Hey again.... another fishes death

[EllieTheJellyy]

So another emergency occurred, I haven't put this post in emergencies because I'm sure other people need help more than me. In the time between my last thread and this one I have treated my main tank with the disease safe and done fortnightly 20% water changes.

Now another of my fish has passed. The night before she was swimming fine and eating but as I woke up she was lying at the bottom of the tank. I still had my other tank set up with the filter so I put her in there, I tested the water first. I also did a water test in my main tank and it was good. She was still on the bottom of the tank till about 4pm then I had to go out and came back at 6pm. She was just laying motionless on the ground but would move slightly when I tapped her. She then passed around 8pm.

I will include a picture of her out of water after she passed. It's strange as I cant see any damage to her back and her fins are fine, the last fish had these problems. I wondered if anyone can tell me if they see anything wrong. Also her poop was white.

I would really like to stop this from happening again, I'm down to 3 fish. Is it old age? Or disease? Also I think that's a bit of tissue on her eye from when I turned her over. (I dont like looking at dead things myself but I thought this would be helpful.)

https://gyazo.com/b305c5cfda6d043025e90cbb53ea97c2

 

[Metalhead88]

Is this a new tank? What are your readings ammonia, nitrate, and nitrite?

What size tank? What other fish are in the tank? Have you done anything new recently?

 

[AbbeysDad]

The average tank needs a 50% weekly partial water change or more (and this includes good gravel cleaning and filter maintenance) - 20% every 2 weeks is not enough.

 

[Colin_T]

The fish in the picture appears to have a bacterial infection in the middle of its body (the black area).
It has a clamped tail but that could be the way it is set on the paper.
It has excess mucous on its eye and face.
It looks pretty skinny and has a black edge to its tail and fins.

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How long have you had the fish for?
What is the time frame between fish deaths?
What are the symptoms besides sitting on the bottom of the tank and doing white poop?
How long did she produce white poop for?
Any chance of a picture and short 20 second video of the fish?
If the pictures are too big for the website, set the camera's resolution to its lowest setting and take some more. The lower resolution will make the images smaller and they should fit on this website. Check the pictures on your pc and find a couple that are clear and show the problem, and post them here. Make sure you turn the camera's resolution back up after you have taken the pics otherwise all your pictures will be small.

If the video is too big for this website, post it on YouTube and copy & paste the link here. We can view it at YouTube. If you are using a mobile phone to take the video, have the phone horizontal so the video takes up the entire screen. If you have the phone vertical, you get video in the middle and black on either side.

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Fish do a stringy white poop for several reasons.
1) Internal Bacterial Infections causes the fish to stop eating, swell up like a balloon, breath heavily at surface or near a filter outlet, do stringy white poop, and die within 24-48 hours of showing these symptoms. This cannot normally be cured because massive internal organ failure has already occurred.


2) Internal Protozoan Infections cause the fish to lose weight rapidly (over a week or two), fish continues to eat and swim around but not as much as normal, does stringy white poop. If not treated the fish dies a week or so after these symptoms appear. Metronidazole normally works well for this.

There is a medication (API General Cure) that contains Praziquantel and Metronidazole and might be worth trying.

It's interesting that API and the Californian government have listed Metronidazole as a carcinogen. That's a concern considering it was widely used to treat intestinal infections in people.
Anyway, handle with care, don't inhale the medication, and wash hands with soapy water after treating the fish or working in the tank.


3) Intestinal Worms like tapeworm and threadworms cause the fish to lose weight, continue eating and swimming normally, and do a stringy white poop. Fish can do this for months and not be too badly affected. In some cases, fish with bad worm infestation will actually gain weight and get fat and look like a pregnant guppy. This is due to the huge number of worms inside the fish.

Livebearers like guppies, mollies, swordtails & platies are regularly infected with gill flukes and intestinal worms. If the fish are still eating well, then worms is the most likely cause.

