Fish at Top of tank, what to do

[mickitiffen]

I have a 20 gal FW tank, inherited from my late husband. I have 2 parrot cichlids, 1 pleco, 2 small cat fish, 1 clown knife and a tri colored shark.
Today the shark was wedged behind a rock and when I moved it I noticed his eyes were cloudy. His scales looked patchy and I saw a few spots that looked red. I called the local fish store who told me to use the Ick out sensitive. I had just done a w/c on 8/20 but they advised another one. I did that today and vacuumed out the tank.

The Eheim filter seemed a little sluggish so I tried to clean up the base part. I have green plastic air stone (?) and I tried to clean that to make sure it was producing a good stream air bubbles. Not sure if this needs to be replaced.

Tonight it seemed the fish were swimming near the top to the tank which seemed odd. The pleco is in a corner near the top. I added stress zyne thinking the fish may be stressed and also some aqua ban. My nitrates had been high before the w/c. Not sure why as I change the water/vacuum 1x a month. Earlier I had added Amquel plus and fertilizer 005 as well as aquarium salt.
Any suggestions about what else I could do for these fish? I am concerned about them.

 

[BillD]

Everything but possibly the small cats gets too big for that tank. Once a month water changes are not enough. How much are you changing each time? I would do a 50% water change immediately, and another tommorrow. Adding chemicals willy nilly is seldom helpful. If you are doing enough water changes, no chemicals should be necessary, other than de chlor. I would get rid of the parrots, pleco, knife, and probably the tricolor, as that tank is too small for them.

 

[mickitiffen]

fish at top of tank

So despite having just put in the meds for the sick shark (cloudy eyes)--ick out sensitive and having just changed the water 12 hours ago you are suggesting I change the water again right now.

The fish seemed pretty stable until this. A home service aquarium co. brought the fish. I realize some can get big but they seemed ok.

Would you put the meds for Ick back in if you suggest I change the water again tonight?

 

[neilanh]

I agree, but for now we should look at the problem at hand.

What are your water parameters? Ammonia, nitrIte, nitrate. What is the temp of the tank right now.

I think you're adding too much stuff to the tank. Hold off until we ID what's going on, then treat accordingly. If your kid got sick, you wouldn't just start pumping them with stuff unknowingly - it's the same philosphy in fish keeping.

What is fertilizer 005? I'm not familiar with that at all.

Cloudy eyes is not a sympton of Ich. Do a large (50%) water change, and add in only a good dechlorinator when you change the water.

 

[JohnPaul]

First off, welcome to Aquarium Advice! I wish your first visit here could have been for happier circumstances, but know we'll do the best we can to help you out.

There is lot to ask and a lot to say here, and it's really late and I'm tired so I probably won't think of everything, but let me throw out a few things to get started.

First of all, the person you spoke to at the pet store was a moron (most pet store employees are, sadly, when it comes to fish). The symptoms you described for your sick fish are not even remotely close to the symptoms for ick, so telling you to use ick medicine was horrible advice. Stop using it immediately and put it away. It sounds instead like some sort of bacterial infection.

Do you have another, small tank lying around that you could use as a hospital tank? If so, the best thing to do is to remove the sick fish from your main tank and put it in the hospital tank, and then treat the fish with a combination of Maracyn I and Maracyn II. Most pet stores should carry those. They are best used in combination because one treats gram-positive bacteria and the other gram-negative bacteria, so between the two you can kill basically any bacterial infection that exists. That being said, it sounds like your little guy there is in pretty bad shape already; it might be too late to save him even with good antibiotics. It's really important to treat the sick fish in a separate tank, because if you put these antibiotics in your main tank you will likely also wipe out the beneficial bacteria in your filter, which you don't want to do.

Secondly, if you have some test kits, it would help us immensely if you cost measure and then share with us:

• the tank temperature
• the pH
• ammonia
• nitrite
• nitrate

This will help us diagnose what's going on in the rest of the tank. What I suspect might be the case is that there hasn't been much tank maintenance lately, which has caused water conditions to deteriorate, which stresses the fish. Stressed fish are much more susceptible to infections, which could explain the bacterial infection the shark has. The poor water conditions could also explain the fish hanging out near the surface. If indeed your water conditions are bad, then the best thing you can do is water changes. Depending upon how bad the water is, you may need to do up to 50% water changes every day for the next several days. But we won't know for sure until you can post the numbers.

