Not Sure What's Going Wrong In My New Tank

[Amryn]

Hi, I'm new here. I actually decided to join because I'm new to having fish and I'm sure I'll need lots of help. Haha!

Over the past month or so I've been trying to set up a tropical tank with my local pet store's help. The tank is planted and about 25 gallons (it's an old hexagon tank). I ran it for about 2-3 weeks with just the plants (plus things like a heater, air stone, UGF, etc.). The pet shop said that as long as I'd added prime (I had) it was fine to add some fish. I bought 3 guppies and 2 corydoras (panda and peppered). In the first week the little male guppy died, however he had a really badly torn fin which may have contributed. The next week one of the female guppies died. She had been rolling/bumping against the gravel for a while before that. I also noticed that she had a strange thick, slimy film over her body.

Of the remaining 3 fish, the last female guppy and the peppered cory are doing great. The panda cory, however, is starting to act a little weird. It's little tail fin looks a bit torn and there may be signs of fin rot. It also has tiny thread like things on its fins. Hard to describe, I got a good picture of its fins which I can post later.

I suspect a disease may have killed the one guppy, and may be harming this cory. Thing is, I never cycled the tank (The pet store never said I needed to. I regret that now). I got the water tested the other day and everything was great except for the ammonia which was really high. (I'm pretty sure that I was feeding too much) At this point I'm trying to balance treating the fish and setting up the bio filter. I'm now doing a "treatment" of seachem stability.

Sorry about the long and confusing post, I'm just not exactly sure what I'm doing wrong or how to fix it. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Akasha72]

hello and 

 firstly.
 
The thing that jumps out is the ammonia. Ammonia will kill your fish and from what you describe this is what has happened. Corydora's are especially sensitive to ammonia and so this needs to be brought under control.
 
The store has got you into what we call a 'fish in cycle' and these can be really hard work. In order to get the ammonia down you'll need to change water daily - sometimes twice a day. Firstly you'll need your own test kit and I'd recommend the API masterkit - it has everything you will need. You need to keep ammonia and nitrite at zero. 
 
If you head to our beginners section there is a pinned post there which explains fish in cycles more in depth and how to rescue your tank and it's occupants.
 
As a side note, the cories need to be in a group of their own kind. Having one peppered and one panda doesn't work. The peppered cory needs at least 4 more peppered friends and the panda need at least four panda friends - but not right now. We need to rescue the tank from this fish in cycle first 
 
Hope that helps

 

[Byron]

I agree with Akasha that ammonia can have these symptoms, and that may seem likely.  If you have live plants as you say, and in a 25g tank, the five fish added should not create any problem ammonia as the plants will take it up and the nitrifying bacteria will still develop slowly.  [The Stability you now have will help the bacteria, I have used this product without plants and had no issues with just a few fish.]  Of course, having ammonia in the tap water may be contributing.  The Prime will detoxify ammonia permanently, and nitrite and nitrate temporarily.
 
If the Prime detoxified the ammonia, it converted it into harmless ammonium.  Tests for "ammonia" like the API will read ammonia/ammonium as "ammonia," so the ammonium will still appear.  But again with the plants and the Prime, that should not be an issue.  Overfeeding will also create ammonia of course, but this must have been considerable to cause what you describe.
 
It would be helpful to have a test kit like the API Master Combo (liquid tests, not strip) which has ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH.  Test the tap water on its own for all three, and then the tank water.  You also need to know the parameters of your source water (tap presumably).  The GH (general hardness) and pH especially, also the KH (carbonate hardness or Alkalinity).  If you are on municipal water, you might track down their website and find this data, or you can call them.  You just want to know the GH and KH which is not going to significantly change in the aquarium, so you know where you start.  Ammonia/ammonium is also dependent on the pH, so that will tell us something more.
 
The other issue is possibly bad fish.  Guppies these days are notorious for being in poor condition.  Definitely do not acquire any new fish until this is fully resolved.
 
Byron.

 

[Amryn]

Thank you both for your replies! I just finished doing a 25% water change. Hopefully that will help ease the stress a little.

