Problems With Barbs

[seb_negrete]

Not sure how basic a question this is but I figured that since i'm new to this stuff, this was the right place to post it anyways...

K, I have a 10 gallon tank set up almost a month ago. Each week, I have progressively been adding fish so that I now have 2 dwarf gouramis (aka colisas, i believe), 4 zebra danios, and now 4 tiger barbs.

my problem is that i keep having to replace my barbs. I have had all three albino barbs that i have bought (on 2 separate occasions) die on me. the first one i bought died as soon as I put him into my tank. the second died 2 days after i had put him in my tank, and the 3rd died 5 days after.

when i first tested my water (about 2 weeks ago) my ammonia level was 0, but my pH, nitrite, and water hardness were all high. i tested a week later after doing a couple of 20% water changes and treating the water a bit and my nitrite level was down to 0 and the pH was down to 7.4. as far as I know, these are pretty good numbers.

so basically, I'm just confused as to why i keep losing fish. the others that i have seem active and happy, with the exception of one of the barbs that i have left who goes through periods of inactivity and even floating with his nose down (which i hear is typically a bad sign for barbs). are albino tiger barbs normally a hard species to keep??

any help would be greatly appreciated.

p.s. I should perhaps mention that all of the albino barbs i have gotten were from the same place and were quite small (<1/2")

 

[WILDER]

Sorry but you have made alot of mistakes, for a start none of those fish are hardy enough for a cycle, you should start a cycle off with only a few hardy fish, then you don't add any more fish to the cycle is completed.
Gouramis are very sensitive to water quality, the danio, tiger barbs should be in a 20gal as they are very active fish.

 

[Deano]

Yep i agree

You need to wait until your tank has completed the cycling stages before adding the more delicate species

Dont add any more fish to your tank until you have finished cycling

I kno i hated this when i first had my tank as i couldnt wait to fill it with fish!

But it is worth the wait in the end as you will lose less (if any) fish


Good luck!

 

[seb_negrete]

I definately wasn't planning on adding any more fish anyways but is there anything i should do in the meantime to try and be sure not to lose the ones i have left? like i said, the other species in the tank seem to be doing fine.

at what point is the cycling finished? i guess i need to read up a lot more about the cycling process. like i said, i took the fact that there was no nitrite or ammonia as the green light to add a couple more fish... guess that was my first mistake

 

[seb_negrete]

lost another barb today. this time it was one that i have had for a couple of weeks
i would really like to know if there is anything i can do about this.

my question still remains: are these generally considered sensitive fish? if they are, i would feel more at ease about it.

i have tested my water several times in the last week and the ammonia and nitrite levels are always 0.

sorry to be so insistent here but i just really want to know what's going on.

 

[RedShark]

I'll help ya.

First off: "2 dwarf gouramis (aka colisas, i believe), 4 zebra danios, and now 4 tiger barbs" <<<<<< WAY too many fish for a 10gal tank. It doesnt matter how big the fish are now, what matters is how big they will soon be. You have to give them room to grow seb. Rule of thumb to go by is atleast 1 inch of fish for every gallon you have.

Secondly: What kind of test kits are you working with? Are they test strips you simply dip in water and wait few secs, or are they the master kits with glass viles and chemical solutions. This will determine how accurate your test results will be.

Thirdly: IMO, return your fish from where ever you got them from and get store credit or whatever. Start from scratch, meaning take down your aquarium, water, gravel and decorations and start all over again.
A crash and burn can be detrimental to ones esteem when you first start out with this hobby. I dont mean to burden or overwhelm you but if i were you i would do a bunch of research before seting up any kind of aquarium. Start with the fish, what kinds do you like and what ones can you afford? Next find out all you can about them. This sight has a phenominal fish index that tells you everything you need to know about ALMOST every fish out there. Life expectancy, characteristics, different size tank requiremints and even breeding habits and all that. READ, ead, read. This will help you make informed decisions about whatever way you chose to go from there. Trust me, managing an aquarium is SOO rewarding when you put that little extra effort into it. Plus you'll never be scrambling looking for advice or feeling helpless. We've all been there before. Especially me, I've been in your shoes m8.
Please ask for anything whenever you need it, goodluck.

 

[seb_negrete]

thanks to everyone who tried to help out.
i'm not going to start all over again but it wouldn't be a bad idea. the reasons i'm not doing it are that the place i got my fish from has a no return policy and i've haven't been able to find anywhere that sells ammonia around here so i don't know how i would do a fishless cycle. my cycle is basically done as far as i understand it so it's just unfortunate that I did it with the fish that I did but i'm just going to try to move on from here.
i'm not replacing the lost fish because i agree that the tank was overstocked. i just hope that the 2 barbs i have left don't get too aggressive now by virtue of not being in a school (if they survive that is).
i agree that i was hopelessly uninformed and misinformed but i'm trying my best now and doing tons of research on this site and others.

 

[dwarfgourami]

thanks to everyone who tried to help out.
i'm not going to start all over again but it wouldn't be a bad idea. the reasons i'm not doing it are that the place i got my fish from has a no return policy and i've haven't been able to find anywhere that sells ammonia around here so i don't know how i would do a fishless cycle. my cycle is basically done as far as i understand it so it's just unfortunate that I did it with the fish that I did but i'm just going to try to move on from here.
i'm not replacing the lost fish because i agree that the tank was overstocked. i just hope that the 2 barbs i have left don't get too aggressive now by virtue of not being in a school (if they survive that is).
i agree that i was hopelessly uninformed and misinformed but i'm trying my best now and doing tons of research on this site and others.

A shame you had such a rocky start to the hobby; hope things sort themselves out. It's happened to a lot of us.

If the barbs start making themselves a nuisance as they grow up, maybe you could find another forum member who'd be able to take them off your hands. Keep a close eye anyway, as tiger barbs are notorious fin nippers and dwarf gouramis are quite easily stressed.

 

[helenesansome]

also sounds as though you need to look around your aera for some more aquatic shops, ect and garden centres, a good place for looking this up is yell.com, type in aquatics, and then your aera, then you can go and have a nosey round, ask some questions ect, see how clean/state teh shops are in, and there policy, a no retuns policy is not good.