pale neons, gulpy gourami

[Briarmoor]

I am in the midst of the cycle from hell with my 10 gallon. The new 55 is no help because it is not cycled either. My poor fish. Just got over Ich and now this.

I was at bad levels on nitrates between 30 and 50 and around 4 on nitrates. Fish seemed fine and were eating well, good color. But I know those levels weren't good. Asked on the board and was told keep changing water, do 50% to get levels down.

I went by LFS and fish guy was not as worried about the levels as me. Said it was part of cycling. Well! I don't want to risk killing my fish if I don't have to. He recommended this stuff called Prime that dechlorinates and also detoxifies nitrite and nitrate, converts ammonia to non-toxic form. I am no chemist, he has fish, so I guess he knows what he is doing. I even measured it out with a clean syringe (I order these to give shots to my dogs and they are individually wrapped, so they are clean and not used for anything else) to be exact for 1 ml for 10 gallon tank as directed. It is supposed to be safe even at double doses.

I do the water change, using room temp water added back over several hours. Tank did drop 1-2 degrees and was creeping back up. A few hours later some fish seem stressed. Neons are pale. Gourami is staying at surface some, sucking air, then going back down to search for any particles of food it might have missed on its last trip around. Corys are running around eating around rocks as usual and otto is doing its job.

I opened the lid to help move oxygen around (covered with screen to keep fish in and cats out). Choice of warming up the water faster or letting out possible gases? from water. The neons finally came out from the log, but some look better than others. The aerator is going and the pump is going. Gourami bumped into some things, not the usual pattern for it. What has happened? What have I done to these fish? On top of it all, the levels are still not that much lower.

Pam in TN

10 gallon - 1 gold gourami (young), 5 Neons (growing), 3 corys (little) 1 otto (little) hopefully not across the Rainbow Bridge for fish by tomorrow

55 gallon - empty, not cycled, future home of the gourami (if it makes it through this)

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

We will need your recent ammonia, nitrate and nitrite stats, stat altering chemicals usually cause more trouble than they are worth and i have a feeling that this chemical you put in to help your water stats has messed up your bacterial cycle- i would do a water right now with proper dechlorinator to try and remove whatever has got into the water as this sounds like a water quality issue as neons go pale when things like this go amiss.

 

[daudy_dojo]

prime isnt your problem its the throwing the fish into an uncycled tank! i learned this the hard way! i use prime and it is the best stuff (seachem saves my life) i was cycling a ten gallon and guess wat?! fish started dying because i chose to put like 200 fish in there (really only like 8 ) but still! the tank was so new i just ugh so yea this is where i am now...i get a tank i cycle it fishless style or with a tad bit of fish! so yea dont blame it on your dechlorinator!


PS its ok to double dose on accident! waist of money but its ok it wont harm them!!


also you are going to need to get another neon seeing how they like to be in a shoal and 2 more ottos seeing how they like to be in pairs and trios!

 

[Briarmoor]

Crisis averted. I left the tank lid open last night, put a towel around it and the temp stayed between 78-80. Neons trooped out from the log this a.m. looking much better. Gourami is fine again, no gulping. What a scare and I think I will stick to the Start Right and if the nitrates go up, just do partial changes each day and try to take care of it that way. I am amazed the neons pulled through as they looked like death warmed over last night. This is way stressful. The fish may make it through the cycle, but I may not. Everyone ate good this a.m. and this evening. I am trying not to add to the waste problem by overfeeding although the gourami is really a pig and grabs the food meant for the neons.

A friend just gave me her old 20 gallon with an undergravel filter and I am going to try to fishless cycle it and see how I do. I will read up on it and probably have ?s in the beginner section if there are parts I don't understand.

Thanks for offering advice on the fish and maybe I can keep them alive through this cycling thing. Does anyone else think it strange that people can keep just about anything alive more than fish, dogs, kids, anything?

Pam in TN

 

[dwarfgourami]

Yeah, I know what you mean, I was never this worried about my babies...
The way I work it out is the needs of different pets (including kids) go along a scale, at one end you've got high attention/high adaptability at the other end low attention/low adaptability to changing circumstances. Dogs need higher attention than cats, but are on the whole more adaptable, easier to take round with them, less fussy about food. Fish are right at the low end of attention but also of adaptability- they have very particular demands as to the quality of their environment (but wouldn't give a toss if you never looked at them as long as they were fed regularly and the water was clear). Kids need all the attention you are ever going to be capable of, but are supremely adaptable to anything else, you can take them anywhere and (if you are strict enough) feed them almost anything.

Congratulations about the new tank. I would definitely go for fishless. I was very nervous about this when I started up, 30 years ago when I last kept fish it hadn't been invented, but the people on the forum took me through it and it worked really well, all my fish are fine and I haven't lost one yet