Killer fog from Hell!

[wilkinss77]

Messages 6







Can anyone help? The water in my 2' x 12" planted tank has gone foggy like milk has been poured in. It's been a couple of weeks now. At first I thought a bacterial bloom & thought nothing of it. But this isn't harmless-the fish started gasping & some died. It got worse & I lost more fish. Tried an ammonia test with a new Colombo kit- zero.
I've tried:
A complete water change. It got worse.
Replacing the gravel bed, because I thought recent white spot treatment had killed Malayan burrowing snail & poisoned the gravel. Fog temporarily started to clear, but it's back & still killing fish.
What I'd like to know is what it is, what could have caused it & how to remedy it?
The fish are behaving like they're gradually being poisoned or have a gill disease.
At the same time the fog appeared, the tank became plagued by a slimy green film of algae, which my 2 bristlenose plecs won't touch- they usually keep the tank spotless.
I've also tried cleaning the filter sponges in aquarium water.
Temperature is 77-78f.
pH is 7.5.
Ammonia is zero.
This tank has been running successfully for more than 4 years.
I'll try to post a pic tomorrow. Looking really closely, the fog seems to consist of millions of tiny (pinpoint size) white globular particles that the internal filters don't pick up.
Anti flocculant clearing agents don't work either.
Can anyone please help?

 

[Back in the fold]

@Colin_T

 

[MaloK]

What you are describing looks like an acute Old Tank Syndrome that was probably already lingering and the uses of strong medication killed good bacterial and trowed the whole thing out of balance leaving the place to other organism to take place in surely a pretty rich environment based on your description.

At the moment the only thing that you can do to really improve things is to clean the tank and do repetitive large water changes every day until the water chemistry comes back and the haziness regresses.

This should have been seriously addressed from the start. While a small bacterial bloom is pretty safe... At some point it can really deplete the water from oxygen if left out of control.

 

[Colin_T]

Need a picture showing the entire tank with the white cloudy stuff, and a picture of the slimy green algae.
Does the slimy green algae smell musty/ mouldy and wipe off in a film/ sheet?

Before this started, how often do you normally do water changes and how much do you change?
Do you normally gravel clean the substrate when you do a water change?

What sort of filter is on the tank?
Is the filter working properly?
How often do you clean the filter?
How do you clean the filter?

Do you have buckets and hoses specifically for the fish tank?
Has anyone else used these buckets for anything else besides the fish?
Do you wear gloves when working on the tank?
Do you have any moisturiser cream, hand sanitiser residue, soap, oil, grease or anything else on your hands that might have gotten into the tank?

Do you have anything besides gravel as the substrate?
What colour gravel did you have and what colour is the new gravel?
Some coloured gravel (usually blue or red) can cause milky cloudy water and both colours have been known to release chemicals into the water that poison fish. It's uncommon but does happen sometimes due to the paint they apply to the gravel.

What medication did you use to treat the white spot?
If the medication contained copper, that would kill snails and the Malaysian livebearing snails spend most of their time buried in the substrate and could potentially be rotting there. That may have been what triggered the problem but shouldn't be the ongoing cause because you replaced the substrate.

--------------------

If the water goes milky cloudy it's caused by a bacterial bloom, which is usually associated with a new tank and filter (not in this case), or uneaten food or dead organisms rotting, or a filter that has lost most of its beneficial bacteria. The treatment is usually big (75%) daily water changes and gravel cleans until the problem has resolved. The same treatment applies to any time the fish start breathing heavily/ rapidly or gasping at the surface. Or if there is a problem with the water quality (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate). Or if the fish are dying from an unknown cause. Then big daily water changes and gravel cleans help by diluting anything bad in the water and buying you some time to try and figure out what is going on.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the aquarium.

As mentioned by Malok, if it's left untreated, the bacteria can build up in numbers and use up the oxygen, which kills fish, snails, shrimp, etc, in the tank. Low oxygen levels then stop the beneficial filter bacteria from being able to process ammonia and convert it into nitrite and then nitrate. This can allow ammonia and nitrite to build up. You have 0ppm ammonia but I don't see any results for nitrite. This would be worth testing for as well as the ammonia, just to see if there's any there. It would also be good to test the nitrate level. You should also test the tap water for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH, just to make sure they are good.

