Rookie With Dying Fish. Need Some Help Here.

[acoe89]

MK

 

[acoe89]

Ran the test tonight.

Ammonia - roughly .25 ppm

pH - roughly 7.6

Nitrite - roughly 2.0 ppm

Nitrate - roughly 20 ppm


Any suggestions, you know, besides daily water changes?

Thanks again to everybody for all your help!

 

[PaBucsFan]

Patience is the key. The Nitrite is high but I'm sure the water changes are helping greatly. With your ammonia being at .25 it appears your water changes and bacteria growth are working. Keep up with the water changes and daily testing!

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

Perhaps it might be easier to catch all the fish including fry and temporarily put them in a fish-only bucket/container (i.e. its never seen bleach or detergents used in the kitchen/bathroom/car etc.) while you do a comprehensive gravel vacuum and gentle rinse of the filter sponges in the extracted tank water...

I'm suggesting you pretty much empty the tank after moving the fish to safety into fresh, de-chlorinated water (they will be fine for 30 mins while you hopefully save their lives).

If those readings are to be believed, that current water is extremely toxic to your fish!

Once you have vacuumed/rinsed/ almost 100% water changed (with de-chlorinatir added to tap water before it goes in tank), do not feed your fish today. Feed them tomorrow, adding food equal to the size of an eye for each fish.

Be prepared to do big water changes (80% or more) twice daily, to remove ammonia and nitrites at all costs!

 

[OldMan47]

Acoe, with nitrites at 2.0 ppm, you need an immediate 90% water change. Your fish may have perked up a bit already but you will be amazed at how much they improve when they have decent water to swim in. The target is to always have ammonia and nitrites below 0.25 ppm. That can require frequent very large water changes if you have very many fish in a tank. As long as you get a decent rough temperature match, the fish will look much better after that water change. Don't forget the dechlorinator and do turn off the filter and heater before you drain a tank that far down.

 

[acoe89]

I did 2 50% changes yesterday and a 75% change today. I plan to keep those up on a daily basis until the ammonia and nitrite levels subside and stay that way. And I have definitely been dechlorinating the water and turning off the filter and heater during changes. Thanks guys!

 

[waterdrop]

Yes, it sounds like the nitrite(NO2) is being a real challange (as it often is) to get all the way down to the 0.25ppm level but that is the number that needs to be the max. You want to find the percentage and frequency of water changes that will have those toxins circling around between zero ppm and the 0.25ppm max. In some fish-in situations that can be quite difficult. Fry are deceptive - even though they are small, they have very high metabolisms and thus produce more ammonia than you'd think!

~~waterdrop~~

 

[crazychris]

Another vote here for the API liquid test kit. Easy to use once you've read the intructions and very accurate. Got mine for £18.99 from a Net seller, garden/fish centre, via Amazon.