I'm Way Overstocked!

[ZanDPY]

So around Christmas my father gave me a 10 gallon aquarium. Being the newbie that I am; I went fish crazy and seriously overstocked the tank. I am kicking myself for doing so now.

Brace yourself it's gonna get ugly:

3 Sunburst Wag Platys
5 Neon Tetras
2 Black Kuli Loaches
2 Mystery Snails
1 Pearlscale Goldfish (Captain Ahab)

My tank has a stock "hung on back" Marineland 10 gallon filter. And currently has 2 Java Ferns and 5 stalks of Hydrophila. As soon as
I about had a heart attack the other day when I finally got an ammonia testing kit. ( It's an API liquid test kit.)

8 ppm
not 0.08 or 0.80
8 and a ph of nearly 7.6!
I have been doing 30-40% water changes for 4 days and bumped feeding back to every other day.
Now the reading is down to 1 and .50 ppm and the the ph is between 7 and 6.8.
Not going to stop the water changes obviously.

I'll go out and buy the Nitrite and Nitrate tests as soon as I can (this weekend at the latest)

Captain Ahab is about to get his own (at least 20 gallon) tank. The snails will be moved in with him since they're good sturdy janitors that he can't eat.


But once he's out of the 10 gallon who else should I rehome? They'd be going to a friend of mine who has plenty of room for them.

 

[dcarmor927]

i would for sure say the loaches...they not only like to be kept in larger groups but need alot of swimming space...maybe the neons too, i dont know if they have enough room in there...maybe someone else knows...good luck, glad you are taking care of the fish now

 

[bordercollie05]

So around Christmas my father gave me a 10 gallon aquarium. Being the newbie that I am; I went fish crazy and seriously overstocked the tank. I am kicking myself for doing so now.

Brace yourself it's gonna get ugly:

3 Sunburst Wag Platys
5 Neon Tetras
2 Black Kuli Loaches
2 Mystery Snails
1 Pearlscale Goldfish (Captain Ahab)

My tank has a stock "hung on back" Marineland 10 gallon filter. And currently has 2 Java Ferns and 5 stalks of Hydrophila. As soon as
I about had a heart attack the other day when I finally got an ammonia testing kit. ( It's an API liquid test kit.)

8 ppm
not 0.08 or 0.80
8 and a ph of nearly 7.6!
I have been doing 30-40% water changes for 4 days and bumped feeding back to every other day.
Now the reading is down to 1 and .50 ppm and the the ph is between 7 and 6.8.
Not going to stop the water changes obviously.

I'll go out and buy the Nitrite and Nitrate tests as soon as I can (this weekend at the latest)

Captain Ahab is about to get his own (at least 20 gallon) tank. The snails will be moved in with him since they're good sturdy janitors that he can't eat.


But once he's out of the 10 gallon who else should I rehome? They'd be going to a friend of mine who has plenty of room for them.

Honestly, I'd think about rehoming them all and doing a fishless cycle. But the goldfish has got to go. It's coldwater and the rest are tropical. Then probably the tetras. The tetras will by very sensative to the water problems and you'll likely be saving their lives by rehoming them. If you must do a fish in cycle keep the platies. I don't know how hardy the Kuhli loaches are, but I think recommended tank size for them is 30 gallons. Could be wrong on that. If you're not sure about what a fishless or fish-in cycle is, check the pinned topics in the newbie section. They explain both very well. Good luck! Hope you get all worked out so you can enjoy your fishies!

Laura

 

[Miss Wiggle]

yes the goldie has to go, tropical and coldwater fish don't mix well.

after that the platys and neon's would make a full stocking for that tank so the kuhlies should go.

but i agree with the above that the best thing to do would be to return all the fish and do a fishless cycle. there's a link in my signature which explains this process and another one called 'whats cycling' which will help you understand it a bit more if you've not got your head around it all yet.

 

[waterdrop]

Yes, agree with above..

I forget whether the goldfish experts say the single goldfish needs 20 or 30G but once people hear that they usually re-double their efforts to rehome it to someone's pond or back to the store or something, not wanting to dedicate a whole huge tank to a goldfish usually.

Until you figure out what's going to happen with the other fish (and I agree with above comments about that) you will still need to attempt to lessen the permanent damage happening currently to their gills and nervous systems. Now by the time you read this you may have already managed to get that ammonia reading down near zero, if so then good, but at the time I'm reading this your post is still saying ammonia might be at 0.50ppm or 1.0ppm. If so, that is still dangerously high, causing gill damage for most of these species.

To remedy that, its helpful to understand two things. Recommendations for 30% or 40% water changes are for when things are normal and the tank is cycled. Whenever ammonia or nitrite(NO2) is higher than 0.25ppm, its better to consider it an emergency situation and perform much larger water changes. Changes of 50% or 70% are in order in these situations. Now when you move to these larger percentages, it helps to wait an hour before another change if the lower test level has not yet been attained. Its also relatively safer with these large ones to be sure to dose the conditioner fully or even 1.5 times the recommended dose and also to be sure to roughly temperature-match with your hand.

~~waterdrop~~