I currently have a nitrate liquid test and a PH liquid test. The nitrates have been below 10ppm. The PH is reading 7.6, however the test says that higher readings will only read to 7.6. The LFS says that this area has very high PH (usually close to 8.0). My water is also from a well.

I've got mainly wisteria and Amazon swords in the tank right now. Oh, and on a side note, I'm pretty sure the guppy is pregnant. If she is, she looks about 2 weeks along.

I was feeding the one guppy one medium-large flake in the morning. The corydoras are fed at night and they were getting 2 wardly shrimp pellets one night and then 2 Hikari sinking wafers the next night. They are both still little (about an inch or smaller).

Again, thank you both so much!

Edit: I don't know if this makes a difference, but I also have seachem root tabs in the tank for the plants.

 

[Byron]

That is not "overfeeding" such as to cause ammonia.  When you say it was "high," did they give you the number?  When taking water to fish stores for tests, always insist they give you the numbers (write them down) as this is very important.  What they consider "high" may or may not be, or things might be even worse, but without the test number we are unable to say.
 
Nitrates are fine...but again, test the source water alone as you need to know if this is nitrate in the well water (which is common, especially in agricultural areas) or occurring within the tank.
 
Once you have the API test (please do get one, this is very worthwhile) all the tests of just the well water (as it comes out of the tap I mean) as well as the water in the aquarium will perhaps show us something, or eliminate things.
 
With Wisteria (very fast growing) and Amazon swords (relatively fast growing), you certainly should not have any ammonia or nitrite from so few fish, so clearly something else is happening here.  Seachem Tabs are not going to be releasing nutrients into the water column; I have been using these for several years, they are very good for swords especially.
 
Is your well water private (only you), or municipal (piped to the community)?  If the latter, the water authority should have the data I mentioned previously; if private, you will need to do the tests.
 
Byron.

 

[Amryn]

I never got the numbers, but I did see the little test tube. It looked green and, when compared to the plastic test card, I'd guess it was between 2 and 4 ppm.

I tested the tap water for nitrates and the amount was about the same as the tank.

I should be at a store that sells the API tests withing the next few days, I'll definitely buy some.

My water is private. Should I get a PH test that goes higher than 7.6?

 

[Byron]

I never got the numbers, but I did see the little test tube. It looked green and, when compared to the plastic test card, I'd guess it was between 2 and 4 ppm.

I tested the tap water for nitrates and the amount was about the same as the tank.

I should be at a store that sells the API tests withing the next few days, I'll definitely buy some.

My water is private. Should I get a PH test that goes higher than 7.6?

 
Yes, given that you believe it likely is.  Our hobby test kits are not scientifically precise, but they are close for our purposes, and the right one will help.
 
The API Master contains ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH (prob basic though), and you have the nitrate and basic pH so it may be less expensive to just get ammonia, nitrite and high pH.
 
If you can get the store to test the GH for you, that will save that kit as you may only do it once.  We need to know; pH is related to GH and KH but the latter are less likely to change.

 

[Munroco]

The API kit I got recently (Freshawater master test kit) has 2 PH test bottles, one for lower and one for higher PH

 

[Amryn]

Good to know! My LFS won't be open for about another hour. I will go right there and then test my water once I'm back home.

Also, can high ammonia cause a swim bladder problem? The one little guppy tends to swim a little tilted to one side.

 

[Byron]

It is usually very difficult to diagnose specific disease/health issues, because many symptoms are common to several issues.  Prevention is much easier, and this starts with the water.  And avoiding stress.

 

[Amryn]

Here are the tests results for ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate:

Test Results: Tank
Ammonia: between 0.25ppm and .50ppm
Nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrate: 5ppm

Test Results: Tap
Ammonia: 0ppm
Nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrate: 5ppm

 

[Byron]

Those numbers are fine.  I don't understand the ammonia in the tank though, but it is a low number.  If you are using Prime as mentioned previously at water changes, it detoxifies the ammonia into ammonium which will still read "ammonia" with the test, but is harmless.  Only use sufficient Prime for the volume of water changed.