water changes, fish stress and cleaning oriments...

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an interest in aquariums or fish keeping!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

stew

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Sep 27, 2003
Messages
73
Location
BC, Canada
Hello all. I've some a few water changes now on my 3 week old 28 gal tank. My 2 gold dust mollies look scared o death afterwards they sit on the bottom or hide, then the rest of the day they will dart around ad hide behind things or stay right at the top of the tank and eyeball me whenever I get near it. I worried i'm over stressing the litle guys, any advice to minimize this weekly trauma?

Also, I picked up a large castle today bcause I had shifted in during the vacuuming and there was TONS on algea and othr nastyness underneath. I would like to make cleaning under the 2 major orniment in the tank a regular thing, but does shifting stuff arround freek the fish out? And also, is putting my hand in the tank do do so a bad thing for ph levels, or amonias or anything like that?

Any comments or sugestions would be apreciated!
 
You may want to let everything settle for a few months, doing nothing below the water besides subtle gravel vacs every 2 weeks, and make sure your fish have a spot where they can hide if they feel scared. Your tank has probably not cycled yet.. even though you see detrius and yuck stuff just let it go, make some dark hiding spots for fish, and go the gentle route.
Also u may want to turn off your lights gently at night and keep an eye on your levels.

Allivymar or other advisors will have even better advice for you though.. I suspect Allivymar will be through here soon on patrol ... hehe
(y)
I might suggest doing all this while listening to OK Computer by Radiohead it is a good old album.. :band:
 
Have you cycled your tank? Tested your ammonia and nitrite levels? Fish usually don't get that upset about a water change so I'm guessing it's a water quality issue. . .
 
I wouldn't worry too much about your fish being scared of you and hiding a lot. Mine did that for the first few weeks, too...but now, I flip open the lid to feed them and they are all there at the surface waiting for me! I guess it just takes them some time to get used to their new environment, and then they'll also get used to you and your hand coming in there. My fish don't even scurry away when I stick my arm in to adjust something--sometimes I have to brush them away from me because I don't want them to get squashed when I'm sticking a plant back into the gravel.

I read somewhere that when you do put your hand/arm in the tank, just to be sure you don't have a lot of chemicals on your skin (e.g., sunblock, insect repellent, a lot of body lotion, etc.), because these will come off your skin and may do something to the water and the fish. I don't know if this is true, but I haven't wanted to take any chances, so I've actually washed my hand/arm before AND after I do something in the tank.
 
The tank isn't cycled yet, but nitrates are present so hopefully amonia levels will drop off soon.

All the fish are very friendly, but after a gravel vac and a water top-up all the fins are clamped and I get the cold shoulder all day haha :)

I'll get some more plants so they have better hiding spots, thanks for the advice.
 
About sticking your hand/arm in the tank -- I have some gloves that go up to my shoulder, that I wear for tank cleaning. I got them from Drs Foster Smith:

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_Display.cfm?siteid=6&pCatId=8162

They are not bulky and they don't interfere with tank cleaning. They aren't totally leakproof, but my hand does stay pretty dry. Take off your jewelry when using the gloves and that may make them last for more than a few uses. Hope this helps some!
 
What the heck! Gloves??? No Fun.

Half the fun of this hobby is getting your arm wet on a regular basis!

I just plan for it. Never after using soap, oil, bug stuff, lotion. Well, regular body soap, super well rinsed.

if you are like me and need hand lotion, esp. in winter, just make sure you are finished with the tank for the day before putting any on.

Stew, Are you matching water temp. and adding enough dechlor when changing water? Having fish act that weird for the rest of the day is decidedly odd. Mine are back to normal within an hour or so. Then again, it's only been 3 weeks, perhaps they will settle down when they get used to you.
 
Just outta curiosity, what are your water params like?

If your ammonia levels are particularly high...your fish might be stressed from that, rather than the gravel vacs( how often are you doing water changes?)

I'll have to respectfully disagree with this advice, though

subtle gravel vacs every 2 weeks... even though you see detrius and yuck stuff just let it go

Detrius in the gravel can cause deadly ammonia spikes...it's a tough balance in a cycling tank, if you don't have a bio-wheel, a lot of your bacteria will colonize in the gravel, so every gravel vac is going to suck the critters out, but at the same time, you probably don't want to expose your fish to high levels of ammonia.
 
I second the motion to leave the gravel alone for a while, at least until you are cycled. Stirring it up can cause an ammonia and/or nitrite spike (or a nitrate spike after the tank is established) and that is almost definitely reflected in the behavior of the fish afterwards. There is some stress involved with housecleaning (ha, they are not the only ones who find it stressful :) ) but the fish do get used to it. Mine now come up to the vac tube and peck at the crud going past! Sounds like you are proceeding nicely, though, and you should be there in no time! After that, clean the crud in sections with each water change focusing on a certain area of the tank so you dont get it all stirred up at once. Good luck!
 
They might just be a little nervous from their time at the fish store too. Everytime the top opened up at the LFS one of their buddies disappeared...never to be seen again!!!!
 
