platy

[newbie hob]

hello to all;

i have a 30ltr tank with two platy's and some 30 fry in an unmatured tank (two weeks old), with some plastic ornaments and one real plant (moneywort), two filters, no air pump, and some brown color algea at the bottom on the shells. I use potable drinking water and add 5ml of dechlorinator plus conditioner, water temp is constant 28 C.

two days ago both the platy's spent all of the time on the top or hiding, i did a 10% water change and added 1/4 tsp salt, yesterday morning the male platy was dead, i did another 10% water change, however the fry and the mother are still staying on the top, the female platy spins around the tank pecking the sides of the tank.

Can someone tell me if this is normal?? or there might be something wrong??

Thanks

 

[Angel Lady]

What is your water readings? Like nitrites, ammonia, nitrates, ph if you do not have these testing kits I would strongly recommend that you buy them. It sounds to me like high ammonia which is normal for a two week old tank. I would recommend that you do daily water changes of around 10 percent or so. This will keep your fish alive during the rest of your cycle. Please post the readings so We can see if this is what is going on with your fish.

 

[newbie hob]

thank you angel lady for your reply.

I just got my self the nitrite and nitrate test kits, i will give you the reading very soon, however i could not get the amonia test kit ( a couple of the stores that i went to didnt have them, i was told they are hard to find here in the UAE.

rgds

 

[Def]

Your platys are very unhappy. Depending on what they are doing, it may be that there's not enough oxygen in the water. Is the surface being rippled? If your filters are doing the rippling, slide the output up to max asap for 24hours and see if that helps. If they aren't rippling the surface, get an airstone or powerhead etc.

 

[appleblossom]

or move the filters up in the tank so that the outlet is just poking out of the surface of the water....

 

[newbie hob]

thanks every one for your feed back,
okay now this is what i did, i got an air pump ( jeez noisy ) i changed the whole filter from a 360 ltr/hr into a new 400 ltr/h, the reason is when i put the unit up a little it stopped running every one is happy and playing now joyfuly for the past couple of a days.

as far as the nitrit reading was 0,025mg/l and nitrat was @ 0mg/l.