HEEELP! (Or what the hell just happened?)

[rabbit]

I spilled about half a bottle of soda water into my aquarium and the fish have all gone nuts (possibly lost all of them. ) what the heck happened? I read the ingredients and all it says is that there is CO2 and sodium bicarbonate.
Considering that less than 1L fell into a 20gal. tank I didn't think that the concentration would be strong enough to do anything. Ive done about a 1/2 water change, but the fish look like they're gonners...
Why did it affect the fish like that?

 

[Enki]

OMG dude that is terrible! There is a LOT of co2 in soda water, it is really acidic but the sodium bicarbonate should buffer that a little bit, but probably just enough to keep it from burning you while you drink it...

What kind of fish? What Ph do they prefer? Can you do a Ph test?

 

[BrianNY]

There's a lot of CO2 in soda water. Aerate the tank heavily to speed up the out gassing!! The fish could be simply stressed or O2 deprived. Are they breathing heavily?

 

[rabbit]

yeah they're all panting and gasping. The tank holds some gourami, some black widow tetras and a couple neons, as well as a rubber nose catfish. But its HEAVILY planted and theres a HOB filter that operates at max output hanging from it, that is actually for bigger aquariums. So there's lots of aeration just from that since it creates quite a bit of current. Plus I did the half tank water change.... oy. And here's a reason why you shouldn't keep open topped tanks next to the kitchent counter at counter height.

 

[Enki]

Aeration should help for sure, if you have a spare powerhead or even if you can borrow one off another tank for a little while to increase surface movement it will probably help a lot.

 

[ferret]

Anything that can create surface agitation would be good. Well, as long as it isn't a blender or something.

 

[BrianNY]

I'd just throw as many air stones as you can in there rabbit. I think you can lick this thing!!
Brian

 

[rabbit]

well Ive got some serious aeration goin in there now. Hooked up an old air pump I had. I think I managed to save the black widow tetras, but Im afraid that most of the neons died. A couple seem to be fighting for it, but...
The gourami look like they might survive too. That surprised me. The black widows seemed to be able to handle the stress better. I always thought that gourami were labyrinth fish. I wouldve thought that if any, they would be able to survive bad water. Huh... you learn something new every day.
On the plus side, my Cabomba pearled quite nicely. D'OH!

 

[Sati]

Boy... good luck. I'll be anxious to hear how everbody fares.

 

[Fruitbat]

In addition to the carbon dioxide, most sodas have caffeine and phosphoric acid in them. Caffeine could cause increased respiration in fish....though I've never seen any studies on the effects of caffeine on aquarium fish . Phosphoric acid might be able to cause gill irritation. The water change idea is probably the best one.

 

[QTOFFER]

OH NO!!!!!!!!

Selzer water is a saturated solution of CO2 in water. According to my trusty Merk Index, the solubility of CO2 is 880 ml in 1 L water at 20o C. With a density of 1.976 mg/ml at atmospheric pressure, that works out to 1739 mg/L, or 1739 ppm.

Assuming that 0.5 L of selzer water got into your 75 L tank, the concentration of CO2 would have skyrocketed to 11.6 ppm (0.5L/75 L x 1739 ppm)!!!
I've read that anything above 2 ppm CO2 is lethal.

Any chemists out there, please check my calculations for accuracy.

Then, as Enki pointed out, the excess CO2 in your tank formed carbonic acid (H2CO3(aq)) resulting in a drop in pH.

Your poor fish! Did any survive? Keep us posted.

 

[QTOFFER]

I just read your subsequent posts. Thank goodness it's a heavily planted tank. Between your massive water change, increased aeration, and the presence of the plants, your fish may pull through this.

I would suggest keeping your lights on for a few hours to encourage photosynthesis.

The plants (but not the fish) will thank you for this mishap!

 

[BrianNY]

Good point QT but he'd need a botanical garden to photosynthesize that much CO2.
I didn't want to bring up the ph drop because those fish are so stressed that another violent swing in the other direction would almost certainly kill them.
That's why I wouldn't do to much water changing right away.

The best hope is to get as much O2 in that tank as quickly possible and gas out the CO2. The ph should rise gradually and those fish he has left will hopefully survive.

 

[rabbit]

Final casualty tally: 10 neon tetras DOA, 1 otto and one clown loach MIA (can't see them or their bodies anywhere, so might still be alive).

Bloody pain in the butt this was.
(Bottle doesnt say anything about caffeine in it. Not to say there isn't any. Ive heard that its not something that has to be listed. Oh well.)

 

[rabbit]

oh, and QT, it was unfortunately closer to a full litre. (The bottle was 2L) damn... poor little buggers.