Losing my clowns

[rupp3322]

I started this reef tank about 8 weeks ago. Cycled it with a damselfish. I have liverock, sand, a nexx canister filter. The first fish we put in were a percula clown and a bl. and wh. percula clown. The black and white was at the lfs for a long long time, but died in my tank in a matter of days. So we replaced with another regular percula and they did fine. Then we added a yellow and blue damsel and a sand sifting goby. Then we added another black and white percula that was in a friends aquarium for a long time. Then we added a yellow angelfish. All these fish were added about a week apart. Meanwhile water perameters were great. Then it started to go down hill. The black and white clown got ich and died. And now my other 2 clowns are showing signs of distress, not swimming around, stopped feeding on anything, and heavy breathing and gill movement. No sign of ich spots or fin damage yet. All other fish are doing great! What is with these clowns? I dont know what to do for them. I thought clowns were supposed to be easy and hardy. My lfs brings fish in and acclimates them for 2 to 3 weeks before allowing you to take them home. Please help me save my clowns before its too late.

 

[kdpuffer]

I highly suspect the water is toxic as you have added alot of fish very quickly. In saltwater you need to go slow. Adding that many fish that fast has likely over powered your bacteria that handles fish waste. The bacteria is likely still alive just that there is not enough of it to handle the large amounts of waste being put into the water. I would start with a water change ASAP.

 

[Schism]

I started this reef tank about 8 weeks ago. Cycled it with a damselfish. I have liverock, sand, a nexx canister filter. The first fish we put in were a percula clown and a bl. and wh. percula clown. The black and white was at the lfs for a long long time, but died in my tank in a matter of days. So we replaced with another regular percula and they did fine. Then we added a yellow and blue damsel and a sand sifting goby. Then we added another black and white percula that was in a friends aquarium for a long time. Then we added a yellow angelfish. All these fish were added about a week apart. Meanwhile water perameters were great. Then it started to go down hill. The black and white clown got ich and died. And now my other 2 clowns are showing signs of distress, not swimming around, stopped feeding on anything, and heavy breathing and gill movement. No sign of ich spots or fin damage yet. All other fish are doing great! What is with these clowns? I dont know what to do for them. I thought clowns were supposed to be easy and hardy. My lfs brings fish in and acclimates them for 2 to 3 weeks before allowing you to take them home. Please help me save my clowns before its too late.

You moved way too fast man. You cannot stocky even half that quickly without having problems. It can over a year or more to stock a tank properly depending on size.

If you have ich then you need to treat it. It will not go away on its own and soon will infect/kill most of not all. If you have inverst and/or coral then you need a quarantine tank for the fish as inverts and corals can not with stand ich treatments of hypo salinity or copper treatment.

 

[Bkmrsteel]

I'm still very new to salt water, but that was way to fast...

 

[rupp3322]

Thanks

Thanks for the advice. I will slow down and get hings under control.

 

[Jake337]

My question is....How big is your tank?

 

[rupp3322]

Its 60 gallons

 

[BHead707]

cycling with 1 damselfish for a 60 gallon doesnt seem like enough bioload to get a good bacteria colony up. just an observation