Aggression during water change?

[baron1282]

So, I was doing a water change on my 55 today. Not a full blown out water change where I clean the filters and everything, just a water change where I take water out and put new water back in.

Long story short, all my fish which normally get along swimmingly (Pun intended), starting to freak out and go after one another. Nipping, and my wrasse was driving my poor puffer insane! My wrasse and puffer don't even interact that often in the tank, but are nice to one another when feeding time comes. No chasing, nothing!

So he chased the poor little guy around and nipped at him all during the water change, and I tried to help the poor puffer by showing the wrasse my hand when he got close to drive him away from the puffers corner. Now the puffer is in the corner of my tank just hanging vertically. I hope he ends up being ok. Just never seen my wrasse so aggressive before, now after the water change he is fine and all my fish are fine but the puffer.

Could it have been the fact that I did not turn off the filters and allowed the water to cascade down and cause the water to be stirred up more than normal? What would cause this trigger of aggression out of all my fish that normally act so peacefully towards one another?

 

[baron1282]

Update! Fish are fine now. Swimming next to one another no nipping. Weird how they all freaked out like that.

 

[carey]

Glad they got back to normal! Sometimes that happens though, my cichlids get all in an uproar when I do their changes too. lol

 

[dmolavi]

Mine occasionally go bat-crap crazy, both fresh and salt. My skunk cleaner will even start biting my hand every once in a while. Who knows why they do it, but the important thing is that they return to normal.

My theories have been something on my hand/arm that gets into the water and drives them bonkers, or maybe I woke them up from a nap...