Tale of wow dwarf childs

[Bazza1946]

I have kept tropical fish fo 50yrs and have a 160L cube water is tested weekly keeping the nitrite and nitrates to zero ph 7.2 max chlorine very low .As my schools of rummies and cardinals needed topping up I bought 6 of each plus a German blue ram after 2 weeks the ram had two pink spots on his head and died within 36hrs.
4weeks later using the same process but this time a golden ram all was fine for 2weeks when I noticed his tail fin was clamped,still swimming fine. Within 12 hrs he was hiding 12hrs later spinning around loosing total control he was dead. The next morning.Looking at him through a powerful magnifying glass he looked perfect.All 12 cardinals and rummies are fine.Any advice would be welcome.

 

[Slaphppy7]

Welcome to the forum.

What do you mean by "chlorine very low"? Do you use a water conditioner? Is your tap water chlorinated?

 

[Wills]

Blue Rams are a tough fish to keep - usually best in a set up dedicated to them rather than adding them to something else.

The basic requirements are soft water, a ph of 6.8 or below and high temperatures (28c +). They are quite overbred now as well so you have to be careful where you get them from and also watch out for any obvious issues in the store like skinny, sunk bellys, inactive etc.

The two pink spots on the first one - were they like wounds or an infection type thing?

Wills

 

[kribensis12]

I have kept tropical fish fo 50yrs and have a 160L cube water is tested weekly keeping the nitrite and nitrates to zero ph 7.2 max chlorine very low .As my schools of rummies and cardinals needed topping up I bought 6 of each plus a German blue ram after 2 weeks the ram had two pink spots on his head and died within 36hrs.
4weeks later using the same process but this time a golden ram all was fine for 2weeks when I noticed his tail fin was clamped,still swimming fine. Within 12 hrs he was hiding 12hrs later spinning around loosing total control he was dead. The next morning.Looking at him through a powerful magnifying glass he looked perfect.All 12 cardinals and rummies are fine.Any advice would be welcome.

Welcome to the forum!

Could you provide some additional information?

1. How often do you do a water change and how much is changed?
2. What is the pH, kH and gH of the water you have?
3. You mentioned that you test Nitrite and Nitrate weekly. Unless the tank is well planted, it's almost impossible for Nitrates to be 0. Do you use a liquid or a strip test kit? Nitrates, if your readings are inaccurate, could be part of the problem. I do think this is unlikely as Cardinal's are also sensitive so I would think the water is okay, but ya never know.


As @Wills said, they can be pretty delicate fish. I have quite a few that are all doing very well - but the key is warm water (82-85 degrees is perfect), soft water (low pH, low kH and low gH) and a balanced died as they are prone to bloat.

Getting Rams from a reputable breeder is 1/2 the battle due to inbreeding and the fact that even the wild version of the fish is very delicate.

 

[Essjay]

According to the water company, the GH is 277 ppm/15.7 dH; pH average is 7.6.

 

[Bazza1946]

Welcome to the forum.

What do you mean by "chlorine very low"? Do you use a water conditioner? Is your tap water chlorinated?

I’ve always used declorinator our tap water has constant chlorine readings

 

[Bazza1946]

Welcome to the forum!

Could you provide some additional information?

1. How often do you do a water change and how much is changed?
2. What is the pH, kH and gH of the water you have?
3. You mentioned that you test Nitrite and Nitrate weekly. Unless the tank is well planted, it's almost impossible for Nitrates to be 0. Do you use a liquid or a strip test kit? Nitrates, if your readings are inaccurate, could be part of the problem. I do think this is unlikely as Cardinal's are also sensitive so I would think the water is okay, but ya never know.


As @Wills said, they can be pretty delicate fish. I have quite a few that are all doing very well - but the key is warm water (82-85 degrees is perfect), soft water (low pH, low kH and low gH) and a balanced died as they are prone to bloat.

Getting Rams from a reputable breeder is 1/2 the battle due to inbreeding and the fact that even the wild version of the fish is very delicate.

My cube is heavily planted,water changes 2-3 weeks 30%, use NT Labs to test my water.

 

[kribensis12]

I would suspect that it may be a combination of your tanks water parameters (kH, gH and pH) along with poor specimens from the shop.

Hard to know for sure.

