mass fish loss in less than 10 mins?

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I never top off my tanks. I do weekly water changes. I'm not really sure if its a good suggestion or not, maybe someone can correct me, but I always thought water top offs were bad. Maybe you should do weekly pwc's instead of topping off?
 
ashleynicole said:
I never top off my tanks. I do weekly water changes. I'm not really sure if its a good suggestion or not, maybe someone can correct me, but I always thought water top offs were bad. Maybe you should do weekly pwc's instead of topping off?
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I'd say doing a small top off, say less than 8% of the water volume, while also doing your doing weekly PWC's later in the week is fine .. as long as the top of water is properly treated.

But yes I can see how just doing top off's without a follow up PWC later in the week could be bad, the nitrates would just continue to build up. I personally also don't top off, if my water level's low due to evaporation, i do a PWC.
 
jcolon said:
I'd say doing a small top off, say less than 8% of the water volume, while also doing your doing weekly PWC's later in the week is fine .. as long as the top of water is properly treated.

But yes I can see how just doing top off's without a follow up PWC later in the week could be bad, the nitrates would just continue to build up. I personally also don't top off, if my water level's low due to evaporation, i do a PWC.
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Yes, but he said they only do partial water changes twice a month and top offs every week. Wouldn't that cause a high concentration of dissolved toxins or something at some point? Also I guess it depends on how much the twice a month water changes are. If you only change the water twice a month I would imagine you would have to change at least 50% as opposed to a weekly 20-30% PWC.
 
You guys are talking about "Old Tank Syndrome".
http://www.bestfish.com/oldtank.html

I've always associated OTS with high nitrAtes and pH crashes...but the TDS aspect is definitely a key point. I just think the tank would have to be much more neglected than pwc's every 2 weeks plus top offs for it being responsible. I think it would have also needed to be a massive pwc to have any type of immediate negative impact on the fish.

I'm leaning towards jcolon's idea with the municipality flushing the lines. I've also seen threads about it, and I'm not sure up to what degree a water conditioner would instantly neutralize the chlorine. However, if it contained enough to instantly kill the tank...I'd think it would have smelled like a public swimming pool coming out of the faucet.

Definitely a head scratcher :-/
 
Thanks again for the over whelming response.....

to answer some of your ?'s/ responses.....no contamination on our part.....the dechlorinator is an absolute must here...you can smell the chlorine when you turn on the tap. I have only used aquarium salt with PWC during ammonia spikes and bacteria blooms.....I did call the city this am and they have not purged the lines BUT they are doing sewer work a block away so there may be something there..but my wife said the water was clear (not discolored or anything like that).....as far as all debate over how often water changes and top offs are done.....as I said before I have done this for 15 yrs and NEVER EVER had a problem before.....this is a total first for me.....I do not use ANY other chemical products in or near my tank nor does my wife...to the extent of using water from the tank to clean the glass on the outside....and nothing new decor wise has been added since May.

UPDATE....this morning my twigfish is not looking so hot....I fear he may be gone in the next hour or so...he looks as though his scales/slime coat have or are dissolving...:facepalm:I want to do a PWC to try to save him but I work less then an hour and don't want to use the Nutrafin and nearest store that sells stresscoat is an hour drive away......:banghead:

thanks again everyone
polar
 
Did you clean the substrate when you did the PWC? Maybe you stirred up a dead spot.

Other than that, I can only think that something contaminated the tank, whether it came in from the vessel used, on someone's hands (some chemicals stick to your hands for a long time even if you wash them), or straight from your water source.
 
Polarfoot said:
to answer some of your ?'s/ responses.....no contamination on our part.....the dechlorinator is an absolute must here...you can smell the chlorine when you turn on the tap. I have only used aquarium salt with PWC during ammonia spikes and bacteria blooms.....I did call the city this am and they have not purged the lines BUT they are doing sewer work a block away so there may be something there..but my wife said the water was clear (not discolored or anything like that).....as far as all debate over how often water changes and top offs are done.....as I said before I have done this for 15 yrs and NEVER EVER had a problem before.....this is a total first for me.....I do not use ANY other chemical products in or near my tank nor does my wife...to the extent of using water from the tank to clean the glass on the outside....and nothing new decor wise has been added since May.

UPDATE....this morning my twigfish is not looking so hot....I fear he may be gone in the next hour or so...he looks as though his scales/slime coat have or are dissolving...:facepalm:I want to do a PWC to try to save him but I work less then an hour and don't want to use the Nutrafin and nearest store that sells stresscoat is an hour drive away......:banghead:

thanks again everyone
polar
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Well, if ther were doing sewer work, that seems to me like a likley culprit. I still agree with you about not using the Nutrafin stuff again though, just to be on the safe side.
I know that where I live, the city has made errors more than once that contaminated our water and it did not have a small or discoloration in any way. I am not saying this is what happened to you, but we got salmonella once and e.coli a different time in prt of our city's water supply. So, I personally can certainly see a water issues because of the sewer work as a possibility.
I am really sorry about your loss and I hope twigfish makes it!
 
This is a huge stab in the dark and is probably really silly. But is I possible that the fish became reliant in something the stresscoat provided and the nutrifin did not?
 
Ya'know, I'm going to have to run with something in the local water supply for this one.

