HELP fish are dying!

First topic message reminder :

due to a house remodel I had to move 6 fish from a 29 gallon to a 10 gallon for 2 months..no problem...I set 29 back up..all fine..3 weeks later I added 7 new fish along with a petstore advise to add aquarium salt...now a week later I have lost 11 fish...1tsp to 5 gallons is what I was told....I have done a 40% water change 3 days ago and fish are still dying..PH is fine ..............HELP!!!!!

Alton S wrote:

Just thought it might have been too strong. But soounds like you did good there to me. How big of a tank is this?

a 29

Alton S wrote:

Just thought it might have been too strong. But soounds like you did good there to me. How big of a tank is this?

just looking now it appears my algae eater has this cr@p now...I swear it almost looks like their skin is coming off and eyes have a haze over them too...WTH

If you have a few 5 gallon buckets you could do a 20 gallon water change quickly. Just have a bucket or 2 ready and pull out 20 gallons and while your doing that if you have a gravel vaccum I clean the gravel as I am taking the water out.

Did you clean the gravel with colorox?

Alton S wrote:

If you have a few 5 gallon buckets you could do a 20 gallon water change quickly. Just have a bucket or 2 ready and pull out 20 gallons and while your doing that if you have a gravel vaccum I clean the gravel as I am taking the water out.

Did you clean the gravel with colorox?

I had a gravel vacuum... got thrown away by accident during the house ordeal...and yes did the gravel in 3 different buckets and rinsed the you know what out of them too

I never use colorox on my gravel. It will kill all the good bacteria out of it. If you want to give gravel a good cleaning place it on a tarp and spray it with a hose til the water runs clear. Seasoned gravel is huge to starting a tank fast. Once gravel has been cycled in my opinion it is best to be rinsed only with fresh water. Soaking it may trap the colorox and it could be seeping out into your water.

When you do the water change I would remove the fish and use a vaccum to clean the gravel. Might be colorox from the gravel getting into your water. But Just my opinion here.

Alton S wrote:

I never use colorox on my gravel. It will kill all the good bacteria out of it. If you want to give gravel a good cleaning place it on a tarp and spray it with a hose til the water runs clear. Seasoned gravel is huge to starting a tank fast. Once gravel has been cycled in my opinion it is best to be rinsed only with fresh water. Soaking it may trap the colorox and it could be seeping out into your water.

When you do the water change I would remove the fish and use a vaccum to clean the gravel. Might be colorox from the gravel getting into your water. But Just my opinion here.

oh great...that would be my luck...I have to be honest the tank got pretty nasty sitting outside I didnt know what else to do...but do you think after all this time this may be still be the case?...tank has been set back up about a month to 5 weeks now maybe and this just started last week

In my opinion, I would think yes. When the fish dig in the gravel it will release the toxins from the colorox. Kinda like chlorine will kill a fish. If the gravel was still damp when you put it in then it still had colorox on it, I would think. I am not an expert here either.

Alton S wrote:

In my opinion, I would think yes. When the fish dig in the gravel it will release the toxins from the colorox. Kinda like chlorine will kill a fish. If the gravel was still damp when you put it in then it still had colorox on it, I would think. I am not an expert here either.

well again..OH GREAT....I'll get up early and take a water sample in...see what that says ,buy another vacuum....change some water ...I dont know....I'll let you know tomorrow what happens...i appreciate all your help and advise

I think ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels would show through the roof. Sounds to me like this was a tank that was, essentially, a new tank. It started cycling and had a fairly low fish load so everyone was okay. Plus, they were in there the whole time able to adapt a bit as the parameters changed. Suddenly the fish load is more than doubled in a tank that may or may not have been finished the initial cycle but was still unstable. Ammonia spikes because there's not enough bacteria to handle the increase. Ammonia is more toxic at a higher pH and I'm guessing you meant somewhere around 7.0 as far as the pH being okay and since this is a new tank and hasn't had a chance to lose buffering capacity yet. Ammonia spikes at a lower pH, say 6.0, isn't nearly as devastating. I'd fine a store that sells Prime and triple dose it. Locks up ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate, chloramine, etc. Prime is a fish keeper's best friend and it's the one additive you're guaranteed to find always in stock in my house. It's safe for fresh and salt and great for unexpected ammonia spikes. Plus, I've dosed up to five times the normal dose with no ill effects. Only down side is that it smells like sulfer but once it's in the water you can't smell it. Just when the bottle's open. If you decide to try it and you find some funny looking gunk floating it that's totally normal. Pretend it's not there. It's just a precipitate that forms. Oh, and I don't know that I'd suspect clorox. It's possible but not as likely. I can tell you, though, that if this is an ammonia spike disturbing the gravel with deep vacuuming is the last thing you want to do. That's where your good bacteria is and killing that off will only make things worse. That cloudiness you saw after adding the new fish was a bacterial bloom trying to catch up with the new load in the tank. Hope this helps and best of luck!

