I Still Need Ur Help Urgently

[rahina]

Hi All
I am a new fish tank owner I have bought a tank, left the water for three days, added the gravel, the filter and the live plant and left it for three days extra then I added six guppies.; two males and four females
this was last Tuesday. the problem is they did not eat food, flakes and dried worms except Friday's morning. they ate finally . one of my friends said that this might me because of the change of the tank and the fish might be feeding on the live plants. I saw one of the females doing so but what about the others?
On thursday one of the females died . she made some hysterical mobes before her death. I noticed something strange as well one of the males seemed shy and hid within the gravel. was it because the other male was dominating and wanted the females for himself? Well! guess what? the other "bold" male died on Friday . I found him lying dead at the bottom although he seemed lively and suffered no problem since I bought him
I have read about the nitrogen cycle. I figured that my tank hasn't cycled yet although my plants seem great. they are not considered a symbol to show that the tank has cycled. now I have decided to buy no more fish before two weeks and do the tank maintenance regularly. I think it is very important to buy the test kit although it won't be easy to find it.
Wish me luck and I highly welcome all your advice

 

[donna123]

hi
sorry to hear that your guppys died, yes testing kits are a must imo while you are cycling,
have you decided how you are to cycle your tank yet? just leaving it to stand wont do anything to it, you will need to decide if you are doing a fishless cycle in which case you will need some pure ammonia, there is a pinned topic on this, or cycle with fish, guppys are not hardy enough for this as you found out the hard way,
its good you have live plants , good luck with what you decide to do, always post any questions you may have, there will always be a friendly reply,all the best donna .

 

[achalagal]

You neednt have kept the tank idle for 3 days 1 day is more than enough. By adding Anti Chlorine you could add them on the same day as well (Anti chlorine is used to negate the chlorine effect of the water.) Guppies need Sodium Chloride (Salt) thus you need to add some salt (for a 3*1*1ft tank requires 30grams of salt) Salt is essential for guppies and they do not survive for long without it.

If you need any help or have any queries please contact me achalagal@yahoo.com

 

[dwarfgourami]

Salt is essential for guppies and they do not survive for long without it.

Not, it is not and yes they do. They are not brackish fish. They do prefer hard alkaline water, but as long as yours is not totally soft and acid, this will not be your problem. Healthy guppies should do fine without salt; the important thing is that the water is clean= no ammonia or nitrites.

The problem, as you yourself realise, is more likely to be ammonia and/or nitrites in the water because of the cycling process. So you need to test for these two (testkits can be bought in lfs or ordered online) and dilute the water with partial water changes (dechlorinated), if necessary once a day until the readings are at 0.

Too late to take donna's advice about the fishless cycle as you still have surviving guppies, if I've understood you right- so you are not in a position to add ammonia.

Incidentally, you might want to take achalagal's advice and add a little salt, not because this is something that guppies have to have all the time, but because it can actually help to counteract the effects of nitrite poisoning.

 

[donna123]

hi,
sorry i wasnt sure you had any fish left, is it possable to take the fish back or put them in a friends mature tank? then you could do a fishless cycle, as i said before guppy are not hardy enough to take the high ammonia and nitrite while your tank is cycling. if you have no where to take the guppys do keep a very close eye on them and the water quality, again good luck with what ever you decide to do.all the best donna

 

[rahina]

Today Saturday I found two more dead fish. only two females left and I doubt one of them is pregnant. I did not take this nitrogen cycle seriously at first in fact five years ago when I had my first tank I knew nothing about it
yet still I want change my plan I determined to have a healthy fish tank so I will wait this time and be patient for the cycle to continue
WISH ME LUCK

 

[sylvia]

What size tank do you have?

Can you return the remaining guppies? They'll die otherwise.