You can use Praziquantel to treat tapeworm and gill flukes. And Levamisole to treat thread/ round worms. If you can't find these medications, look for Flubendazole.

Remove carbon from filters before treatment and increase aeration/ surface turbulence to maximise oxygen levels in the water.

You treat the fish once a week for 4 weeks. The first treatment will kill any worms in the fish. The second, third and forth treatments kill any baby worms that hatch from eggs inside the fish's digestive tract.

You do a 75% water change and complete gravel clean 24-48 hours after treatment. Clean the filter 24 hours after treatment too.

Treat every fish tank in the house at the same time.

Do not use the 2 medications together. If you want to treat both medications in a short space of time, use Praziquantel on day one. Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate on day 2 & 3. Treat the tank with Levamisole on day 4 and do a 75% water change and gravel clean on day 5, 6 & 7 and then start with Praziquantel again on day 8.

The water changes will remove most of the medication so you don't overdose the fish. The gravel cleaning will suck out any worms and eggs that have been expelled by the fish. Repeating the treatment for 3-4 doses at weekly intervals will kill any worms that hatch from eggs. At the end of the treatment you will have healthier fish.

 

[EllieTheJellyy]

The tank is not new I've had it for about 8 months now and the fish a little over a year, I dont know how old she was when I got her. Ammonia is 0, nitrite is 0 and nitrate is 5ppm. My tank is a 19l with 3 platies left now. And I haven't done anything new.

I just followed the advice it gave on the site I bought the disease prevention from.

The time frame is a few weeks, she was showing no other signs and it was very sudden. I dont tend to keep dead fish in my house so I cant get a video.

I assumed that the black mark was a gravid spot, she was pregnant about 10 months ago and I managed to rescue 1 baby which I have noticed that she has that same mark too, my other fish have black markings so it's hard to see if the mark is there.

Sorry I took so long to reply as I had to go to work on a farm so couldn't use my phone.

 

[Colin_T]

I just followed the advice it gave on the site I bought the disease prevention from.

Have you got a link to the information that you used, or what did you do for disease prevention?

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If the fish gave birth 10 months ago but hasn't been pregnant since, then she probably had intestinal worms, which could contribute to them dying but doesn't normally kill them unless they have lots of worms.

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Can you take me through from when she started acting funny (you first noticed she wasn't looking right) to when she died?

When did the first fish die from this problem?

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Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate each day for the next week. This will dilute any disease organisms in the water. Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.

 

[EllieTheJellyy]

Have you got a link to the information that you used, or what did you do for disease prevention?

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If the fish gave birth 10 months ago but hasn't been pregnant since, then she probably had intestinal worms, which could contribute to them dying but doesn't normally kill them unless they have lots of worms.

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Can you take me through from when she started acting funny (you first noticed she wasn't looking right) to when she died?

When did the first fish die from this problem?

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Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate each day for the next week. This will dilute any disease organisms in the water. Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.

I have word processing difficulties so I hope that I read it right. I only treated once with it and I do my water changes monthly as it says on the filter pack but I changed them to more frequently.

https://gyazo.com/da08885964097ec7e7c8eb42a5203407

https://gyazo.com/c6407aa06cb079f76915dca63d7398c3

Timeline of her death
Saturday night 8pm - She was fine and eating normally
Sunday morning 10am - She was swimming close to the floor and hiding in the plants although she did swim up to the top for food
Sunday afternoon 2pm - She was staying on the floor not moving much, I didnt want to risk it so I moved her into the other tank she sank right to the bottom.
Sunday afternoon 4pm - She was motionless at the bottom of the tank but moved when I tapped her.
Sunday night 9pm - She was flat on the floor and had passed.

I have made a thred on my other fishes death but to break it down, she got her tail trapped in the filter, had what looked to be a broken back, I moved her into another tank, she was swimming diagonally, went motionless and then she passed. It was less than a month ago.

Should I do a water change now or treat it straight away? I haven't water changed for a week.