It really does sound like something got into the supply itself instead of the conditioner or tank being contaminated.

Have you had heavy rains in your area lately?
I ask this a lot.
The run off from heavy rains or melted snow goes into the water supply, the water plants have to add extra stuff to clean the contaminated water. Remember, this is water that runs off our streets/roads etc into the sewer then off to the plant. So if you are treating your tank for "normal" conditions, you need to add extra to make up for the extra chemicals used at the water plant.

I know here, during spring/summer run off, our water is horrid. I add extra Prime now.
 
BillD said:
There are a couple of things here that should be of concern. The amount of weekly evaporation is very high. This will cause a steady increase in the TDS (Total Dissolved Solids) in the tank. After a length of time, the tank water and tap water get significantly different, which can lead to osmotic shock caused by a water change, which can kill fish. I don't think this is what caused the problem, because the amount of water added wasn't that large.
So, you need to determine if there is chloramine in your tap water. You said you tested weekly so I assume you have a test kilt for ammonia. Test the tap water.
I would suggest you get glass covers for the tank to slow down evaporation. At this point I would do some large water changes to get the water in the tank back to the same parameters of the tap water. In fact since you have only one fish left, I would change all of the water and start over.
I don't see that anything was done incorrectly here with regards to the manner in which the water change was performed. Even if there was chloramine in the water, the small amount added should not have been an issue.
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If u ads water weekly wil the fish get shock?
 
mfdrookie516 said:
So, you're suggesting they don't add dechlorinator to their tap water? That's definitely not good advice. If you're using treated tap water (not from a well), you HAVE to use dechlorinator (unless you let it offgas... but chloramine isn't that easy)

Why? Ever hear of chloramine?

Most people do, but you have to use something to remove chlorine and/or chloramine. That's not the issue at hand here.
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Lol I like how you just hate on me! Look, this is wat I do and nothing happens at all. Wat I ment by ammonia in tap water was that ammonia can kill people too so it's not good. Chlorine is also toxic in large quantities to humans. And germanium is my favorite element on the periodic table. Wat ur saying may be right, but I've never had a problem. Also individual experience may vary. Same thing happened wen I asked if using a breeder box is a good idea. Most said no. Some said yes. And in the longrun, it worked for me and the mother is safe and sound in my tank eating an algae wafer with her mate and five of her children as we speak. So ya
 
Polarfoot said:
to answer some of your ?'s/ responses.....no contamination on our part.....the dechlorinator is an absolute must here...you can smell the chlorine when you turn on the tap. I have only used aquarium salt with PWC during ammonia spikes and bacteria blooms.....I did call the city this am and they have not purged the lines BUT they are doing sewer work a block away so there may be something there..but my wife said the water was clear (not discolored or anything like that).....as far as all debate over how often water changes and top offs are done.....as I said before I have done this for 15 yrs and NEVER EVER had a problem before.....this is a total first for me.....I do not use ANY other chemical products in or near my tank nor does my wife...to the extent of using water from the tank to clean the glass on the outside....and nothing new decor wise has been added since May.

UPDATE....this morning my twigfish is not looking so hot....I fear he may be gone in the next hour or so...he looks as though his scales/slime coat have or are dissolving...:facepalm:I want to do a PWC to try to save him but I work less then an hour and don't want to use the Nutrafin and nearest store that sells stresscoat is an hour drive away......:banghead:

thanks again everyone
polar
Click to expand...

Ok how big is the tank..?
 
GhillieSniper115 said:
Lol I like how you just hate on me! Look, this is wat I do and nothing happens at all. Wat I ment by ammonia in tap water was that ammonia can kill people too so it's not good. Chlorine is also toxic in large quantities to humans. And germanium is my favorite element on the periodic table. Wat ur saying may be right, but I've never had a problem. Also individual experience may vary. Same thing happened wen I asked if using a breeder box is a good idea. Most said no. Some said yes. And in the longrun, it worked for me and the mother is safe and sound in my tank eating an algae wafer with her mate and five of her children as we speak. So ya
Click to expand...
Not hating, just point out that you're giving advice that shouldn't be given. Suggesting that someone should not use dechlorinator is bad. Chlorine is toxic to fish. Ammonia in tap water is perfectly safe for us... that's what chloramine is (chlorine and ammonia). Just because you're somehow getting by without it in no way makes it right to suggest to others.
 
Have to agree with eco23 and mfdrookie516. Anyone using municipal water needs to use a dechlorinator / conditioner to neutralize chlorine and or chloramines. Humans can deal with the amounts of ammonia & chlorine in municipal water, but the BB cannot deal with the chlorine .. it ends up killing the BB meaning ammo just builds and builds. The fish then cannot deal with excess ammonia that comes from bio-mass, uneaten food, decomposing stock and in some municipal water with chloramines.
 
mfdrookie516 said:
Not hating, just point out that you're giving advice that shouldn't be given. Suggesting that someone should not use dechlorinator is bad. Chlorine is toxic to fish. Ammonia in tap water is perfectly safe for us... that's what chloramine is (chlorine and ammonia). Just because you're somehow getting by without it in no way makes it right to suggest to others.
Click to expand...

True. But then again, how am I getting by without it....??
 
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