own lack of knowledge.
Do you have a test kit for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and ph?

Only have a PH test kit and it is sitting pretty much bang on 7.

 

[soybean]

I don't think you're going to solve this overnight.

1) massively overstocked with inappropriate fish
2) too few waterchanges bring done
3) I suspect your filters aren't cycled and you'll need a test kit to find out. Api master kit is reasonably priced on eBay.

 

[Luvmygeetars]

I'd say that yellow tinge is tannins from the bogwood you have in there. Completely harmless to all fish, and is beneficial to some.

Possible, but unlikely if it's 6 years old. Has it always been in use, OP?

The driftwood has been in the tanks since day 1, when I started with Cichlids, but I never had the yellow water problem in six years. I'm just wondering if I've hit some kind of limit in terms of bacteria and waste in the tank. I do have a large Eheim external filter that my brother says is overkill for my tank, but I'm wondering if there's too much "gunk" sitting under the gravel now from having too many fish in there

 

[soybean]

Rarely such a thing as filtration overkill and with stock like that you need it.

Do you do gravel vacs? Do it once a week when changing water, the filter doesn't remove all the gunk for you.

 

[coldcazzie]

When you change your water, clean your tank and clean your filter what exactly do you do? As much detail as possible

 

[Luvmygeetars]

Thanks for all the replies.

Ok, so firstly, when I clean my filters, I only ever clean them with siphoned water from the tank. I squeeze the sponges from the internal cannister filters until there is no gunk. With the external filter, same thing - siphoned water only. Squeeze out the big sponge filter, rinse the little white bits of filter media and replace the top layer of filter wool.

The fish are all still fine, but I took a sample in today to be tested. So, they agreed the sample had a yellowish tinge, but the tests couldn't tell them anything
Ammonia levels were fine. PH was perfect. Nitrates were fine. they even ran a test for food and waste levels, which was fine.

I asked them about stock levels and they said I was right on the limit, but definitely no more. Their only suggestions were remove the driftwood and try some carbon filter media in the Eheim.

I'm going to take the old driftwood out and do another water change and see what happens.

Thanx for all your help

 

[RadaR]

they even ran a test for food and waste levels, which was fine.

What the...? Huh?

Ammonia, nitrite, nitrate. Indicators of the waste level in the tank.
Although nitrate test kits are inaccurate so not really worth paying attention to.

Yellow water points towards humic acids (which are fine) and decayed/ing organic matter (which is not ok).

 

[Mowbz]

Ammonia levels were fine. PH was perfect. Nitrates were fine. they even ran a test for food and waste levels, which was fine.

A what test? A food and waste level? I need this....

Anyone else ever heard of these? lol

Based on that alone, i think that's enough proof your fish store is quite probably knowingly deceiving you.

 

[soybean]

When you say they told you your test levels were 'fine', did they offer/did you ask for the exact readings? 'Fine' = 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite. Nitrate is easily controlled by water changes, and ph doesn't need to be messed with. So I would be interested in the exact readings. Incidentally, if they're using test strips, theses can be extremely inaccurate and can't pick up trace readings in the same way a liquid test can. I really think you need to buy your own liqiud test kit and find these readings out for yourself.

A test for food and waste level doesn't exist. I think what he meant by this is an ammonia test, as these two things produce ammonia. Again, the only result you want is 0.

I don't believe your 6 year old bogwood is causing a yellow tinge. I think you have an overstocked (way beyond the limit), dirty, quite possibly uncycled tank, brought about by too infrequent water changes, and little (or no?) gravel vacs.

Here's what I've picked up from some LFS. If they don't know the answer, they'll make it up. If they think they can convince you to buy something to solve a problem, they will. If you ask if you can fit anymore fish in you tank, you'll rarely hear "no". If your fish die and you get your water tested, they'll say it's fine, and you'll buy some more.

It's why so many people post on here with problems with clown loaches, angels, common plecs, various types of shark, oscars, and in turn mysterious deaths, illnesses, poor water quality, etc etc. Bad advice from the LFS is so often at the root cause.

The difference here is no one is trying to sell you anything and the only benefit for giving help and advice is knowing someone is taking better care of their fish. So please listen when I say, again: You are hugely overstocked for that size tank, and you need to improve your tank maintenance regime to see results.

I hope this helps.