NEED SOME HELP QUICK! Golden Ram lost most of her colour and breathing heavily

[philipraposo198]

This morning she was looking fine, at least I didn't notice anything but honestly wasn't looking all that hard.

I did a small wc about 17gallon out of my 75g, this is the second time I ever did a water change, the first time during the end of the cycle it was a larger one almost 50% and she freaked out and almost went like a statue for a while.

I don't know if the wc has stressed her out and thats what this is but I am nervous. all other fish are doing perfect.

she has lost most of her colour and is breather heavier than normal.

I do wc with 5g bucket that I dose small bit of prime per bucket (1ml).

she is swimming with my male and picking at the ground. she was eating this morning too after the wc.

any ideas of what is going on?! i have no clue. i looked up diseases and can't find nothing that would compare to what she is going through. the only thing i can think of is stress. but why.

going to test water parameters right now. its been an hour since the wc.

 

[Brookster123]

Do you test your nitrates and ph? The problem with infrequent wc's is the water sits in the tank and nitrates rise and rise, the sudden drop can shock fish, rams especially. We know you know everything there is to know already but there is a reason why pretty much every member in here does weekly 50% wc's.... Welcome to the "learning" group of aquarists Phillip...

 

[philipraposo198]

my nitrates are below 5ppm each day.

i test daily still.

0,0,3-4ppm and ph is normally 6.4

 

[Brookster123]

Did you temp match the water to atleast a couple degrees??

 

[philipraposo198]

Yes it stayed at 79-80.

Ammonia 0
Nitrites 0
Nitrates less than 5

I think I found the problem... The pH was 6.4 and its not almost 7.4. I didn't think a small WC would change the ph so ddrastically

I dont know what I can do for her at this time. A my other fish are not showing the same signs. She is still acting normally though.

 

[Brookster123]

That was my next guess, ph out the tap is usually different than after it ages 24 hrs.. Not much you can do really..

 

[philipraposo198]

Think she will make it??

 

[Brookster123]

Well the thing with stressed fish.. This could leave her more susceptible to any diseases is the tank.. Best thing is just keep a close eye on her for the next few days and feed good quality food.. Consider gassing off water for changes as to avoid this in the future, also a more structured schedule will do you some good!

 

[Pamiam]

From my experience

Some fish are just prone to stressing out during water change, the ones that I have that stress out easily, I make sure I do not add the clean water near them. I also add small amounts of water at a time ...making it more of a slow stream entering the tank and I have the air bubble things set to max to mix the water more quickly.

I hope your fish does well the next water change

 

[treemanone2003]

If it were me, I'd do more water changes more frequently. But I'm old school and cycled all my tanks without chemicals from a tv show. Then again, being so old school and with my 20 years of research, I know all about 24 hour pH swings, aging water, off-gassing and so on. Also, adding dechlorinator to the TOTAL TANK VOLUME and not just the actual WC volume is recommended.