Stupid Heaters...dodgy Ones Anyway :(

[fishlette]

please read:
Help!!!

i posted this is tropical chat originally but i feel it has become a bit of an emergency of sorts. ive lost 5 fish already due to this and my kuhli loaches and other tetras are looking worse for wear. what should i do? i have a spare tank but its not set up and is really way too small even for a short time. i turned the heater off about an hour ago and the temp went down a few points but then went back up to more than it was and now it seems to be REALLY SLOWLY cooling down. is there anything i can do? im beside myself with worry that everyone is going to die

 

[dane261]

looks like your thermostat in your heater is broke your best bet is to get back to where you bought it and exchange it ive had this problem before luckly i had a spare heater on hand as for keep adding cold water wont do your fish any good with the temp fluctuating up and down this will cause stress then eventually die

cheers dane

 

[fishlette]

looks like your thermostat in your heater is broke your best bet is to get back to where you bought it and exchange it ive had this problem before luckly i had a spare heater on hand as for keep adding cold water wont do your fish any good with the temp fluctuating up and down this will cause stress then eventually die

cheers dane

i know and thats why i was doing it slowly. basically the fish are dying right now. although fluctuating temp is bad i thought slowly adding new cool water would help. the way i saw it was i scooped out my panda cory and put him in my 3ft with the livebearers and their temp is 26.5C. he perked up and is doing well now. so if he can come straight out of that into the other temp and be fine, then slowly adding water only slightly cooler than the 3ft tank should be ok. i dunno...im clutching at straws here just got my first batch of bristlenose fry and im worried they are going to die too. putting together the breeder net for them as we speak so i can put them in the 3ft.

 

[WILDER]

Wrap the tank up in a blanket till you can get a new heater.
Turn room temp up.
Don't touch or add water to the tank it will just stress the fish more, let the temp go down.
Watch out for swim bladder, columnaris, and whitespot.
Good luck.

 

[fishlette]

Wrap the tank up in a blanket till you can get a new heater.
Turn room temp up.
Don't touch or add water to the tank it will just stress the fish more, let the temp go down.
Watch out for swim bladder, columnaris, and whitespot.
Good luck.

during the day it is still quite warm here so i should be ok until i get home from work later this arvo. being the tropics even coming into winter the days are warm but the nights are pretty cold. during the day i rarelyt see the light on indicating that the heater is doing anything so im confident it will be ok. its taken 3 hours for it to drop to 29.7C so im guessing that when i get home it should be normal. pity i have had to lose 17 fish in the meantime plus 3 baby bn's. they only came out of there home for the first time today

should i treat with something?? available i have melafix, salt, stress coat and a broad spectrum antibiotic. or should i just wait and see if i see any signs of disease. would like to get a jump on it if i could

 

[WILDER]

No don't treat just yet keep a close eye on them.
Good luck.

 

[for_my_fish]

keep the heater out if its causing problems. IMHO its better to just do your best to let the tank cool down slowly. Cover the tank with blanket to retain some of the heat overnight. Its better for the fish to endure a gradual cooldown than constant increases and decreases in temp.

And replace the heater as soon as you can (but you knew that already!). Once you have replaced the heater, bring the tmep up to normal very slowly (over a couple of days - depending how cool its got). Good luck with it.

 

[fishlette]

well temps returned to normal...heater is replaced (not that i have had to turn it on yet) and all fishies are well. i ended up losing 39 of my fish which is quite a substantial amount of my community. the survivors were the corys, the bn's, the kuhli loaches, gouramis, bettas, BBG's, some of my larger tetras (i lost most of them), 2 of my ghost catfish, my blue rams (one died) and my bolivian butterflies. this should be a lesson to everyone...new heaters should be tested somewhere where no fish are present. even if its just in the bathroom/laundry/kitchen sink. i did that with the new one. i filled the sink and put the heater in and turned it on. i put the digital thermometer with the probe in the sink and left it overnight. this morning its working well and the temp is good so im happy to put it in the tank now.

poor fishies

 

[WILDER]

Thats alot of fish R.I.P.
Surprised thought it would be the bottom dwellers more at risk.
Did any fish have a bent spine as electric shocks can cause fish deaths.

 

[fishlette]

No don't treat just yet keep a close eye on them.
Good luck.

what do i need to be watching for the most?

 

[WILDER]

Swim bladder problems, fluffy growths bleached out patches columnaris mouth fungus, and whitespot.

 

[fishlette]

so far so good been staring at everyone for about two hours now and no signs of any issues

 

[WILDER]

Good luck.

 

[fishlette]

Good luck.

thank you

 

[Sky042]

Sometimes it can be worth keeping a spare around.
Right now my 125 is running on a single 350W as both of my Titanium submersible 300W heaters died within 2 days of each other. So I'm waiting on replacements from Big Al's