Failed Tank Transfer Method

[RavieReefer]

I am curious to know what I may be doing wrong. I am writing in regard’s to my daughters aquarium that I am helping her with. She has a 20 gallon DT. It is new’er and had not fully cycled. Ammonia was no longer detectable, nitrite and nitrate was being dealt with.

She wanted to get fish in there before the tank was fully cycled. She got a Weather Loach, 4 Red Tail Tetras and a Male Beta. This was not all at one time, but there was not adequate time for the biological filtration to adjust (it wasn’t even fully developed yet). Her Beta developed ICK or at least the first observed with it. Her Weather Loach was next to develop spots. The Beta did not make it, but the Loach has survived. The Tetras looked unaffected but in my quest to deal with ICK they were lost. I have read a lot about the tank transfer method and was attempting that. We were using 2 5 gallon buckets, 2 heaters and aeration. We treated the water with a water conditioner, made sure the temperature was matching and transferred the fish. I think we made it 5 days into it. We had an initial transfer and then two other transfers, one was early because a tetra died. The final outcome was an aborted procedure because all 4 Tetra’s died and we did not want to kill the loach as well, which is now back in her display tank.

At this point, she will not be getting any new fish to allow her tank to finish cycling and to allow us to deal with the ICK.

Why in the world did all her Tetras die????? They looked the healthiest. Can water be aerated too much? Ammonia was being checked daily and we had Prime if it started to creep up? I'm not certain what was being done wrong in relation to the TTM.

 

[NRB]

Sorry to hear about the fish. ICK is one of the most frustrating things you can have happen to a tank. I had it a few years ago, and I tore the whole tank down for a few months.

I don't think there was anything you necessarily did wrong. I think it is possible to over oxygenate the water, but probably not the cause of the tetra deaths. While ICK is the white spots you visibly see that is in the adult form. The juvenile ICK is not necessarily visible. The fish probably had it on them and then by moving them to a bucket they released more into the water and over the 5 days it attacked the fish until they died.

It is extremely hard to kill ICK. I know there is medicine out there and some say increasing the salt content will help, but just be careful dosing medicine and salt with the loach. I think one method you could try is to raise the temp gradually and keep it at that temp for a week or so. Also keep doing water changes to help get rid of the juvenile ick. If it can't find a host to attach to it will die off.

Most tanks have parasites in them, but if parameters are correct and you do water changes, it normally isn't a problem. Once you get everything up and running, just start slowly with adding fish until the tank is cycled.

Just try to tough it out. Aquariums are awesome, but occassionally you have to deal with these things.