are you able to take out the remaining fish into a separate small quarantine tank/container while you deal with the fish tank? I think the bleach theory could be right. 3 parts bleach to 10 parts water is even stronger than the the required solution for laboratories!

iAt this point any bacteria in the gravel is pretty much ruined I think. If it were me, I'd take out the fish into a temporary home with new water(not from the tank) or better maybe a buddy's tank water. Then I would redo the whole fish tank, rinse the gravel out well, and dry the gravel completely. Then when putting the tank back together I'd rerinse the gravel before putting it in the tank, and wait extra long for the tank to dechlorinate, and even better, fully cycle the tank before adding fish again.

I don't know at this point right now(if bleach is the culprit) if adding a bunch of dechlorinator and stirring up the gravel would even help. First it would really stress out the fish and you should take them out anyway, so why not start from scratch anyways?

when you left the tank outside during the remodel, was the gravel under water? how was its condition to suggest bleaching? Bleaching is a viable solution, albeit extreme. when you were rinsing your bleached gravel, could you still smell the bleach smell? If so(which is likely at the concentration you used) it still had bleach in it.

fishface30 wrote:

are you able to take out the remaining fish into a separate small quarantine tank/container while you deal with the fish tank? I think the bleach theory could be right. 3 parts bleach to 10 parts water is even stronger than the the required solution for laboratories!

iAt this point any bacteria in the gravel is pretty much ruined I think. If it were me, I'd take out the fish into a temporary home with new water(not from the tank) or better maybe a buddy's tank water. Then I would redo the whole fish tank, rinse the gravel out well, and dry the gravel completely. Then when putting the tank back together I'd rerinse the gravel before putting it in the tank, and wait extra long for the tank to dechlorinate, and even better, fully cycle the tank before adding fish again.

I don't know at this point right now(if bleach is the culprit) if adding a bunch of dechlorinator and stirring up the gravel would even help. First it would really stress out the fish and you should take them out anyway, so why not start from scratch anyways?

when you left the tank outside during the remodel, was the gravel under water? how was its condition to suggest bleaching? Bleaching is a viable solution, albeit extreme. when you were rinsing your bleached gravel, could you still smell the bleach smell? If so(which is likely at the concentration you used) it still had bleach in it.

I say 3 parts to 10 parts but the bleach was old and not as strong smell as the norm,the dilution could have been a lot less...I rinsed until everyone I asked couldn't smell it,I was worried about that too...I sold the dang 10 gallon so I guess I'll be going and getting another one maybe.Testing the water is going to be the 1st thing on the list and go from there.

Jeepluv77 wrote:

I think ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels would show through the roof. Sounds to me like this was a tank that was, essentially, a new tank. It started cycling and had a fairly low fish load so everyone was okay. Plus, they were in there the whole time able to adapt a bit as the parameters changed. Suddenly the fish load is more than doubled in a tank that may or may not have been finished the initial cycle but was still unstable. Ammonia spikes because there's not enough bacteria to handle the increase. Ammonia is more toxic at a higher pH and I'm guessing you meant somewhere around 7.0 as far as the pH being okay and since this is a new tank and hasn't had a chance to lose buffering capacity yet. Ammonia spikes at a lower pH, say 6.0, isn't nearly as devastating. I'd fine a store that sells Prime and triple dose it. Locks up ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate, chloramine, etc. Prime is a fish keeper's best friend and it's the one additive you're guaranteed to find always in stock in my house. It's safe for fresh and salt and great for unexpected ammonia spikes. Plus, I've dosed up to five times the normal dose with no ill effects. Only down side is that it smells like sulfer but once it's in the water you can't smell it. Just when the bottle's open. If you decide to try it and you find some funny looking gunk floating it that's totally normal. Pretend it's not there. It's just a precipitate that forms. Oh, and I don't know that I'd suspect clorox. It's possible but not as likely. I can tell you, though, that if this is an ammonia spike disturbing the gravel with deep vacuuming is the last thing you want to do. That's where your good bacteria is and killing that off will only make things worse. That cloudiness you saw after adding the new fish was a bacterial bloom trying to catch up with the new load in the tank. Hope this helps and best of luck!

Thanks for your information! I will check water tomorrow 1st off and go from there and look for the Prime ...thanks again

good luck to you!

Another thought, too. Does your local store sell ro/di water? If so, get some buckets and change out up to 50% with that remembering to buffer up the pH first. Just a hint on pH, don't use the "Neutral pH" or "7.0" or whatever your store sells for one step buffering. It's loaded with phosphates so you'll end up with massive amounts of algae down the line at some point once it's built up. Most tap water is loaded with phosphates as well. Stuff is like slime algae fertilizer. Get the two step buffering that has one bottle label acid and one labelled alkaline and mix according to directions. The only down side to this is that you'll need to be sure to check your tanks pH and the pH of the water your about to add to make sure they're within 0.2 of each other. Investing in a liquid test kit for this. More accurate and you'll get a ton more uses than you will with strips.

