Very Poor Water - Fish Dying

[Spooky76]

Hi peeps,

Got home last night, 6 fish dead

Ammonia 0
Nitrate 0
Nitrite < 0.3mg/L
Kh 3
PH 7.25

At the moment, my tank is recovering from Ich treatment, but it seems my PH from tap water has gone from 7 - 7.33

I just wanted to check that I am right in thinking that the c02 content is too low ? I have a fluval 3 which is set to high, because the ich treatment I was using increases surface tension for a while.

I had an airstone which I turned off last night.

Just wanted to know if you think im on the right lines here ? Can anybody help or affirm what im thinking ?

 

[Azaezl]

Did you cycle your tank before you added the fish? If you didn't / don't know what I'm talking about have a read of this

Cycling

The nitrite is probably what killed them, you want both ammmonia and nitrite to be 0 all the time, Nitrate technically is safe up to 100 but you should ideally aim for 40 or lower, obviousley the lower the better.

Are you asking if the co2 was too low for your plants or you fish? Fish need oxygen, plants need co2, I'd turn the airstone back on just to make sure they are getting plenty of oxygen, your fish should be your main priority not your plants.

 

[Spooky76]

This is NOT a new tank. This has been running 6-8 months.

The cycling got a bit messed up with ich treatment.

According to my API test kit, With the PH and Kh you can measure C02 content. Which should be around the 4-12 mark..mines at 2, which indicates my c02 level is too high....My theory was that I was putting too much 02 into the tank therefore forcing the c02 out, am I wrong ?

 

[fishlette]

personally i would turn the air stone back on. i keep airstones in all my tanks all the time

 

[Spooky76]

Can I ask you, with a 4fth tank, how much surface water movement is needed ? its 18" deep too and I thought you had to move it more if the tank is deeper? I dont think the chemistry is wrong, it seems pretty ok. and my smaller tank has the same stats and nothing is dying in that...

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

Some questions;
a. Are any of the fish in the tank showing any odd symptoms whether behavioral or physical (like gasping, faded colours, flicking and rubbing, hanging near the bottom or top of the tank a lot when they shouldn't etc)? Did any of the fish that died show any odd symptoms before they died?
b. What brand of whitespot/ich treatment did you use and how long for?

I would advise watching the fihs for 30mins to see if you can spot any symptoms they are displaying.


Fish don't need CO2, but it can be beneficial for plants, however many plants don't need it to grow well. You can actually have too much CO2 in a fish tank.

Many meds like whitespot meds reduce the oxygen carrying capacity of the water, which is why they recommend that you do as much as posible to increase the oxygen content in the water by doing things like adding bubble pumps or raising the filter in the tank so the filter current produces lots of surface movement etc.

How often do you do water changes (and how much water do you take out) and substrate cleaning sessions in the tank and what types of fish have died exactly and how long did you have them for?

 

[vinylman]

Can I ask you, with a 4fth tank, how much surface water movement is needed ? its 18" deep too and I thought you had to move it more if the tank is deeper? I dont think the chemistry is wrong, it seems pretty ok. and my smaller tank has the same stats and nothing is dying in that...

I have a 4ft long, 18'' deep tank, and have positioned the spray bar so that the surface is ONLY JUST rippling. That's mainly because my external filter is so quiet I wanted to know it's still working without having to open the cabinet door every time I pass the tank.

 

[aquaticadmirer]

I think we need a little more info. Fill this out, it might help:

Tank size:
pH:
ammonia:
nitrite:
nitrate:
kH:
gH:
tank temp:

Fish Symptoms (include full description including lesion, color, location, fish behavior):

Volume and Frequency of water changes:

Chemical Additives or Media in your tank:

Tank inhabitants:

Recent additions to your tank (living or decoration):

Exposure to chemicals:

Digital photo (include if possible):


Also, do you have any plants in the tank? If you don't, then CO2 doesn't matter very much and as long as you are keeping the water moving the levels should not be harmful to fish and you do not need to test for it (very high levels might cause pH swings but this should only happen if you're injecting CO2).

That being said, O2 levels are critical for fish. You don't need to test for it but the water should be moving at all times. If the fish look like they're gasping at the surface or breathing quickly, you might need more circulation. You said the Ich treatment increases surface tension, and with the airstone off it might be that there was not enough circulation and the fish suffocated.

Also, I'm unclear on what the pH actually is. First you said 7.25, then you said it changed from 7 to 7.33. Whatever the case, if the pH changed drastically in a short period of time the fish may have died from that.

 

[Spooky76]

Hey

I do a 10-20% change every week.

Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate < 0.3 mg/l (according to API thats fine)
GH 4
Kh 3/4
PH Was 7.25 - 7.3 (Thats what my digital one said)

Fish showed no symptoms of anything, behaved normal. I lost another guppy on Friday night, but since that the PH has not stabalized at 7

I turned the air stone back on and lowered the Fluval so its just rippling the surface now.

Yes the tank is heavily planted (about 20 plants in all).

I still am non the wiser what has caused all this really....

 

[Azaezl]

In your first post you said it was nitrite that was 0.3, is it nitrite or nitrate that is 0.3? Has anything been sprayed near the tank, air freshners etc? I've read that alot of people have lost fish for no reason only to realise it was something to do with air freshners being nearby. I've lost 2 panda corys for no apparent reason recently, like you my stats were fine, so I'm still clueless. Only other thing is maybe an ich treatment overdose if that's possible? Did you put the correct amount in? Or as aquaticadmirer said they may have suffocated because airation wasn't increased when treating for ich. I hope somebody else can offer you some better advice as I have no idea what could have killed them.

 

[Spooky76]

Thats a good question....I dont know to be truthful. Maybe the Mrs sprayed some near it...will ask her thanks.

The Nitrite was 0 Nitrate <0.3.

I didnt overdose, I underdosed because of the pleccy and catfish. I increased airation during treatment as it told me to, but I think it might have caused other problems after the meds were removed by carbon filter.

All I know it that my co2 was low according to my API test kit, everything else was fine, other than PH was slightly elevated. I know PH change according to airation though..

I wish I had listened in Chemistry at school now

 

[aquaticadmirer]

Well I don't have a planted tank so I'm not an expert, but I think that pH can swing overnight when dosing with CO2, especially if it continues to inject overnight and isn't turned off. I'm pretty sure this has something to do with the fact that the plants don't actually use the CO2 when it's dark so CO2 levels rise at night which affects the pH. So maybe you had some kind of pH swing that killed all the fish at once.

I would bet that your fish died from either a pH swing, suffocation from lack of oxygen, or the Ich medication didn't work and they simply died from Ich (especially since you said you undermedicated).