Unexplained Deaths...

[thereverendturtle]

Really quick...
20 gallons
pH 7.2
am 0
nitrite 0
nitrate 20

In the last week since I added a couple of female guppies, I've lost 3 kuhli loaches and 5 cories peppered and sterbai.
They show no signs of disease, the 3 I've seen die, just go from swimming normal, to having difficulty swimming, to dead in about an hour.
They have zero signs of disease. no rapid breathing, bloody streaks, parasites or anything. I've never seen anything like this in 30+ years of fish keeping.
The other fish in the tank, some tetras and guppies are fine... so I don't know what to treat for.
Initially I raised the temp from 77° to 82° and added an anti-protozoan medication. Still losing fish.
I usually do 20-30% water change once or twice a week, so I'm at a loss.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

How old are they? Any discoloration prior to death?

Sounds bizarre. Any possibility of a perfume or air freshener being sprayed or scented candles near the tank, etc.?

 

[thereverendturtle]

All the fish in the tank were juveniles when I set it up. The oldest being in the tank 18 months. No change in color at all.

Nothing I can think of. I don't use things of that nature.

Also I would think the tetras might be more sensitive to that.

 

[techen]

Is there something else in your water you've not noticed? Worth checking up on your water supply website.

 

[star4]

Weird its all bottom dwellers you have lost, my thoughts would be its something in the substrate, maybe a pocket of trapped gas somewhere.

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

Did you quarantine the new Guppies before adding them to the community tank?

 

[thereverendturtle]

Did you quarantine the new Guppies before adding them to the community tank?

Unfortunately not. I know that's a huge mistake on my part. My quarantine tank, currently has some cichlids that would easily eat guppies. So I rolled the dice and lost.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

Could be they were/are carriers. Sorry rev.

 

[thereverendturtle]

Thank you.
The worse part is I know better. Never again will I do something this way. I guess I'll need extra quarantine tanks.
Update on the death toll since last night, 1 more sterbai and 1 more khuli.
Wish I knew why, whatever it is, is just affecting the bottom feeders.

 

[DJH584]

Sorry to hear of your further loss in addition to the rest.

It makes me wonder if the guppies are passing something in their faeces that it causing the death of your bottom feeders.
Am I correct in thinking that the faeces from the guppies is normal?

 

[N0body Of The Goat]

Have you tried an emergency water change of 75-95% to see if that helps? Mysterious deaths are the horrible, not only do we lose the fish, but have nothing learnt to know what we could have done better.

 

[Besty42]

Sorry to hear of you loss, it really is terrible when fish die and theres almost nothing you could have done, you took a risk and sadly it was against you.

 

[thereverendturtle]

Thank you all. Yeah, first thing I did was an 80% water change, followed by 50% the following day.
As for the guppies feces, I haven't seen them have a bowel movement, so I don't know.

 

[thereverendturtle]

Update; Thursday I added an antifungal medication and no losses since the kuhli and copy. So I guess now I'll have to wait and see. I'll update if anything new arises.

 

[thereverendturtle]

Well I think I figured it out. I had a dwarf puffer with them, didn't even think about it til just nowthat I had found a partial corpse in my tank a day or two before it all started.
So in my book, case closed.