At this stage it's a matter of doing big daily water changes and gravel cleans and posting some pictures and responses to the questions. Then hopefully we should have more to go on.

 

[wilkinss77]

Need a picture showing the entire tank with the white cloudy stuff, and a picture of the slimy green algae.
1. Does the slimy green algae smell musty/ mouldy and wipe off in a film/ sheet?

2. Before this started, how often do you normally do water changes and how much do you change?
3. Do you normally gravel clean the substrate when you do a water change?

4. What sort of filter is on the tank?
5. Is the filter working properly?
6.How often do you clean the filter?
How do you clean the filter?

7. Do you have buckets and hoses specifically for the fish tank?
8. Has anyone else used these buckets for anything else besides the fish?
9. Do you wear gloves when working on the tank?
10. Do you have any moisturiser cream, hand sanitiser residue, soap, oil, grease or anything else on your hands that might have gotten into the tank?

11. Do you have anything besides gravel as the substrate?
12. What colour gravel did you have and what colour is the new gravel?
Some coloured gravel (usually blue or red) can cause milky cloudy water and both colours have been known to release chemicals into the water that poison fish. It's uncommon but does happen sometimes due to the paint they apply to the gravel.

13. What medication did you use to treat the white spot?
If the medication contained copper, that would kill snails and the Malaysian livebearing snails spend most of their time buried in the substrate and could potentially be rotting there. That may have been what triggered the problem but shouldn't be the ongoing cause because you replaced the substrate.

--------------------

If the water goes milky cloudy it's caused by a bacterial bloom, which is usually associated with a new tank and filter (not in this case), or uneaten food or dead organisms rotting, or a filter that has lost most of its beneficial bacteria. The treatment is usually big (75%) daily water changes and gravel cleans until the problem has resolved. The same treatment applies to any time the fish start breathing heavily/ rapidly or gasping at the surface. Or if there is a problem with the water quality (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate). Or if the fish are dying from an unknown cause. Then big daily water changes and gravel cleans help by diluting anything bad in the water and buying you some time to try and figure out what is going on.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the aquarium.

As mentioned by Malok, if it's left untreated, the bacteria can build up in numbers and use up the oxygen, which kills fish, snails, shrimp, etc, in the tank. Low oxygen levels then stop the beneficial filter bacteria from being able to process ammonia and convert it into nitrite and then nitrate. This can allow ammonia and nitrite to build up. You have 0ppm ammonia but I don't see any results for nitrite. This would be worth testing for as well as the ammonia, just to see if there's any there. It would also be good to test the nitrate level. You should also test the tap water for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH, just to make sure they are good.

At this stage it's a matter of doing big daily water changes and gravel cleans and posting some pictures and responses to the questions. Then hopefully we should have more to go on.

1. No, & no. It dissolves into dust when wiped off.
2. Once a week, 25%.
3. Yes, areas of the gravel not obstructed by plant growth.
4. Internal sponge filter.
5. Yes, it seems to work fine.
6. Once week with the water changes, using water from the tank.
7. Yes.
8. No, only me & only for the tank.
9. No.
10. No, I wash my hands first.
11. Originally a 2 layered substrate- aquarium plant compost on the bottom, a gravel divider & then honey sand (a very fine light brown aquarium gravel) on top. This has been perfectly ok for the past 4 years.
12. It's now a fine grade natural aquarium gravel. No dyes or artificial colours.
13. Treatment was Waterlife Protozin.
I always use a chlorine/chloromine dechorinator.

 

[Colin_T]

Everything you are doing is fine so just post some pictures when you can and keep doing big daily water changes until we can figure this out.

 

[GaryE]

You seem to do everything right.

Try taking a clear container and filling it from the tap. Could you have a problem with the mains? I know that here, we get a yearly flushing of the mains. The goal is remove build up in the pipes and one year, it turned a tank white and wiped it out when I wasn't vigilant in a water change. But that's done overnight and clears quickly.

Still, it cant be ruled out with having a look into it. It isn't likely, but.

Other than that, I'd stick with Colin's advice.