Please Help! ;'(

[-FighterFishh]

After all of my neon tetras killing each other, I only have one left. Why would they be doing this? I didn't think neons were aggressive..But it isn't him that's the problem.

I have a yellow platy, and she's active and swimming about, but she has a large bite out of her tail. A small area around the cut looks a bit like it's infected, but the cut must have been done over the last six hours, so would it be able to develop over that time?
Also, my baby wagtail platy is sulking around the bottom. I can only see a little of her, but she doesn't seem to be infected with anything, just sulking, but it's really worrying me.

All fish had food this morning, and were all swimming about normally. Ammonia is pretty high and nitrate is a little high too. Right now I'm going to a waterchange and I'm recharging a pad which sucks out all the nasties in the water. Could the higher levels of ammonia and nitrate be making my baby fish sulky? And make my older one even more prone to infection?
If my older fish doesn't look better by tomorrow, we're going to put a new filter cartridge in which helps with fungus and get a little medicine.
Is there anything else I can do in the meanwhile?
Thank you!

 

[lilfishie]

any ammonia is fatal to fish, you need to do a water change immediately a big one.
i am thinking with you haveing ammonia your tank is not cycled?

 

[-FighterFishh]

any ammonia is fatal to fish, you need to do a water change immediately a big one.
i am thinking with you haveing ammonia your tank is not cycled?

I've just done a large water change, and we cleaned out the filter. Turned out it had a tiny baby sword in it, dead
We also sucked out the crap from underneath the filter and mum thinks she's just found a dead tetra.
The ammonia has gone down already

This tank is around 9 months old, actually. I can't work out why the ammonia is so high

 

[lilfishie]

oh i was expecting it to be a new tank

anyway how exactly are you cleaning the filter out?

 

[-FighterFishh]

oh i was expecting it to be a new tank

anyway how exactly are you cleaning the filter out?

With the siphon. It's taking some water out which we're replacing with further new, so we've changed about 20L [2/3] of the old water.
My baby platy's dorsal fin is up and down, so I'm hoping it's worked.
The nitrate and ammonia levels have gone down significantly, and I'm hoping they'll go down even more once I put the newly charged pad in.
I'll get some more accurate tests soon, but for now I just have the dip ones. I'll get hold of some liquid ones soon

 

[jacko32]

sounds like your changing your filter media too much which is causing your tank to be in an endless cycle

 

[-FighterFishh]

sounds like your changing your filter media too much which is causing your tank to be in an endless cycle

Noo, I haven't touched the media in all the months the tank has been set up. I have a biOrb, and underneath the bubbletube and the filter cartridge there was lots of rubbish so me and my mum cleaned it out

 

[lilfishie]

sounds like your changing your filter media too much which is causing your tank to be in an endless cycle

thats what i was thinking too.

that gunk would certainly send your ammonia levels up

 

[-FighterFishh]

sounds like your changing your filter media too much which is causing your tank to be in an endless cycle

thats what i was thinking too.

that gunk would certainly send your ammonia levels up

I don't change the filter cartridge that often, every 6 weeks ish, and when it looks dirty we just squeeze it out.
We never touch the special pebbles at the very bottom of the tank which actually came with the biorb, since they help with all the biological filtration

The baby is looking a lot better, her dorsal fin is still up, though she has a small rip in it. I think the last tetra might of been attacking her. I'm thinking of taking him out soon, since I don't want him to kill the two tiny baby swords.