 

[Colin_T]

If the fish was fine and eating well on Saturday night but died on Sunday night, and it had a stringy white poop during that time, then it probably had an internal bacterial infection. This can occur in any fish at any time and unfortunately, there is no cure.

If you lose fish every month or so, and they have exactly the same symptoms, they might have Tuberculosis (fish TB). However, at this stage I will just stay with internal bacterial infection.

I don't think it's TB but just as a precaution you should avoid putting your hands or arms in the tank water if you have any open wounds, cuts, scratches on them. If the fish do have TB and you get contaminated water on your cuts or scratches, you can get a localised infection called a granuloma and this will need anti-biotics to treat. So just avoid putting your hands and arms in the tank if you have any sores on them. And wash your hands and arms with warm soapy water after working in the tank.

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The information on the filter packaging is not very good. If you have a filter that contains pads/ cartridges, you should add some sponge to the filter. You can buy spare sponges for different brands of filter and use a pair of scissors to cut the sponge to fit in your filter. You leave the new sponge and filter cartridge together for 6-8 weeks and then remove the pad and throw it away. The sponge can be squeezed out in a bucket of tank water and re-used. You can add some more sponge after removing the filter pad and this will increase the total amount of filter media.

You can also buy round/ cylindrical sponges for some brands of internal power filter. These cylindrical sponges have a hole through the centre and fit over the intake strainer of most external power filters. The sponge will hold good filter bacteria and prevent small fish or sick fish being sucking into the filter. The sponge can be squeezed out in a bucket of tank water and re-used.

Once the sponges have been in the filter for 6-8 weeks, you can start cleaning it. Established filters should be cleaned at least once a month and every 2 weeks is better.

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Water changes should be done every week. I recommend doing a 75% water change and gravel cleaning the substrate every week. The water changes won't affect the beneficial filter bacteria as long as the new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it is added to the tank.

You do water changes for 2 main reasons.
1) to reduce nutrients like ammonia, nitrite & nitrate.
2) to dilute disease organisms in the water.

Fish live in a soup of microscopic organisms including bacteria, fungus, viruses, protozoans, worms, flukes and various other things that make your skin crawl. Doing a big water change and gravel cleaning the substrate on a regular basis will dilute these organisms and reduce their numbers in the water, thus making it a safer and healthier environment for the fish.

If you do a 25% water change each week you leave behind 75% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 50% water change each week you leave behind 50% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 75% water change each week you leave behind 25% of the bad stuff in the water.

Fish live in their own waste. Their tank and filter is full of fish poop. The water they breath is filtered through fish poop. Cleaning filters, gravel and doing big regular water changes, removes a lot of this poop and makes the environment cleaner and healthier for the fish.

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Right now I would do water changes and gravel clean the substrate every day for at least one week, and monitor the fish after that.

Can you post some pictures of the fish that are in the tank?
They might be showing some symptoms.

 

[EllieTheJellyy]

If the fish was fine and eating well on Saturday night but died on Sunday night, and it had a stringy white poop during that time, then it probably had an internal bacterial infection. This can occur in any fish at any time and unfortunately, there is no cure.

If you lose fish every month or so, and they have exactly the same symptoms, they might have Tuberculosis (fish TB). However, at this stage I will just stay with internal bacterial infection.

I don't think it's TB but just as a precaution you should avoid putting your hands or arms in the tank water if you have any open wounds, cuts, scratches on them. If the fish do have TB and you get contaminated water on your cuts or scratches, you can get a localised infection called a granuloma and this will need anti-biotics to treat. So just avoid putting your hands and arms in the tank if you have any sores on them. And wash your hands and arms with warm soapy water after working in the tank.

-------------------------
The information on the filter packaging is not very good. If you have a filter that contains pads/ cartridges, you should add some sponge to the filter. You can buy spare sponges for different brands of filter and use a pair of scissors to cut the sponge to fit in your filter. You leave the new sponge and filter cartridge together for 6-8 weeks and then remove the pad and throw it away. The sponge can be squeezed out in a bucket of tank water and re-used. You can add some more sponge after removing the filter pad and this will increase the total amount of filter media.

