Fish are not doing well

[kronickhigh]

Hello, I am new to the forum. I am baffled at what is going on. I have started my hand at a planted aquarium. I have been working on my knowledge of aquariums for about a year now. I feel like I'm doing things correctly but I am encountering issues.

My fish are having issues with breathing, and two fish have died now.
the first fish that died this morning appeared to be breathing heavy for the last few days. I thought it was related to my ph being a little high.

I started injecting co2 two days ago. It hasn't been an easy process as the fermenting container wasn't getting started easily. I have a drop indicator on the tank that says the co2 is still low. I included a video as well showing that it's not tossing in bubbles at a ridiculous rate.

Brand new canister filter.

In case I was testing my water incorrectly, I took it to petco and they tested it too... looks great.

I did a water change two days ago.

pictures include water test I did just now in accordance to the specs in the book, the samples are in the same order as the color key. Co2 drop indicator, the picture wasn't as accurate as the color looks. It seems to be blue green to me, suggests that the co2 levels are still low.

I can't seem to attach the video, so here's hoping the link works. The video shows the rate that my bubbles are coming in.

I don't know what else to include. Thoughts?

 

[Delapool]

Hi, welcome to the forum

My thoughts would be to turn of the CO2 and see of the fish improve.

Also the new canister and 0 nitrate are a little puzzling. Did the fish shop also use a liquid test?

Last one would be to do a water change anyways. Assuming your water company hasn't done something different to the water (has happened), a water change may help.

 

[kronickhigh]

Thank you for the welcome. I've disconnected the co2. I did a 50% water change. There's plenty of movement on the surface of the water which I understand gets the co2 out faster.

Petco used a strip test.

What else should I be testing for? I will be traveling to work at some point so I will just have to see how they do when I get home, but everything looked as if the co2 was low even when I was putting it into the system. would the brand of yeast have an impact on the quality of the co2 produced? Lastley, what if the fish get better... am I not able to ever put co2 into the tank?

Thank you very much for your assistance!

 

[jessipanda]

How long has this particular tank been setup? Is this the year old tank, and you just added plants to it? Are you sure it's cycled? The results in the pic look like 0 ammonia, .25 nitrite, and 0 nitrate. Is this correct? While it's possible to have nearly no nitrates with a planted tank, it's still uncommon. Plants only do so much. Any sign of ammonia or nitrites would indicate that the tank isn't fully cycled. If your fish were having trouble prior to the water change, perhaps the nitrite levels were too high. Nitrites are more dangerous for fish than ammonia, so it's extremely important to keep them as close to 0 as possible. When you switched to the new filter, did you discard all your old filter media, or did you add any to the new filter?

Were/are your fish gasping at the surface? Many things could cause this...from too much ammonia or nitrite, to a lack of sufficient o2 in the water, as well as some diseases. Any other symptoms such as weight loss, bloating, swimming issues, lack of appetite, lethargy, etc?

 

[kronickhigh]

very sorry, very busy. So the tank is kind of a long story. Real fast though, I moved the last of the fish into another aquarium. It was only three little ones, two tetras and a platy. So this aquarium was up and running for a year, and then I wanted to do the naturally planted tank so I moved the fish to the other aquarium and removed all of the substrate and everything. I put a little of the water from this setup back into the tank, and I was using the same filter with a little bit of the same media. That was on February 9th. Then during the process of setting up I replaced things like the lights, the hood, the filter. I did not put any of the media from the other filter into the canister. All of my levels looked good so I thought that maybe the tank was doing well and had already established since I had used some of the old water. Maybe I'm just wrong, so the only thing in there now are the plants and ghost shrimp.

Dropbox - File Deleted - Simplify your life

that picture is another nitrite test I did this morning, and while my camera on my phone is not the greatest, without a doubt it is 0ppm, and has been.

The fish were in the tank for about a week and a half.

 

[kronickhigh]

I also forgot... when they were breathing hard they were at the bottom of the tank and often trying to hide. I haven't really seen them eating much. They appear to be less stressed in the other tank.

Edit:

Lame that this one posted but the one I typed up before it did not. I'm guessing it's because of the link to the picture.

Anyhow, the nitrite is absolutely 0ppm, my camera may not be super great on my phone, but the color is super sky blue.

So this was the tank that was setup for a year with no problems. I wanted to have a naturally planted tank so I moved the fish out and started the tank on February 9th. I used a little of the water from that tank cycle to start this one, and I used the same filter with new media with a little of the old media in it. The tank seemed to be cycling well so I put the fish back into the tank about a week and a half ago. When I put the new filter on I did not put any of the old media in it. I still have it, should I shut it down and do that now?

It also occurs to me, that I planted some dwarf hairgrass about a week ago as well and it doesn't seem to be doing so well either. I attributed it to the lack of co2, could that also have an impact on it?

 

[jessipanda]

Tank water has no where near enough beneficial bacteria to help cycle. The filter media houses nearly all the BB, and some resides in the substrate and on decorations and such. Which leads me to believe that your tank is just not cycled. How large is the tank? And how long were the fish in it before you moved them back to the other tank?

If you still have the old filter media, it's probably no good anymore. After a month, it would have to have been kept running in an established tank for the BB housed in it to have survived. If it has been kept moist this entire time, you could try, but I would just discard it if I were you. Instead, place some extra filter media in the filter of the tank where your fish are currently being housed and leave it in there for about a month. If the tanks are about the same size, you should be able to pretty much insta-cycle the new tank with that seeded material. You'll still want to constantly monitor the water parameters until you're sure the tank is actually cycled.

As for the dwarf hairgrass, it's possible the tank needs co2...this I'm not sure about. With plants, it's all about the right balance of light, co2, and nutrients for your tank. I'm successfully growing anubias, crypts, and vals in my low tech planted, but my dwarf hairgrass and banana plant aren't doing great. Still working on the right balance lol