Jeepluv77 wrote:

Another thought, too. Does your local store sell ro/di water? If so, get some buckets and change out up to 50% with that remembering to buffer up the pH first. Just a hint on pH, don't use the "Neutral pH" or "7.0" or whatever your store sells for one step buffering. It's loaded with phosphates so you'll end up with massive amounts of algae down the line at some point once it's built up. Most tap water is loaded with phosphates as well. Stuff is like slime algae fertilizer. Get the two step buffering that has one bottle label acid and one labelled alkaline and mix according to directions. The only down side to this is that you'll need to be sure to check your tanks pH and the pH of the water your about to add to make sure they're within 0.2 of each other. Investing in a liquid test kit for this. More accurate and you'll get a ton more uses than you will with strips.

I did a 40% water change 3 days ago using Chlor-out which neutrilizes chlorine and chloramines and added API PH down to new water before I added the new water..my tap water here is really high in PH so I always make sure I get it down before I add the new water..I had this tank set up for 17 years with no problems until I had to do the house thing and it was broke down for 2 months.I have the liquid PH test kit...I need to get another ammonia one(no thanks to my dog chewing it up a year ago)I'm thinking either your 1st comment about the tank is more on Q or the "me"bleaching the gravel...which I hope is not the case ..getting ready to go get water checked..THANKS!

IMO the water "freaked out" had some sort of spike.

Dramatic changes to a well established tank can cause problems.

I know for sure the salt has nothing to do with the the deaths.

All you can do is be patience, do some water changes until everything seems back to normal and hope for the best.


PS I would not waste money buying all these test kits and ph buffers. Some of them don't even work correclty.

Less is more with fish tanks... if your tap water is within reason for the fish you keep there is no sense is buffering PH or anything else that is not expressly needed.

That being said... the only risk you would normally have in vaccing the gravel is if it is a very old setup that has not been touched in years. The decomposing matter in the tank can build up gases under the gravel that when disturbed releases toxic gasses... if you had just setup your tank this won't be a worry for you. Slowly vaccing the tank gravel would be the best bet and release the least amount of dirt into the water.

The beneficial bacteria that does grow in the gravel is anaerobic mostly and takes a very long time to establish compared to the aerobic bacteria that grows in your filter.
Also like to note here that algae is not what is processing the ammonia, nitrite in the tank. It primarily uses the nitrates, phosphates to grow. A bed of algae could in theory provide a bed for bacteria to establish but I doubt it would be as efficient as a properly working filter where surface area and aeration is greatest.

It seems like you had either a spike in the tank due to adding too many fish at one time OR the fish you got from the LFS had an infection or other pathogen that has since spread to the tank.

I would advise against throwing meds or other chemicals in the tank that are not needed. Once you start down t hat path you will never know what may have caused the next problem and without knowing exactly what is wrong is more likely you will just stress out the fish further...

As for the use of salt... not sure why all the pet stores tell everyone to use this honestly. It is decent at helping with stress and killing pathogens common to freshwater it is also fairly harmless. The problem I see is that if you always use salt in the tank when you have a problem (much like you are now) the salt treatment is less effective because they are already use to that amount. Also if your tank has never had salt in it and you feel compelled to add it I would do so slowly and bring up the concentration that way you can monitor the fish for signs of stress and allow them to adjust.

As others have stated the use of Prime can be very useful in treating water problems. You can easily dose up to 5x the amount to help with any water issues and give your filter time to catch up. As mentioned this can also be used to neutralize the bleach added to the tank if there was any left.

Keep up on the water changes and try to just use de chlorinated tap water. Keep it simple and easy.

Great info

Eager to see an update on how things are going. I'm totally against adding any kind of dissolved antibiotics to a tank. Really, I don't even use them in a quarantine tank. To be effective you'd have to know what type of bacteria you're dealing with and then there's the factor of trying to determine dosing which, really, is just guess work. In the end, you generally just waste money and increase the amount of antibiotic resistant bacteria being flushed in to waterways and often have little to no change in the outcome of the fish. Now, this does not apply to topical treatments where you remove the fish and apply directly to a wound. Salt dips can be great too if done properly but, like strikingthematch, I don't like adding salt directly to the system. I don't subscribe to the use of Melafix or Pimafix either. Just never have found it effective at much beyond producing a very odd smell. Fish have an amazing ability to heal themselves given the opportunity. The only "medication" I might use is colloidal silver which has proven highly effective for treating my foster kittens' antibiotic resistant URIs and has worked against various viruses in humans. Safe for all animals, including fish, and very little side effects. But, it's antibacterial(in addition to antifungal and antiviral) so I would not use it in a display tank.

