Should I Be Worried?

[nigsy]

Hi all,
As the title says I have lost 2 fish within 24hrs of each other and am a bit concerned.
I have a mature setup and have not lost a fish in nearly 6 months. Yesterday morning all fish were present and correct for feeding, but about an hour later one of my rasboras (harlequins) was belly up (slightly distended) floating in the current dead. I'm thinking maybe constipation, not sure.
This morning I notice one of my Leopard Danios is having trouble staying upright, it's now 9 am and he's gone, I'm guessing swim bladder.
I have made no changes to the tank recently and have not added any fish for at least 12 weeks, some neon tetras.

Do you think the 2 are unconnected and it's just coincidence that they have gone to the great aquarium in the sky close together or might there be an underlying problem that I should be aware of?

Stats for tank etc below:

260l Fluval
Artificial plants/ with fine gravel floor, rocks and mangrove root.

Stock (after the deaths):

4 shrimps
4 Albino corys
2 Harlequins
4 leopard danios
10 neon tetras
5 white tip tetras
5 phantom tetras

Water stats:

PH 7.2
Nitrate 0
Nitrite 0
Amonia 0

I have run the test this morning after removing the Danio. Last 10% water change on Saturday.

 

[Athena]

Hi - just a couple of quick questions - did you use liquid test kit or strips to test your water? Just that it's a bit unusual to have 0 nitrates.

Also, have you fed your fish anything different in the last few days? Any live foods that maybe weren't sterilised?

Athena

 

[nigsy]

Hi - just a couple of quick questions - did you use liquid test kit or strips to test your water? Just that it's a bit unusual to have 0 nitrates.

Also, have you fed your fish anything different in the last few days? Any live foods that maybe weren't sterilised?

Athena

Nothing different I alternate between frozen tropical mix and flake.
I use liquid test kit. Everyone picks up on the nitrate thing, it always shows low values, should I be worried about that??

 

[mwood2]

as far as I know most Nitrate tests need the instruction to be followed closely since the results are sometimes not accurate if not followed exactly. Reason being is that after almost a week without a water change the nitrite bacteria will produce enough nitrate to show up in a test. Only time you wouldn't see it would be in a cycle but since you have no ammonia or nitrite I would just guess your nitrate test was just inaccurate.

 

[saz326]

Only time you wouldn't see it would be in a cycle but since you have no ammonia or nitrite I would just guess your nitrate test was just inaccurate.

second that.

Is the test kit very old? Would think the chemicals would oxidise and change over time.

Sorry to hear they have both popped off so quickly to each other. Any chance ther has been any fighting in the tank?

 

[nigsy]

Ok, redone the Nitrate test and is now reading slightly lighter than 5ppm so I'm thinking that's spot on.
Must not have shaked the test tube hard enough this morning!!

Only time you wouldn't see it would be in a cycle but since you have no ammonia or nitrite I would just guess your nitrate test was just inaccurate.

second that.

Is the test kit very old? Would think the chemicals would oxidise and change over time.

Sorry to hear they have both popped off so quickly to each other. Any chance ther has been any fighting in the tank?

Thanks,
No more "fighting" than usual, Danios are high spirited anyway, so hard to tell if there fighting or not, they usually get short shrift from the other fish and then move on.
The harlequins are very placid and spend most of the time shoaled together in the current from the filter outlet.

The test kit is about 9 months old.

I'm thinking it was one of those things, just a coincedence.

 

[mwood2]

Nitrate usually isn't the problem due to it needs to be above 20ppm to make a difference but hold long have you had each of the fish that have been lost? Have they been purchased in the last few weeks? Did there bodies show any odd signs then usual? White spots, etc. From what I can tell it may just be bad luck.

Oh and does each fish's diet vary between live foods and flakes and are you able to tell if any of your fish have not gotten enough food?

 

[benmate]

you should be ok dont panic

 

[Schmill]

As said above, NitrAte usually isn't a problem, but with regards to the test make sure you shake the reagent bottles REALLY hard, (I bang the bottom of the bottle against my other hand), as I found that one of the bottles has a nasty habit of seperating and being thick in the bottom of the bottle

 

[nigsy]

Cheers all,

I'm putting this one down to bad luck/coincedence.
I will give it a couple of weeks to settle down then introduce some more harlequins just to bring there numbers back up.