Why all the bad luck?

[zacdl]

OK My fish are 1/3 that have lived. The damsel died during cycling, not surprising.
Now, the green chromis died yesterday, and I have no clue why.

WHAT IS GOING ON? Should I give up on SW?

 

[NewFishGuy]

Well....I am by no means the expert here....not even the slightly knowledefied newbie.....but I do know that the first thing your gonna be asked is what are your water parameters.....

 

[JohnNLuc]

How long ago did your cycle end? what are your water params etc? Did you properly acclimate the fish? These are all things that you should consider before throwing your hands up and quitting

 

[zacdl]

I had already posted my parameters in the ASAP post that I made that I didnt get any help out of...

Cycle ended 2 weeks or so ago.

Yes Acclimated the fish fine, it died on its 7th day, and only on the 7th day I had it did it act weird.

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?t=50104

 

[Phyl]

I'm still saying that day 7 was an acclimation issue, but that's JMHO.

 

[Brisc0]

What kind of salt do you use? What are you using for top off? Are you dosing anything into the tank, if so, what, how much, and how often? What are you feeding the tank and how often? What temp do you keep your tank at? Finally what brand of test kits are you using?

Sorry about the barage of ?'s.

 

[zacdl]

I thought 7 days would be enough time for the fish to be acclimated. Shouldnt it be?

 

[zacdl]

Best salt there is, Instant Ocean
Well Water (Natural water found in the ground)
Nope, not dosing anything.
I was feeding veggie flakes or something like that, and just a small amount every day or two (They didnt eat so I put some in there in case they "find" it later)
Temp of tank I try to keep at 78-80
Seachem Test Kit

 

[Brisc0]

Okay, I give 20 to 1 odds that its the well water. If your not running it through RO/DI filtration than I bet your dumping tons of heavy metals and other things into your tank that will never show up on any test kits. Secondly the seachems aren't bad kits for getting through a cycle, however I would go with salifert from now on if you want to really know whats going on in there. I have found that sea chem and red sea are very unreliable and often times show you what you "want" to see, not whats actually there.
Buy yourself 30 gallons of RO/DI water or get yourself a filter and make up a fresh batch of IO water. Let that sit for 12 - 24 hours with a powerhead to circulate it and then drain every drop out of your tank. There is a chance that your substrate and live rock could have sopped up some of the stuff in your well water, but only being 7 days you may be okay.
This is just my opinion, but I feel pretty secure in giving it to you.

 

[zacdl]

The tank sat for like 2 weeks before I started the cycle, so i bet its a sopped up as it can be.

Where can I get RO/DI Water at and how much is it? I dont want to go to the store every single time I need more water.

 

[Brisc0]

I would like to get some other peoples opinions on my coments about your substrate and live rock before you act on that. I know that when I was on well water we had to filter it to crazy degrees because we had lots of metals namely lead in the source. I am saying that about your substrate under the asumption that its not so much nutrients cause you haven't had a monster algae bloom or at least you didn't mention it, which leads me to believe there is another contaimination in the water like metals. I figure that if copper treatment for fish illness makes live rock unusable in anything other than a QT tank that you may have a similar situation but im not 100% and since remove all your substrate would pretty much require a new full cycle, lets see what some other people say before we get that going through your head perhaps uneccisarily
However I confidently stand by the need for RO/DI water and you can get it for about a buck a gallon at the store or you can buy a filtration system for your water. Its cheaper in the long run, but it is a long run to hit that point. Your local marine store likely also sells water. I have a kent HI-S RO/DI unit that I use on my water and I like it quite a bit.

 

[zacdl]

Is RO/DI water the kind with the blue jugs you see at walmart?

 

[Phyl]

You can buy a RO/DI unit from eBay for under 100$. Just check with the seller before buying it and make sure you don't need anything special for the unit that they sell given the fact that you're using well water (there might be an issue with water pressure... something I've read but not experienced since I have city water). I think the well water is an interesting issue. You never know what's in that from pesticides to heavy metals. I doubt there's much lead in it if it has passed water tests for potability. I think you can take it to a pool supply place and have it tested for metals. Call around first. At least then you'd know what metals you were dealing with.

 

[zacdl]

We have city water too, it has clorine in it though thats why I didnt use it.

I was thinking of doing like I used to do with freshwater tank, reserve some city water in a jug or something and when I need to do a water change or top off for evaporation (once a week or so) the clorine is long dead. I am thinking I may just do it this way.

I bet it does have metals in it, I think I will do the city water thing from now on (when I get my LR I will take out some of the water and replace with city water thats been sitting out a while)

 

[Edmonton Eskimo]

Usually well water is high in sulphur as well. When I lived on a farm I would haul jugs and jugs of water for my fishtanks. I'm really glad I'm in the city now.

 

[EJS4]

Read your other post do you still have nitrites in the tank. Nitrites are toxic to fish, not as toxic as ammonia but still toxic. Nitrite will drop to zero when cycle is done. Check your parameters again and let us know. You may have just put the fish in to early

 

[ellisz]

Did the fish ever eat? One reply earlier said it did not. If it never ate, it was probably sick already. I had 3 chromis die for no apparent reason when I first started. A fish could hang around for 7 days if not eating.

I have always used Seachem kits too.