Don't add any more fish. You are correct, your tank hasn't cycled - and that's why your fish are dying. I don't know how much of the 'cycle' you are familiar with but basicaly:

Fish produce waste (so does rotting food/rotting leaves etc which is why it's crucial to feed very little - but twice or so a day - and gravel vacuum when possible). The waste contains ammonia. Ammonia is deadly and should be 0 when you're keeping fish. Good bacteria grow in the tank - mainly in the gravel and in your filter's media (which is why you shouldn't rinse the media directly under the tank as chlorine in tap water kills these bacteria - not to mention it's why you MUST use de-chlorinated water when doing water changes so buy a water conditioner from your fish store if you don't have one already). Anyway, the good bacteria change the ammonia to nitrIte. This is still deadly and the nitrIte tends to appear at its highest around the 3rd week of the cycle as it takes a while for enough bacteria to colonise the tank. At this point, the ammonia begins to drop. Another type of good bacteria then grows in your tank. Again, these live in your filter media and gravel (note that none live in the water - this is a common miscoception). These bacteria change the nitrIte to nitrAte. This is the final stage in the cycle. NitrAte is relatively far less harmful and can be in your tank up to a concentration of 40ppm (buy a liquid-based test kit ASAP!) without concequence to most species. However, you need to try to keep it under 20ppm - which you do by doing a weekly 25% water change with de-chlorinated water.

What I suggest for the time being is water changes - continuously to reduce ammonia levels. Don't even cosnider adding more fish for at least another month and a half - the cycle may even take longer than that while you have fish in the tank.

Alternatively, return your remaining guppies to your LFS (but don't expect a refund). Also, in future, be aware that LFSs rarely, if ever, give any useful advice So always take theirs with a grain of salt - it's far better to research things on your own on the net and ask questions here.

Anyway, if you return the fish, you can then continue cycling fishless. This takes far less time and you need not worry about doing water changes (which helps speed the process up a bit). Just add a pinch of fish food every couple of days. This'll rot and give off ammonia - just like the fish did. You can 'watch' the cycle progress using your test kit. Once ammonia and nitrIte have been reduced to 0, the cycle is complete. It should take far less than the 1-2 months you'd expect from cycling with fish - sometimes even as little as two weeks.

At this point, continue adding the fishfood. Stop only on the day you've decided to add your first fish. Now you need to do a big water change to reduce the nitrAte levels as they're probably sky-high. Make shure you change about 90% of the water with de-chlorinated tap water and also do a gravel vacuum to get rid of any leftover rotting food. Now go get a group of 3 or so small fish. If you add too many at once, you might disrupt the cycle - especialy now that it's still quite 'fragile'. Monitor the water quality. If all's well, you can add some more fish the following week.

Do you know what kinds of fish you want? Again, this depend son your tank's size but guppies may not be ideal. Besides being short-lived and as of recently, quite fragile, when you keep them in mixed groups they breed rapidly and can quickly over-stock the tank.

About stocking - there's a general guideline you can use to help you choose fish - basicaly, you need to have about 1" of adult fish per gallon. Note that this points to ADULT sizes - ie: a female guppy counts for about 1.5-2" and therefore counts for 1.5-2 gallons. The size at purchase is irrelevant

Obviously, with this guideline, you don't consider aggression levels or territoriality or schooling behaviour etc. For those you just need to research very carefuly and ask lots of questions (here - not at your LFS ).

Anyway, right now, don't worry about stocking - concentrate on getting through the cycle with as few casualties as possible. Read the links in my signature - they may be useful to you. Good luck!

 

[rahina]

Thanks Sylvia for your reply and great advice. I was greatly happy when I read it. As for my tank it is 16 gallon. I really appreciate your help and comprehensive elaboration

 

[rahina]

One more important question which bothers me is that I learnt that I have to change the fish tank water totally every six months and partially every week after the total water change do I have to leave the tank fishless to do its nitrogen cycle and just add live plants and fish food and check the percentages daily then introduce the fish after the cycle is completed??? is that it?

 

[sylvia]

Like I said, the water doesn't contain any of the good bacteria so a complete water change should have no effect on your cycle as long as you don't keep the tank empty for too long and the filter media/gravel doesn't dry out. HOWEVER, you DON'T need to change the water fully - not ever. You DO, however, have to change the water (about 25%) partialy every week - but that shouldn't psoe any problems as logn as you sue a water conditioner to de-chlorinate your tap water before adding it to the tank