brittneyrose
Aquarium Advice Newbie
- Joined
- Oct 14, 2014
- Messages
- 1
Some background:
We have a 29 gallon tank that was fishlessly cycled - took about 6 weeks. Then we added some plants and then fish. We got all our fish with 1 week of each other after it had finished cycling. The most recent change to our tank would be the new filter, a Fluval C4 that we added during the last week of August.
Our current water parameters are pH - 7.2, Ammonia - 0, Nitrites - 0, Nitrates - .1-.2 and the temp is 76. We use the API master test kit. The last water change was Saturday and we typically do 20% once a week.
Until everything started going wrong this week the tank was stocked with - 2 Yoyo Loaches, 4 guppies, 1 young angelfish, 2 Electric Blue Rams (mated pair). Now we have 1 loach, 2 guppies, 1 angelfish, 2 rams.
About a week ago, one of the female, and very pregnant, guppies started acting stranglely. It seemed to have trouble swimming and would swim erratically near the top of the tank then get very lethargic and sometimes go stiff. There was nothing else strange about it's physical appearance or behavior. We did some research and chalked it up to pregnancy. A few days ago it started hanging out in plants and seemed like it was hiding there and on the bottom. This sounded exactly like what it should do right before birth so we weren't worried. It died yesterday sometime overnight.
Then, yesterday evening, a male guppy died. It was not acting strangely. It did have some raggedness to its fins, though. We thought the angelfish was nipping them because it can be a bully sometimes when we feed them. I looked into fin rot but the descriptions really didn't match up with how the little guy's tail looked so...*shrug*. We were actually actively watching the tank when it died and everything seemed completely normal with it right up until it sunk and stopped breathing.
Now, today, after not seeing much of our loaches all day I set out to find them. They love to hide in our rock, under the substrate and in plants but I was worried because of the 2 guppies. I found one dead under the rock. They were both acting just fine. Both were happy playful silly loaches the day before and now one is dead. It wasn't even pale.
Yesterday and today I've noticed the remaining two guppies are acting strangely. One won't leave the bottom of the tank and is acting exactly how the pregnant guppy was the day before it died (hiding, lethargic). The other one is at the top of the tank and doing the weird erratic swimming thing then going stiff as a board for a few seconds. It looks like very mild swim bladder problems or something. It's often on its side and like it can't control its movements well.
The angelfish isn't eating. It's usually voracious and attacks both flakes and frozen foods but neither of them are enticing it at all starting yesterday. We feed once in the morning and once in the evening and I haven't seen it eat a thing yesterday or today. It's staying towards the back of the tank and barely moving around.
The rams have not changed in behavior at all. They eat, they chase each other a bit, they swim around in a pair.
None of the fish have spots of any kind - red, black, white. I can't see any gold dusting or protrusions. We did have ich right at the beginning from buying our rams at Petco, but we took care of it with Ich Attack more than a month ago.
Please help us figure out what could be wrong. We're worried we're going to lose the whole tank.
We have a 29 gallon tank that was fishlessly cycled - took about 6 weeks. Then we added some plants and then fish. We got all our fish with 1 week of each other after it had finished cycling. The most recent change to our tank would be the new filter, a Fluval C4 that we added during the last week of August.
Our current water parameters are pH - 7.2, Ammonia - 0, Nitrites - 0, Nitrates - .1-.2 and the temp is 76. We use the API master test kit. The last water change was Saturday and we typically do 20% once a week.
Until everything started going wrong this week the tank was stocked with - 2 Yoyo Loaches, 4 guppies, 1 young angelfish, 2 Electric Blue Rams (mated pair). Now we have 1 loach, 2 guppies, 1 angelfish, 2 rams.
About a week ago, one of the female, and very pregnant, guppies started acting stranglely. It seemed to have trouble swimming and would swim erratically near the top of the tank then get very lethargic and sometimes go stiff. There was nothing else strange about it's physical appearance or behavior. We did some research and chalked it up to pregnancy. A few days ago it started hanging out in plants and seemed like it was hiding there and on the bottom. This sounded exactly like what it should do right before birth so we weren't worried. It died yesterday sometime overnight.
Then, yesterday evening, a male guppy died. It was not acting strangely. It did have some raggedness to its fins, though. We thought the angelfish was nipping them because it can be a bully sometimes when we feed them. I looked into fin rot but the descriptions really didn't match up with how the little guy's tail looked so...*shrug*. We were actually actively watching the tank when it died and everything seemed completely normal with it right up until it sunk and stopped breathing.
Now, today, after not seeing much of our loaches all day I set out to find them. They love to hide in our rock, under the substrate and in plants but I was worried because of the 2 guppies. I found one dead under the rock. They were both acting just fine. Both were happy playful silly loaches the day before and now one is dead. It wasn't even pale.
Yesterday and today I've noticed the remaining two guppies are acting strangely. One won't leave the bottom of the tank and is acting exactly how the pregnant guppy was the day before it died (hiding, lethargic). The other one is at the top of the tank and doing the weird erratic swimming thing then going stiff as a board for a few seconds. It looks like very mild swim bladder problems or something. It's often on its side and like it can't control its movements well.
The angelfish isn't eating. It's usually voracious and attacks both flakes and frozen foods but neither of them are enticing it at all starting yesterday. We feed once in the morning and once in the evening and I haven't seen it eat a thing yesterday or today. It's staying towards the back of the tank and barely moving around.
The rams have not changed in behavior at all. They eat, they chase each other a bit, they swim around in a pair.
None of the fish have spots of any kind - red, black, white. I can't see any gold dusting or protrusions. We did have ich right at the beginning from buying our rams at Petco, but we took care of it with Ich Attack more than a month ago.
Please help us figure out what could be wrong. We're worried we're going to lose the whole tank.
I would suspect water chemistry or bacterial infection. 