As long as the airstone is producing bubbles, then you don't need to replace it. Making sure the canister filter is working well, though, is very important, as it seems to me you are probably overstocked for a 20 gal tank. Aquarium salt is usually useless (there are a few rare exceptions), and as for the fertilizers I'd hold off on them for now until we figure out what in your water is stressing your fish.

 

[mickitiffen]

Tank Temp is 81
5 in one test showed this.
ph 6.2
gh 300
nitrates 80
nitrites 10
ammonia 0.0

The fish store person felt that it was fungal not bacterial (maybe b/c of the patchy scales?

If the shark has to go into a sep tank. Does that need a special filter/heater/air stone too? I only have an extra heater.

I don't recall my husband doing much except water changes and cleaning the sides of the tank. I change water every 3-4 weeks (50%) and vacuum. What else should I be doing?

 

[SpeedEuphoria]

Nitrites and nitrates are high, you should do another large water change(as big as you can) and do as thorough gravel vac as you can

 

[mickitiffen]

Just changed the water and only added the dechlorinator. No one has come to the top yet.

 

[SpeedEuphoria]

Keep an eye on your fish and test your water frequently for awhile. For some reason you have Nitrite which should be 0 if the tank is cycled. Have you by chance replaced the filter media with new?

Nitrates being high is normally from not enough water changes/cleaning the gravel.

If the fish are large then you have too many or too large of fish for that size tank.

 

[mickitiffen]

tank problems continued

Last night I changed the water again.

This morning the tank was very cloudy and 2 were dead (pleco and sick shark). Others didn't look good.

I did another 50% water change immediately.

I took the Eheim filter apart and replaced the white pad, took out the dirty water, rinsed off the pump head (hope I got it back together right). I had some trouble restarting it but it seems to be going again.

The base part that sits in the bottom of the tank has algae on it. Any advice on how to clean that? I think someone told me to take it apart but it didn't seem to budge and I was hestitant to attempt it for fear I wd not get it back together.

I didn't have any of the white pasta looking substrate around but was thinking I should change out some of that? I have been told different things--change it, rinse it, leave it alone (good bacteria).


Anything else I should be doing?

Will the water look cloudy for awhile.

 

[Alaris]

I took the Eheim filter apart and replaced the white pad, took out the dirty water, rinsed off the pump head (hope I got it back together right). I had some trouble restarting it but it seems to be going again.

You do NOT want to change the filter media. You have lost all of your beneficial bacteria. The white cloudiness you see in your tank is a bacteria bloom. You probably lost your plecos due to an ammonia spike. Your tank will now go through another cycle. Please test your water parameters again.

 

[neilanh]

Sorry for your losses Micki...

I think she lost the fish prior to swapping out the pads, if I read it correctly.

But, Alaris is correct, the white cloud is most likely a bacteria bloom, indicative of probably a mini-cycle occuring. You'll want to watch your ammonia and nitrIte levels daily and do a 50% water change anytime either of them gets to 0.5ppm

 

[mickitiffen]

tank problems continued

Yes- The fish died before I cleaned the filter media. The manual had said change to white foam pad occasionally. Was this wrong? What about the pasta like substrate stuff? The filter was running slow that is why I did this change. I changed 50% of the water too today. Water is settling down but still not that clear. Will check the levels and report back.

 

[mickitiffen]

ammonia 0.0
Nitrates 40 ppm
Nitrite 5 ppm
hardness 150
Alk 300
ph 6.8

Fish don't seem hungry
Temp is 81.
Filter is running as is air stone
Any suggestions?

 

[JohnPaul]

Nitrite can severely bother fish as low as 0.5 ppm and can be toxic starting at about 1.0 ppm. So right now the issue seems to be the nitrite; you are looking at having a level 5x of what is lethal to some species.

