Mouth Fungus Again!

[ICEEGRL]

This tank is about to drive me crazy!!!!
I finally got it cycled a few months ago. Everything was going fine. I got my last remaining mollies well (3), and everything was going fine. Now I am getting nitrite and nitrate spikes that I can't figure out. I have started doing daily water changes (30%) to try to keep it under control, up to 50% when it is really high. That seemed to be working, and the nitrites are staying under 1 now.
Today I came home and they have mouth fungus starting. I checked my water, and not only is the nitrites still up, but now my pH and KH are droping! I can not figure out what is going on in this tank. My small tanks cycled and are still fine, but this tank just will not cooperate!!!!!!
My stats are all over the place! I will post what they are now, but they keep changing.

29 gal. tank with whisper 30/60 power filter (double bin with 2 carbon inserts and 2 bio foam) It has a areo 2 air pump with bio foam inside tank, marbles, 5 bulb plants, sea shells, 1 ceramic cave, and fake plants. I am not sure what the heater is. It is old and all the stuff is worn off.

temp is 80 f.
ammonia 0
nitrites between .5 & 1.0 (up & down)
nitrates are about 20
GH 75
KH was 130 now 100
pH was 7.8 now 6.8

There is nothing new in the tank. Nothing at all different.
I can not figure this out. What could be causing this?

I have moved the 3 adult mollies to the 10 gal. with the fry and danio to be treated with them. I also have two maybe ottos that my sister sent me today.(another story) Now my hospital tank is overstocked!
Any way, the only fish in the in the 29 gal. is 1 cory and 1 pleco(waiting to be rehomed) I have really got to find the problem before it kills all my fish! Every time I think I have this tank right... it shows me I am oh so wrong!

PLEASE HELP!
I am getting desperate.

 

[Tolak]

That's not a real big drop in hardness, but a big pH drop. Swings in pH are common with a cycle, or in your case, a mini cycle. Try testing your tap water. Leave it in a bucket with an air stone for 24 hours. With the changing seasons sometimes water companies change what they add to the water, more chlorine, chloramine, & buffers is common. Much of this depends on where your water originates. If it's a surface water source, foul weather usually means a period of increased additives to tap water.

This is a regular occurrence for my water supply, Lake Michigan. I can get by with plain sodium thiosulfate that I mix myself during the summer when there is predominantly fair weather. After a strong rain with the accompanying runoff, as well as the lake being churned up, I double dose replacement water with Prime.

Many times I can smell the increased chlorine in my water supply when I run the water to get it up to tank temperature after bad weather, I should really get a chlorine test kit to double check my nose. The last few days have had strong winds here; the water smells like a swimming pool.

It may be a case of your usual dose of dechlorinator only partially doing the job, leaving some chloramine behind that is damaging your bio filtration, or leaving more ammonia behind from splitting chloramine into it's components, chlorine & ammonia. Your bio filtration may be having a hard time dealing with the increased ammonia.

I would start with double dosing with Prime. It's hard to overdose with it; I've used 4 times the dose in hatching tanks when the water is crummy. Another thing to look into is any aerosol cleaners that have been recently used that may contain some sort of anti-bacterial component. These are being used more & more in cleaners, air fresheners, hand soaps, and probably more that I am unaware of.

 

[ICEEGRL]

Thank you!
I ordered some (alot) of stuff this morning, but I won't have it until the end of the week. All I have is stress coat and amquel plus right now. will one of them be ok using more than directions say?

 

[Tolak]

http/www.novalek.com/korgd28.htm

Sounds similar to Prime, except weaker. 1 ml of Prime is reccomended for 10 gallons of water. It also mentions nothing about heavy metals, the usual additive for this is EDTA, which Prime has. It can't hurt to try it.

 

[ICEEGRL]

You told me about prime in another post the other day when the spikes started. I ordered some. I am just waiting for it to get here. I also ordered sponge filters for all my tanks to help keep the good bacteria in my tank. I also ordered more foam for my filter. I am trying to get as many places for it to grow as possible.