Great info Jeepluv. I have had to treat my discus already but used a medicated flake food. IMO if your fish are still eating ti is by far the most effective treatment. The dose it MUCH lower and more direct. Not having to worry about it killing the bio filter is also an added benefit. There are times when treating the tank with medicine is needed but the problem I see is the infection/illness ect... is most often caused by other conditions such as bad stock, water quality, neglect and that treating the fish with medicine only treats the current problem but it will likely be back soon to to the root cause not being addressed.

Absolutely! You have to ensure good water parameters. I've never tried medicated food as it's impossible to ensure a fish eats a good amount but it seems that it would be far more effective if they are eating well. But then, you do also still have the problem of not knowing what bacteria you're treating. Bad stock is a huge problem in some cases. If you notice that most of the fish you get from somewhere are sick or that your tank crashes any time you get fish from a certain store just don't buy there. That's another thing I heard alot. "The fish I got from XYZ store were always sick and most died but they were cheap so I just kept going there". What!?

Jeepluv77 wrote:

Eager to see an update on how things are going. I'm totally against adding any kind of dissolved antibiotics to a tank. Really, I don't even use them in a quarantine tank. To be effective you'd have to know what type of bacteria you're dealing with and then there's the factor of trying to determine dosing which, really, is just guess work. In the end, you generally just waste money and increase the amount of antibiotic resistant bacteria being flushed in to waterways and often have little to no change in the outcome of the fish. Now, this does not apply to topical treatments where you remove the fish and apply directly to a wound. Salt dips can be great too if done properly but, like strikingthematch, I don't like adding salt directly to the system. I don't subscribe to the use of Melafix or Pimafix either. Just never have found it effective at much beyond producing a very odd smell. Fish have an amazing ability to heal themselves given the opportunity. The only "medication" I might use is colloidal silver which has proven highly effective for treating my foster kittens' antibiotic resistant URIs and has worked against various viruses in humans. Safe for all animals, including fish, and very little side effects. But, it's antibacterial(in addition to antifungal and antiviral) so I would not use it in a display tank.

Well actually I GREATLY appreciate your help on the Prime...I took a water sample and you really were dead on the money....ammonia way too high...I cant believe I was SO slack on that...I've had SO much going on with everything....fish remaining are doing good and seem relieved...I guess I got way to ahead of myself trying to "get back to normal"...tank is still a little hazy but no more losses... THANK YOU again!

Don't blame yourself. It's not being slack, it's just a learning process. A lot of us have been there. I most certainly have! As for the haziness, don't worry about it. It's just a bacterial bloom from the biofiltration trying to catch up. It'll clear up on it's own with time. Because of dosing with the Prime, which binds the ammonia, it may take a little longer but it's much easier on the fish. I used to recommend Marineland Bio-Spira(not to be confused with Instant Ocean's saltwater additive called Bio-Spira!) but they've done away with the originial formulation and I have no experience with the new SafeStart they've replaced it with. I've used a product called Biozyme with great success before but I'm not sure it's even still on the market. Both of those would have been great for speeding up the "re-cycling" process which is essentially what your tank's going through. But, since I've got no experience with one and no idea where to get the other my personal opinion would be to just wait it out. I've always been one for instant gratification and the fact it's often not possible is the most frustrating part of the hobby for me. But it's worth the wait! Glad we could be of help and I'm stoked your fish are doing well. :)

Don't blame yourself. A single dead fish stuck back behind an ornament can cause an ammonia spike and kill many others before you find the source.

I do have to disagree with KMX on the value of liquid water testing kits. That's most likely what the store used in diagnosing the ammonia spike. Without the test - we'd still be speculating. If Kris68 had one at home (I recommend the API Master kit - use it with all of my chemistry classes as well as at home) the ammonia spike would've be spotted at the first sign of trouble. The main thing with these kits is that you replace them every 18 months (or so..) after opening them since some of the indicators used will slowly oxidize after being exposed to air - rendering them less reliable.

It should not take any longer to cycle with prime.
Prime is not a binding agent but rather converts ammonia to ammonium. Ammonium is a less toxic form of ammonia but still useable by the bio-filter.
This is why even after a large dose of prime is you use a common ammonia liquid test which looks for NH3 and NH4(such as the API test kit) you will still see "ammonia" (ammonium now) present in the water.
You just cycle the tank like normal and in an already cycled tank the recycling process should go by rather quickly. Keep testing ammonia and nitrite I would bet that within a week it will be back to normal though it may take a little longer until the haze clears.

I didn't see this asked, forgive me if it was,
What kind of salt did you use? Did you just
'crack the seal' or has it been on the shelf a
month or two?.. -peace JT