It looks to me like your tank has essentially un-cycled. Which means the only thing you can do right now is large water changes very frequently until you re-establish your filter bacteria. If there is a LFS near you (or another hobbyist you know) that can give you some filter gunk out of their filters, that would help a lot in getting your cycle restablished.

 

[mickitiffen]

need help with nitrites

I have been doing daily water changes b/c I had some fish loss and the nitrates were high
I am down to 4 fish in the 20 gallon tank--2 catfish, 1 cichlid, 1 ghost knife
I have been testing the water every day and nitrites are still high 10 ppm
nitrates 40
GH 300
KH 40
PH 6.8
Temp 81

I have only added decholrinators following advice on this site. However the test kit says to add aquarium salt for high Nitrites. I also have Amquel + which says it removes nitrate, nitrite, ammonia, chlorine and chloramines.

What else should I be doing to bring the nitrite down???

I recently replaced the green plastic ring airstone tip with a long bubble wand which really doesn't seem to be producing that many bubbles.

I had cleaned out the filter (Eheim) and replaced the pad. As I still had the old pad I added back some gunk per the advice here. I did have an some trouble w/the filter. When it got moved it seemed to lose it flow--not sure why. I turned it off and restarted it and it seemed to pick up.

Is there anything else I should be doing for these fish? The knife is swimming along vertically and I am worried about it.

 

[JohnPaul]

You're doing about all you can...

• Keep up with the PWC's, 50% every day until you get your nitrite levels under control
• I wouldn't worry about adding any salt (catfish tend to not do well with salt anyways)
• If it seems the fish are gasping at the surface, then maybe lower the temp just a little bit (2-3 degrees, in increments of about 1 degree per hour). The lower the temp, the more oxygen is able to dissolve in the water.
• cut back the feedings to once every other day, and be sure there is absolutely no uneaten food left in the tank

I must admit, I do not totally believe your nitrite readings. Are you using test strips or a liquid reagent kit? I ask because on my API (Aquarium Pharmaceuticals) test kit, the highest possible reading you can get for nitrites is 5.0 ppm. I think they figure anything higher than that, everything is dead anyways. If you really do have nitrites of 10.0 ppm, then it is a miracle anything is left alive in that tank at all. It could be that the AmQuel is binding/detoxifying enough of it that the actual levels of "free" nitrite are significantly lower. When you do the PWC's, for the time being add enough AmQuel to treat the entire tank, not just the amount of water you are changing. (So essentially, dose AmQuel at a double dose.)

There is not much else you can do for the nitrite. There are only two ways to get it out of your tank; to "physically" remove it via PWC's, and to biologically remove it by having your filter bacteria break it down into nitrates. However, it sounds like you had a die-off of at least some of your filter bacteria, which means the biological breakdown is right now far less than it needs to be...so until you can get those bacteria built back up again, you just need to keep doing the PWC's.

It would actually be really helpful to know your ammonia readings as well. For the time being, GH KH and pH reports are not needed.

 

[mickitiffen]

need help with nitrites

The kit I am using is a jungle kit. It has 5 tests in it and it does show 10.0 as a nitrite test level.

I used a separate ammonia kit 2x and that was fine 0.0. LFS got similiar reading.

I also went to the LFS and their all in one kit was showing high nitrites as well.

Is it possible to add too much Amquel. you say to treat the whole tank 20 gallons instead of the water put in? I am concerned for the ghost knife.

I dialed down the heater temperature. It is a visitherm stealth so I think it is working properly.

I also poked at the base of the eheim that sits in the tank b/c it seemed to be running slowly and it picked up more force for the stream. I am beginning to wonder if the filter is the problem. As I noted I changed the white pad and emptied the water (some said this was a bad thing to have done).

I have been changing the water every day but I was told by LFS and a friend that could disturb the fish. Everyone on this forum says to keep the changes up so I tend to believe the group rather than these others.

 

[Alaris]

The test strips are completely unreliable. You'll want to get API Freshwater Master Test Kit. You can find it in Petco/PetSmart for $20-35 or you can find one online for under $20.

 

[mickitiffen]

test kits

I already have a sep ph and ammonia test kits.
Should I be buying nitrate and nitrite kits instead of master kit since I have those?