Neon Tetra

[alya24]

Hi all,

Having completed my fishless cycling I purchashed my first fish yesterday, 9 neon tetra. All appeared in good health, alert with no swimming abnormalities. I acclimatised them to my tank as per normal and no problems for first day. They all were feeding fine and alert before I went to bed.

I came down this morning to find 3 having swimming problems, I.e. Floating on their sides, unable to orient themselves. A few hours on they are now just lying on the bottom, though still breathing. The remain 6 are showing no signs of ill health. My tank stats are:

pH - 7.2
Ammonia - 0
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - 60ppm (possibly a tad high?)
Temp - 26

Any advice or recommendations as to anything I have done wrong much appreciated? Is there anything I can do to save the 3 or is it too late?

 

[guppi]

How did you introduce them to the new tank.?

 

[anon02]

Neons are known to be fragile especially in new set ups, most experienced fishkeepers recommend that they are only added to mature tanks, with 6 monthe being the generally recommended minimum

 

[Joshwainwright]

How long did it take to transport them from your LFS to your house? Also, were there any temperature changes?

 

[alya24]

It was about 30 mins from LFS to home. I floated the bag they were in in my tank for about 2 hrs then gently netted them into my tank. I did not add the bag water to the tank. The tank there were in at the LFS was at 26 degrees C as is mine. Just noticed a 4th has started having trouble swimming. Remaining 5 still fine.

I even ran an ammonia check on the bag water after thinking they had been in a while, it was <0.25ppm.

This is not fun!

 

[Joshwainwright]

Hmm, I don't know what to suggest.

 

[myrtle]

When acclimatising new fish just floating the bag to adjust to your temp isn't enough, you have to gradually add some water from your tank to the bag to let them adjust to the water parameters. It may be that your lfs keeps their fish in RO or RO mixed water so the pH could have been drastically different as could the mineral content and numerous other dissolved substances that the fish need to adjust to.

 

[alya24]

Good point. I shall try that next time. Apologies for the ignorance but what is RO?

 

[anon02]

R O stands for reverse osmosis, a filtering process that removes most of the minerals and chemicals from tap water, fish that have been reared and kept in ro water or fish caught from pristine waters in the wild can have problems when introduced to tap water conditions especially in you have hard water (a lot of disolved minerals)