You can also buy round/ cylindrical sponges for some brands of internal power filter. These cylindrical sponges have a hole through the centre and fit over the intake strainer of most external power filters. The sponge will hold good filter bacteria and prevent small fish or sick fish being sucking into the filter. The sponge can be squeezed out in a bucket of tank water and re-used.

Once the sponges have been in the filter for 6-8 weeks, you can start cleaning it. Established filters should be cleaned at least once a month and every 2 weeks is better.

-------------------------
Water changes should be done every week. I recommend doing a 75% water change and gravel cleaning the substrate every week. The water changes won't affect the beneficial filter bacteria as long as the new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it is added to the tank.

You do water changes for 2 main reasons.
1) to reduce nutrients like ammonia, nitrite & nitrate.
2) to dilute disease organisms in the water.

Fish live in a soup of microscopic organisms including bacteria, fungus, viruses, protozoans, worms, flukes and various other things that make your skin crawl. Doing a big water change and gravel cleaning the substrate on a regular basis will dilute these organisms and reduce their numbers in the water, thus making it a safer and healthier environment for the fish.

If you do a 25% water change each week you leave behind 75% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 50% water change each week you leave behind 50% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 75% water change each week you leave behind 25% of the bad stuff in the water.

Fish live in their own waste. Their tank and filter is full of fish poop. The water they breath is filtered through fish poop. Cleaning filters, gravel and doing big regular water changes, removes a lot of this poop and makes the environment cleaner and healthier for the fish.

-------------------------
Right now I would do water changes and gravel clean the substrate every day for at least one week, and monitor the fish after that.

Can you post some pictures of the fish that are in the tank?
They might be showing some symptoms.

I have had to take a video as they are too fast for pictures. I've noticed 2 do a white poop.

I tried to increase the oxygen flow so it's a bit violent right now. I have been putting sponge in the filter to quite it down as it's really loud. Am I okay to leave the filter media in? And the filter cartridge has carbon in so should I take that out?

I also do a 75% water change before I treat the water, correct?

 

[Colin_T]

Yes it's fine to leave the media in the filter for a while. If the water flow is reduced then you can squeeze the filter pad out in a bucket of tank water and re-use it.

The carbon should be removed before you add any medications because it will remove them from the water. You can usually make a small cut in the top of the filter pad and tip the carbon out and throw the carbon away, then re-use the pad.

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One of the platies is unwell and the other two look fine.

I would do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate, and add some salt to the tank. Do the 75% water change and gravel clean every day for a week and add salt each time you do the water change.

You can add rock salt (often sold as aquarium salt), sea salt or swimming pool salt to the aquarium at the dose rate of 2 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres of water.

If you only have livebearers (guppies, platies, swordtails, mollies), goldfish or rainbowfish in the tank you can double that dose rate, so you would add 4 heaped tablespoons per 20 litres.

Keep the salt level like this for at least 2 weeks but no longer than 4 weeks otherwise kidney damage can occur. Kidney damage is more likely to occur in fish from soft water (tetras, Corydoras, angelfish, gouramis, loaches) that are exposed to high levels of salt for an extended period of time, and is not an issue with livebearers, rainbowfish or other salt tolerant species.

The salt will not affect the beneficial filter bacteria but the higher dose rate will affect some plants. The lower dose rate will not affect plants.

After you use salt and the fish have recovered, you do a 10% water change each day for a week using only fresh water that has been dechlorinated. Then do a 20% water change each day for a week. Then you can do bigger water changes after that. This dilutes the salt out of the tank slowly so it doesn't harm the fish.

If you do water changes while using salt, you need to treat the new water with salt before adding it to the tank. This will keep the salt level stable in the tank and minimise stress on the fish.

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Monitor the fish over the next week while they have salt in the water, and if the fish look worse, then post another video.

Don't add any more medication, just use salt and water changes for a week and we will see if it helps.