Hallo everyone,
I have a question concerning my 4 year old 10.6 inch pleco. Tank mates: one guppy, one otocinclus.. in a 20 gallon tank. I had this fish gang for 2 years together now, with only minor problems. I adopted the guppy and the pleco from a colleague so they have been together for quite a while before.
A few days ago (Wednesday night) the pleco started acting weird..not being able to suck on the glas anymore for a long time, not being able to swim properly (almost like paralyzed; laying only on his side) and certainly no appetite. It takes a lot of strength for him to pull himself up and it is so painful to watch.
There were multiple occurrences before that within the last two months: filter broke and I had to wait a few hours over night to get a new one from the store. The radiator in my apartment broke and the fish were in the cold (- degrees) for a while (the guppy almost died). Due to this incidence we decided to move them after everything had stabilized to the new apartment since there is more maintenance there compared to the previous one. We changed quite a bit of water in the process. I actually wanted to keep more of the old water, but a guy who helped us move the fish (he called himself an expert) said we only need one or two gallons of the old water...still mad that I let this happen. The move was over 3 weeks ago.
I got the tank water checked on Thursday morning and all the values ammonia, nitrites, nitrates were almost off the chart. The person working at the pet store gave me the bacteria mix they use for their tanks and we carefully changed a bit more than a quarter of the water over the last few days not to shock the pleco even more.
Tested the water again yesterday, ammonia went down as well as the pH. Nitrites and nitrates are still high. Added some more bacteria yesterday and now I play the waiting game.
Could this be ammonia poisoning, stress or swim bladder problems? The guppy and the otocinclus are perfectly fine. Was it just too much stress for the pleco?
I hope you guys can help me. Thank you very much in advance.
I have a question concerning my 4 year old 10.6 inch pleco. Tank mates: one guppy, one otocinclus.. in a 20 gallon tank. I had this fish gang for 2 years together now, with only minor problems. I adopted the guppy and the pleco from a colleague so they have been together for quite a while before.
A few days ago (Wednesday night) the pleco started acting weird..not being able to suck on the glas anymore for a long time, not being able to swim properly (almost like paralyzed; laying only on his side) and certainly no appetite. It takes a lot of strength for him to pull himself up and it is so painful to watch.
There were multiple occurrences before that within the last two months: filter broke and I had to wait a few hours over night to get a new one from the store. The radiator in my apartment broke and the fish were in the cold (- degrees) for a while (the guppy almost died). Due to this incidence we decided to move them after everything had stabilized to the new apartment since there is more maintenance there compared to the previous one. We changed quite a bit of water in the process. I actually wanted to keep more of the old water, but a guy who helped us move the fish (he called himself an expert) said we only need one or two gallons of the old water...still mad that I let this happen. The move was over 3 weeks ago.
I got the tank water checked on Thursday morning and all the values ammonia, nitrites, nitrates were almost off the chart. The person working at the pet store gave me the bacteria mix they use for their tanks and we carefully changed a bit more than a quarter of the water over the last few days not to shock the pleco even more.
Tested the water again yesterday, ammonia went down as well as the pH. Nitrites and nitrates are still high. Added some more bacteria yesterday and now I play the waiting game.
Could this be ammonia poisoning, stress or swim bladder problems? The guppy and the otocinclus are perfectly fine. Was it just too much stress for the pleco?
I hope you guys can help me. Thank you very much in advance.