Top Fin Water Clarifier for chlorine??

[noelllll]

Okay so I've had my fish tank for about 2 months now and every time I do a water change I prepare the water I'm putting in a day before changing by filling up a bucket of water and adding a bit of Top Fin Water Clarifier. When I was starting off the fish tank I went to petsmart to ask get everything set up and the guy there gave me a bottle of the clarifier and told me to do it just like that. Now that I'm looking at it nowhere on the bottle does it say anything about removing chlorine... Have I been putting chlorine filled water in my tank for the past couple months..?

 

[jlk]

Ikes! Well, your saving grace has been you prepare the water the day before so most of the chlorine is likely gone by the next day. Pick up some Prime or another decent water conditioner- what you have is just a cheap clarifier. It does nothing to dechlorinate, remove heavy metals or aid with slime coat. If your water company switches to using chloramines or flushes the pipes, you might not be quite as lucky.

 

[noelllll]

Ikes! Well, your saving grace has been you prepare the water the day before so most of the chlorine is likely gone by the next day. Pick up some Prime or another decent water conditioner- what you have is just a cheap clarifier. It does nothing to dechlorinate, remove heavy metals or aid with slime coat. If your water company switches to using chloramines or flushes the pipes, you might not be quite as lucky.

Wow eh so I've just been adding pretty much regular tap water this whole time..
Never going back to petsmart.
Think maybe that's why one of my fish likes to always hang around the top of the tank taking nice big gulps of air?

 

[Fishanatic]

Wow eh so I've just been adding pretty much regular tap water this whole time..
Never going back to petsmart.
Think maybe that's why one of my fish likes to always hang around the top of the tank taking nice big gulps of air?

Sounds more like ammonia poisoning to me.

 

[jlk]

Do you have a decent liquid test kit for your parameters? How do they look? Nothing wrong with the chain stores for buying supplies though alot of the 'advice' they offer tends to be quite suspect at best. Do your own research.

 

[noelllll]

Sounds more like ammonia poisoning to me.

How would I know that? Or fix it?
I don't have a test kit but I could bring it in to the LFS and have them check it?

 

[brennae]

I would buy some Prime by Seachem or some of the new Marineland water conditioner ( I used it and its not bad) and do a massive water change asap. If you suspect anything like amonia poisoning you need to change a lot of water asap. You can buy a test kit for about $25 at Petsmart or order one off Amazon for less than $20. Don't rely on strips they are not accurate and that;s what Petsmart will use to test your water.
You want API Freshwater Master Test Kit.

 

[Fishanatic]

How would I know that? Or fix it?
I don't have a test kit but I could bring it in to the LFS and have them check it?

Do his gills look red?

 

[jetajockey]

It'd help to know what kind of fish it is before asserting whether or not it's doing something out of the ordinary.

 

[Fishanatic]

It'd help to know what kind of fish it is before asserting whether or not it's doing something out of the ordinary.

True, but when he was saying big gulps of air, it sounded like gasping so yeah :/

 

[noelllll]

Okay I just did a 50% water change hopefully that'll help for now. I'll go pick up a real chlorine remover when I get the chance to go to the fish store.

The fish that's breathing air is an orange molly.
It looks fine no discolouring or anything unusual on it at all.
Anything else I could do in the meantime to help?