Heh, good point julie. I wonder if its sorta like an alien abduction for them? "Uncle JimBob was just swimming past the fake plant when WHAM! This big green monster came down from the sky and took him away! Chased him all around the tank too. I hope they don't have probes..." *smirk*

As for clean hands, I do have some important info on that. There IS a disease one can catch from fish tanks; tis a distant cousin of TB called Mycobacterium marinum. Its fairly rare, but I know of 4 people who have managed to pick it up from the aquarium hobby. Without treatment it can be pretty serious. Gloves are actually a good thing; that being said I have a pair but don't always wear em. Theres a great article about it by Steve Pro here, which explains what it is and what can happen MUCH better then I (graphic pics near the end of the article so be warned): http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-07/sp/feature/index.htm

Hrmm...think I'll make that a sticky post too. Good info for everyone.
 
I've some a few water changes now on my 3 week old 28 gal tank

While your tank is cycling, do water changes every day or every other day, 10-25% of water volume to keep ammonia and nitrItes low. High ammonia and nitrItes will cause your fish much more stress than the actual act of doing the water changes.

Since your fish get stressed after water changes though, you may want to check the quality of your tap water. My water comes from a well, so it gets really cold in the winter time and I have to let it sit overnight to warm up. It all so has nitrAtes in it. On the plus side, I don't have to use a dechlorinater :)

Also, if you have an older house with copper pipes, the water will soak up some copper. So it's best to let the water run a little bit before putting it into a tank. Most water heaters (maybe all?) are metal lined too, so it's not a good idea to use any hot water.

HTH & Good Luck :!:
 
Wow thanks for all the advice!

My water parameters after 4 weeks still show some amonia and nitrites and nitrAtes showed up last week. I've been changing about 15% of the water every 5 days to keep the amonia down (its never got over 1.2) hopefully the amonia leves disapear soon, I have a feeling a bout with ICK that I medicated on week 2 may have killed some of the bacteria which is why things are going so slowly.

My tap water has 0 amonia, nitrates and nitates but the PH is a little lower than what is in my tank (it keeps climbing to 7.6) and then when I do a water change it drops to around 7.3, maybe this is whats effecting the fish?

In any case they all seem to be happy and all the fins are extended and they are eating eagerly, so its probably all psychlogical (I think you are only somthing there julie) :)

I also have 3 molly fry loose in the tank and the water change doesnt bother them one bit.
 
Oh yeah one more thing, what do I use to remove algae from the glass? Is there a special tool for this?
 
what do I use to remove algae from the glass?
If it is soft, brown algae I use a high-quality paper towel folded up. For the more stubborn green kind you have the plastic scrapers on a stick, the coarse foam on a stick (or use a credit card or a coarse sponge that is new and has no chemicals on it) and then there is the magnetic glass scraper. Your LFS should have quite an array of algae cleaning tools. There are also mitts for this too. Don't clean the back glass so the mollies will have some algae to eat :D
 
Stew,

My goldies are a bit skittish during water change, but they settled down after just a few minutes. Odd to see clamped fins all day.

It seems odd to see your tap water with pH of 7.3, going up to 7.6 after sitting in your tank. A pH change of .2 unit is enough to stress fish. However, if you do a 25% water change, the pH would have dropped only to 7.5 from 7.6 by my calculations.

Waring :- skip this if you are math phobic. :D Since pH is log scale, to calculate the new pH, I used:
final pH = log (10e-7.3 * 0.25 + 10e-7.6 * 0.75)

You may want to check the pH before & after just to be sure.


the likliest cause of the pH change is dissloved gas in your tap water, prob CO2. When the CO2 comes out of solution the pH will rise. I have heard that this may be a problem in well water, and you need to let the water sit overnight to degas it. May be you tap water actually is coming from a well? Might be worthwhile checking with your water supplier. Or experiment yourself & check pH of some aged water vs new water to be sure the change in pH is not due to something in your tank.
 
Stew wrote:

Tapadh leat an t-iasg!

'S e ur beatha! :D

I like those gloves. They are cheap, and you get a pair, but I only use one at a time. Plus you can re-use them a few times, so that's a plus. I also really like the algae removers (coarse pad) on a stick. I can get between the tank wall and the heater suction cups with it. I have a hand-held pad (the coarse foam), and the one on a stick. There are different algae removers for glass and acrylic. The glass ones are dark green, and the acrylic ones are white. You don't want to use the green ones on acrylic because they might scratch, and the white ones might not be tough enough to remove algae on glass. My tank is only 5.5 gallon, so the hand-held pad is ok for me. For bigger tanks, the magnetic scraper would be good. The pad on a stick is good for tight places and corners.
 
Time for a trip to the LFS for some algea tools... they see me and my credit card comming from a mile away :) I don't think i've ever made it out of there under 50 bux haha.

jsoong: thansk for the pH info, I will test som tap water after it has settled, that might well be the situation. I need to learn more about adjusting carbonate harness and its a tad low and might be why the PH fluctuates.

Amonia level get rise to just under 1 every 3-4 days so I think i will nedd to do changes more often for now.. hopefully the tank will cycle soon!

Now on to other problems, check out my other thread :(
 
Back
Top Bottom