Tank Nightmare

[FishyWishie]

After an initial good start my tank is rapidly turning into a bit of a nightmare

I've lost 7 rasborra but not all at 1 time its like 1 or 2 every 48-60 hours and my betta has sticky fins (I'm attempting to treat this atm with Melafix). The Rasborra almost all had the eyes eaten/bitten and the one that died overnight seemed to have tail damage (all the rest did not)

The Diamnond Tetra the Corydoras and the Loaches are all fine and have no problems at all.

I initially thought the suplemental internal filter was at fault so I tried turning it off with no results. Ive even tried 15-20% daily water changes as well out of desperation.


PH 7.4

Ammonia 0

Nitrite 0

Nitrate 10 (20 before water change)


I'm wondering could the number of rasborra 25 (well -7 now obviously) and the Diamond Tetras be to much schoaling fish causing the betta to be stressed and attack ? In all the hours I've spent watching the tank he never bothers any fish the deaths are always when I'm in bed. My other thought is/was the rasborra group I purchased may have come with some kind of disease/parasite?

Feeling pretty low atm Tank of Death wasn't really what I had in mind.

 

[fluttermoth]

Hi there FishyWishie,

Sorry to hear of the problems you're having.

I doubt very much if the Rasboras are being killed by your Betta. Most fish will pick at dead fish and this is probably why yours have their eyes bitten; this will almost certainly have happened after they've died.

If all the rest of your fish are fine, then I wouldn't have thought it's any kind of disease or parasite. The only thing I can think of is that your pH is a bit high for rasboras; do you know what species of Rasbora they are?

It might help if you could also tell us; how big is your tank? How long has it been set up, and how long have you had the fish in there?

 

[FishyWishie]

Tank is 240 Litres it has been fully cycled now for about 7 weeks.

The inital fish went in a month ago (maybe just over) The rasborra are the Harlequin variety there was no Rasborra deaths for 7 days after they were added but now its 1/2 dead every 48-60 hours, I added further fish 2 weeks after first stocking.

All the other fish are fine well the betta has sticky fins but he's being treated for it. Although if its down to the rasborra and diamonds stressing him he may need to be moved to his own tank which logistically would be an issue getting a new one cycled quickly enough.

Atm ive prob spent over £550 on everything but its getting me so down I'd happily give it away

 

[Miss Wiggle]

how did you cycle the tank fishywishy? was it fishless or fish-in?

also how confident are you of the accuracy of the test results - what brand of test kit are you using?

the betta could be stressed in a community tank, he might also not like the amount of current in the tank, they don't do well with a high flow rate and in such a big tank i assume your flow rate is probably fairly high. if you moved him to his own small tank you could just take some of the filter media from your existing filter and put it into the new tanks filter then that would cycle it instantly so no worries from that perspectve.

 

[FishyWishie]

I did a full fishless cycle over approx 10 weeks. Im using an API master kit so im fairly certain the results are accurate. I think the betta will need to be moved for his own good.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

glad to hear it!

yes i would try moving him to a small tank, only needs to be 20/30 litres or so for a single betta and as I say it can be instantly cycled with the filter media from your existing tank.

see if that perks him and the rasbora's up, are you seeing any other symptoms in the rasbora's before they die - swimming near the surface, strange colouring, white spots on the body etc?

 

[FishyWishie]

Thats the odd thing apart from them congegating at the side of the tank sometimes and looking out they seem to be behaving normally schoaling well etc no obvious signs of disease Ill go watch them again but they certainly never break the surface.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

i know it's easier said than done but try and keep a close eye on the tank and see if you can see one of them in the period when they actually become ill and die. if you can feed back to us their actions and any symptoms you see in this window that might help to diagnose the problem. hard to catch them at it though and not a particularly nice thing to watch either

as a standard basic thing make sure there is plenty of surface agitation in the tank by moving the filter outlet so it breaks the water surface and makes plenty of waves/splashes. this will increase the amount of oxygen in the water, lots of diseases can make it hard for the fish to get oxygen so you're just giving them a fighting chance and obviously it doesn't cost anything or take much effort.

 

[Jenste]

So sorry about your loss....sometimes an LFS can have just a bad stock that can come in and wipe out fish in your tank....

as said above,
does your filter out put break the surface in a waterfall effect? or does it seem to just spew out water in a gentle flow? you may want to pick of an airstone to make sure the water is oxygenated enough


and when you do a water change, do you make sure to add in temp matched and dechlorinated water?

 

[FishyWishie]

The filter is an external Fluval 305 the filter outputs are under tha water level so I have them aimed upwards to break surface as far as is possible. 1 of the rasborra is swimming at the surface sucking air but only the one so ive added airstone in to see if it helps I cant keep it in long term tho as my tank is moderately planted and the airstone tends to drive out c02

Water changes I temp match as best I can and add Seachem Prime to dechlorinate.

What I just dont get is i had 1 die then none for 48 hours then another die then none for 60+ hours then 2 die.

 

[CheniseMummy]

All i can say is i had similar thing with my danios i had 11 to start with in a cycled tank and they just strated dying for no reason. Some of them i saw gasping at the serfice, some had sores. I treated them for internal infection but was too late to do anything i think as they all perished. This continued for over 12w

 

[FishyWishie]

Atm im torn between spending more money on seperate tank for the betta and stripping down my setup entirely and giving the fish to people who wont kill them

 

[Miss Wiggle]

oh fishywishy don't give up, we have all had problems with tanks at one point or another, particularly with new tanks which are quite unstable even if they have been fully cycled.

there could be a disease problem or they could just be weak fish, there might be some minor instability in the levels of the water quality. While we test for the main things, ammonia, nitrite etc there are lots of other chemical reactions going on in your tank and other chemical levels that we don't monitor because 9 times out of 10 we just don't need to e.g. if the substrate you have gives off some calcium then it will only have a finite amount that it will put into the water, after a little while it'll stop giving it off.

this means that sometimes in new tanks even when we think the water quality is fine with 0 ammonia and nitrite and low nitrate there may be other things going on behind the scenes which hardy fish will cope with but weaker fish won't. it could be that the species is delicate or it could just be that the batch of fish you have come from poor stock. i've had it before with some fish shops that everything i get from there just dies even if everything else in the tank is completely fine and i'm starting to think this may be the case here.

please don't give up though after all that work cycling for 10 weeks or so!

 

[FishyWishie]

Bought a nice 35 Litre tank for the betta so I can move him and medicate his sticky fins/finrot I spotted him tonight nipping at a dead rasborra so its put the doubt in my mind that maybe over night he is attacking them?

Only prob is the 35 litre tank I got didnt include a heater I can get a 50W online here in 48 hours but atm the only spare I have is 300W heater would there be any way that heater would do as emergency till the small Wattage one arrives or will it turn the betta into soup ?

 

[Miss Wiggle]

if the heater has a thermostat and fits in the tank it'll be fine, the thermostat should turn it off before it gets too hot - it'll just get hot very quickly that's all!!