Im A Novice That Been Misled!

[keevil]

Hi im new to this, im hoping someone can give me advice.Im pretty sure the people working in the aquarium shops near me do not know what they are talking about! i have a 45 gallon tank containing:
1 elliot cichlid about an inch and a half long
5 neon tetras
1 krib 1 inch long
3 peppered catfish
5 mollies
3 flying fox
6 mirror tip tetra
3 rams
3 pencil fish
3 wite cloud minnows
3 platys
1 red claw crab

Im sure this is a bad mix.they all seem very healthy but 1 had 15 neons and 6 minnows but somethings killing them. When i come home from work i find one neon or minnow dead floating around with a hole in the abdomen. I suspect either the crab or the elliot cichlid,which was advertised as peacefull and i can find little to no info on them,apart from on here and they said they are a peacefull fish!
Also is there any cichlids that wont attack small fish?
any advice is greatly appreicated.!.

 

[shelaghfishface]

welcome to our world.. can you return them all ?

 

[bagu]

how long has the tank been set up? has it been cycled? what are your water params?

it also seems overstocked

dont worry well sort you out!

 

[Davo86]

Elliotis are very similar to Firemouths and like so are generally ok with fish of a similar size, however neons, minnows and smaller pencil fish are likely to be eaten or simply killed,

The red crab, which i'm assuming is a sesarma bidens needs brackish water and is overall more of a land crab than an aquatic one and really does best in a tank that as more land than water.

Also once two of the rams pair up you will find that the odd one out will get bullied and will need removed to another tank.

adult Kribs can also become territorial and then the rams could be in trouble

Flying Fox are much like Red tailed sharks in that they don't tolerate their own species when they mature, two need to be rehomed.

However regardless of this if the tank has not been cycled and is a new setup then you will need to rehome most, if not all, temporarily or risk losing them all due to the ongoing cycle

 

[meguro]

Probably want to remove 2 flying foxes, the ellioti and the red claw crab (don't know anything about them). The krib should be ok since it's on its own. Might have to remove 1 of the rams if a pair forms but that might not become a problem in such a large tank.

And I think it's safe to assume you're doing a fish-in cycle. In which case you should be changing 50% water every 2 days minimum for halfway decent survival rates. Don't forget to use dechlorinator and try not to disturb your filter at this point.

 

[keevil]

yes the tank is cycled.and the fish have been slowly added.made the basic mistakes a long time ago.i do a 25% water change once a week.and i use the additives.

 

[Davo86]

sorry just to clarify, was it fishless cycled or fish in cycled and for how long?
Do you have an water stats at hand? ammonia, nitrate, nitrite, ph, temp ?

The stats will give a good indication as to whether the filter is coping with the amount of fish you have,
and if you don't have the stats the first question will give us a basic idea of what the stats might roughly be

 

[bagu]

we need water stats mate to see if any ammonia or nitrites are present =/

 

[shelaghfishface]

incase you dont know what stats are they are the results you get from a test kit that testd for a number of things in your tank water.. 3 being, ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate

you need to go to an LFS and get a API freswater master testing kit.. come back when you read digest n test

 

[keevil]

sorry just to clarify, was it fishless cycled or fish in cycled and for how long?
Do you have an water stats at hand? ammonia, nitrate, nitrite, ph, temp ?

The stats will give a good indication as to whether the filter is coping with the amount of fish you have,
and if you don't have the stats the first question will give us a basic idea of what the stats might roughly be

ph is 6.7,water temp is 78.
i had it running for three weeks then added fish,and they all started dying but a percentage survived.then i waited a coiple of weeks and started adding again.so my tanks been running for three months and nothings died for about a month,they seem healthy. the only thing i added was aquarium salt. thanks for the help everyone

 

[Gill]

Flying Fox are much like Red tailed sharks in that they don't tolerate their own species when they mature, two need to be rehomed.

I am Sorry but where did you get that info from..
Flying Fox's are Very Peaceful and happily live together in groups. I have kept them in a number of tanks in groups of 4+. Even into Maturity they are peaceful.

 

[keevil]

Wow you lot answer fast! i do not have a testing kit but ihad it tested at swallow aquatics a couple of weeks ago and said my water was ok? but i have stopped listening to these people,im sure they dont know what they are talking about. they have so far cost me about 50 quid in dead fish.i also bought a gravel cleaner which i use once a week.and wash that cotton wool stuff once a fourtnight in the water i take out when i do a change.oh also it was a second hand tank and gravel.if that makes any difference.my mate sold it to me cos it kept going green.is it really overstocked? cos i wanted to get a few more fish?

 

[Davo86]

Flying Fox are much like Red tailed sharks in that they don't tolerate their own species when they mature, two need to be rehomed.

I am Sorry but where did you get that info from..
Flying Fox's are Very Peaceful and happily live together in groups. I have kept them in a number of tanks in groups of 4+. Even into Maturity they are peaceful.

Are you sure they're Flying Fox and not either True SAEs or False SAEs ??

My dominant (now only) flying fox terrorised the others he lived with, and even now occassionally starts relentlessly chasing my RTB shark who is terrified of it, I have also experienced this at work where we have had to seperate the larger flying foxs

Wow you lot answer fast! i do not have a testing kit but ihad it tested at swallow aquatics a couple of weeks ago and said my water was ok? but i have stopped listening to these people,im sure they dont know what they are talking about. they have so far cost me about 50 quid in dead fish.i also bought a gravel cleaner which i use once a week.and wash that cotton wool stuff once a fourtnight in the water i take out when i do a change.oh also it was a second hand tank and gravel.if that makes any difference.my mate sold it to me cos it kept going green.is it really overstocked? cos i wanted to get a few more fish?

It is certainly near to full stocking atm, but there are really some species that need rehoming as an elliotti will not live peacefully with neons and similar fish, mine is about 2 inches now and is just starting to act aggressively towards a fe other of my similar sized cichlids.

The best thing to do when you get your water tested is to ask the LFS to write down the exact readings of the results and ask what test kit they are using, then you can repost the results here for us to judge

 

[bagu]

what kind of tank you after?

i think a nice tank with Rams in, with Tetras, corydoras Flying foxes would be great

well overall you have around 70 inches of fish i know the 1" per gallon rule of fish doesnt count when mature but i think its overstocked

you got a picture mate?

if there is no reason for the deaths, take a water sample in, expalin the problem and they should give you a voucher for fishes or replace them =]

 

[keevil]

i know ive gone into this a bit blind, all the advice ive been given is from some old boys i know. what threw me out was i would read books on tropical fish and when i read about some cichlids it would say they are community fish so i thought that ANYTHING community not species only could be mixed.how wrong was i! but to be fair in all the books ive read they do not say DO NOT put cichlids with other smaller fish . im so pi@@ed off!