New Tank Disaster

[Me²]

Hello

Hoping someone can help shed some light on a new tank problem I have had. Let me begin.

I have had a 30 litre cold water biorb for the last 27 months in which i have been keeping 6 white cloud mountain minnows. I never had any problem with this tank apart from 2 of my minnows swimming in the filter which I think is a design problem with this tank. When the second of these minnows did this I decided it was time for a change so I went out and bought a new tank and this is where my problems really began.

I now have a 64 litre bow front tank. My thinking was to transfer my old tank into the new, add a heater and keep a variety of different fish.

I bought my new tank on Tuesday, along with some gravel a couple of new ornaments and some bogwood. I cleaned everything with just cold water and soaked the bogwood. That evening I put the gravel, ornaments and bogwood into the tank. And filled the tank about half full using conditioned tap water (I have always used Tetra Aquasafe) and then added a further 8 litres from my biorb. I set up the filter, set that away and added some interpet filter start. I then left the tank 24 hours until Wednesday evening.

Wednesday evening I took another 8 litres of water from the biorb and topped up with conditioned tap water. I tansfered my two moss balls and a large clump of java moss into the new tank. I also transfered about a dozen small pebbles and three biorb colour balls (which look lovely on black gravel). I measured the water temperature in both tanks and when it was the same I transfered my four remaining minnows. (just before I did this they had fed). Initially I had no concerns as they seemed happy enough checking out their new enviroment.

Thursday morning, the fish seemed to be very withdrawn spending most of the time hiding, this continued thoughout the day and evening. I was a little concerned that one of the minnows did not seem to be swimming normally (seemed very lazy). I put a small amount of food into the tank and although they ate it they did not do it with there usual enthusiasm. I also added a little more filter start as per recommendation on bottle.

Friday morning and no change in the behaviour of the minnows, Friday evening when I got home from work one of the minnows was at the bottom of the tank dead. I tested the water and even though I could not see any problems with the readings I did a 50% water change anyway. I did not feed the fish today.

Today (Saturday) I have got in from work to see my remaining minnows have gone to fishy heaven. Again I have performed a water test and found no unusual readings.

The water test results were the same on both Friday and Saturday.
Ammonia 0
CL2 0
PH 6.8
KH 6
Gh 4
NO2 0
NO3 0

These results are in line with I used to get with my old biorb tank. I am a little perplexed by what has happened and simply do not understand it. Any help and guidance from here would be greatly appreciated. The really annoying thing here is that I bought a new tank so the minnows would not get eaten by the biorb filter, 4 days later they are all dead.

 

[Harlequins]

Sorry for your loss

Did you acclimatise the fish before you added them to their new tank?

Stats look right for a newly set up tank,would have been better to add the mature media from the biorb,has you now have a filter that needs to be cycled ...

 

[Newbie_87]

Sorry to hear about your loss

Firstly, it sounds like your using strip tests (correct me if I'm wrong)? If you are, I'd strongly advise getting a liquid testing kit -API freshwater master test kit is far more accurate.

I'm thinking the deaths will have been caused by the new tank not being cycled. You say you transferred water from the biorb but did you swap any filter media?? This could be an opportunity to start afresh with fishless cycling. Sure someone else will chip in with more advice

Remember, we all make mistakes it's how we learn!

 

[MHunt]

Yeah, unfortunately by not adding mature filter media to the filter in the new tank you've put your fish into a tank with an un-cycled filter. Unfortunately the water which you transferred while at a chemistry the fish are used to holds little to no beneficial bacteria, it's really the bio-film' that build up on the surfaces of the filter media that does the work of making the water safe for the fish.

I would suggest doing a fish-less cycle before replacing your fish. It's frustrating when you think you're doing the right thing by your fish and it all goes wrong. I did a similar thing with some cory's by putting them in an un-cycled tank as a quarantine tank to protect the rest of my fish. Suffice to say the fish were dead within 24 hours.

 

[Gvilleguy]

I'm sorry you lost your fish. I'm a little confused as to the cause of death. If the uncycled filter was the cause of death, wouldn't we see elevated levels of ammonia in the water? The uncycled filter would have become a problem eventually, but I would expect her test results to show it (unless the strip tests are not accurate, like someone said).

 

[Me²]

Answers to some of the questions.

I have a nutrafin liquid test for the ammonia, test strips for the rest.

No I did not use any media from the Biorb, I made an assumption that the items I transfered across and with the interpet filter start that would be enough to get things rolling.

No I did not acclimatise the fish, again I just assumed that the measuring the temperature as the same in both tanks would be good enough.

Okay then, I will look into a fish less cycle now. What do you recommend with the tank now, is it worth stripping it down washing and starting again before the fishless cycle?

 

[Harlequins]

Unfortunately it sounds has though its a mixture of a new tank and not acclimatising them into the new tank which lead to their sad demise...

Adding fish from a old established tank to a different new set up was probably to much of a shock to them.

 

[AdultMaleChicago]

I'm sorry you lost your fish. I'm a little confused as to the cause of death. If the uncycled filter was the cause of death, wouldn't we see elevated levels of ammonia in the water? The uncycled filter would have become a problem eventually, but I would expect her test results to show it (unless the strip tests are not accurate, like someone said).

This was exactly my thinking. If the tank hasn't been cycled (and it doesn't seem like it has) then why does the water chemistry look OK? Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

 

[Harlequins]

Test stripes are highly inaccurate,whereas the op had strips for the others but had liquid test for ammonia...