 

[Bazza1946]

When 12 cardinals of best size I could find in a radius of 20miles and the rummies all in perfect condition.Having kept tetras for 40+ years I assure you I know what’s quality when It comes to purchasing fish.My only previous disaster some 15yrs ago with a dozen red phantoms,six survived.
.

 

[Bazza1946]

Blue Rams are a tough fish to keep - usually best in a set up dedicated to them rather than adding them to something else.

The basic requirements are soft water, a ph of 6.8 or below and high temperatures (28c +). They are quite overbred now as well so you have to be careful where you get them from and also watch out for any obvious issues in the store like skinny, sunk bellys, inactive etc.

The two pink spots on the first one - were they like wounds or an infection type thing?

Wills

Infection

 

[Bazza1946]

According to the water company, the GH is 277 ppm/15.7 dH; pH average is 7.6.

200 x170x230. evolution aqua cube.

 

[Wills]

When 12 cardinals of best size I could find in a radius of 20miles and the rummies all in perfect condition.Having kept tetras for 40+ years I assure you I know what’s quality when It comes to purchasing fish.My only previous disaster some 15yrs ago with a dozen red phantoms,six survived.
.

Things can sound a bit blunt in text so appologies if you thought I was questioning your credentials I'm very intrigued to hear your fishkeeping history, really looking forward to picking your brain over time. I think with Cichlids sometimes experienced keepers will try and take on sub par specimens to fatten up which was more the route I was going down.

From the sounds of things I think the water chemistry is just not right for this fish which is something we see all too often on this forum. Have you seen Bolivian Rams before? They are a different species and look a bit washed out in the shop but in a display tank they colour up really nicely and they are a bit more adaptable to different water paramaters and do better at typical tropical temperatures too.

Generally we like to advocate for people to keep fish suited naturally to their water so like me you have hard water so I would usually avoid things like Tetras and South American Cichlids - though I did keep a South American tank for around 8 years in hard water... I had a break from the hobby and came back to it with this approach though and now soften my water for softer species and am planning a second tank for fish suited to hard water like Central American cichlids, livebearers and rainbow fish.

Wills

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

I think I might now have understood the title of your post...did you mean 'woe' and NOT 'wow'?

As already suggested/implied, chlorine should be zero...or less.
Regarding the water, I'd be more interested in the differences between the water the Rams lived and arrived in and your tank water.

Whilst your experience with tetras is showing, (as they're fine), it appears there's something in your tank that disagreed with the Rams.
Whilst it's always tempting to blame bad shop care, or inbred and poor quality fish, this is less of a problem that Thinternet would have us believe.
Obviously, if you returned to the shop and all of their rams were belly up, then they might be the problem after all.

 

[Bazza1946]

The tetras and the golden ram came from the same supplier in fact they where in local water not ten minutes walk from my house,they where in adjoining tanks,the ram was the only golden in a tank marked assorted dwarf cichlids and I’m sure that they had bo restocking I had my eye on him for about seven days before purchase.
water tested today same results as last week and after a 30% water change NO3 10ppm mg/L NO2 0.5 Hardness GH hardness 125 ppm Kh 107 ph 7.2.
1970 to 1974 general community swords platies corys.
1974-1979 Firemouths oscars Severus plecs.
1980 community Corys tetras, cardinals lemons rummies bleeding hearts x rays.Never neons can’t seem to keep them.
Water filtered through nitrate removal plus dosed to remove chlorine and heavy metals.
PS CLl2 0.8ppm

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

The tetras and the golden ram came from the same supplier in fact they where in local water not ten minutes walk from my house,they where in adjoining tanks,the ram was the only golden in a tank marked assorted dwarf cichlids and I’m sure that they had bo restocking I had my eye on him for about seven days before purchase.
water tested today same results as last week and after a 30% water change NO3 10ppm mg/L NO2 0.5 Hardness GH hardness 125 ppm Kh 107 ph 7.2.
1970 to 1974 general community swords platies corys.
1974-1979 Firemouths oscars Severus plecs.
1980 community Corys tetras, cardinals lemons rummies bleeding hearts x rays.Never neons can’t seem to keep them.
Water filtered through nitrate removal plus dosed to remove chlorine and heavy metals.
PS CLl2 0.8ppm

Yep...which strongly suggests that the issue lies with your water.