Saltwater & Reef

cubsfan85 · 04-10-2011, 04:45 PM

I'm so upset and frustrated. We've had for a while a platy that wasn't acting quite right, but we didn't know how to treat him because he was showing no obvious symptoms except for lethargy and eventually he stopped coming out to eat. Then last week, he had started to breathe heavily, and right before he died he lost his ability to stay upright.

Wednesday night I noticed one of the guppies started breathing really heavily too and acting funny, so we went to Petsmart to see what we could find. I ended up getting Tetra Lifeguard since we didn't know exactly what was wrong. By the time we returned 30 minutes later, the guppy was dead. The platy finally died on Saturday. And today, one of my original guppies, who was totally fine last night was dead.

Water parameters are Ammonia 0, Nitrite 0, Nitrate 20.

I have 2 guppies and a dalmation molly left in the tank. I also have a mystery snail but he's living in a bucket while the medicine is being dosed. They all look fine right now, but that doesn't seem to mean much any more. I'm really starting to get upset because I just don't know what I'm doing wrong. I've been researching all kinds of fish diseases and none of them have shown any symptoms except for the heavy breathing, and of course, death.

Deckape · 04-10-2011, 04:50 PM

What is (was) your male to female ratio of the guppies?

cubsfan85 · 04-10-2011, 04:53 PM

All males. It's only a 10 gallon tank and I didn't want any breeding.

Deckape · 04-10-2011, 04:56 PM

Well it wasn't what I thought then. I will give your problem more thought. It isn't because your tank isn't cycled because of your numbers. Sorry this is happening to you and your fish.

Deckape · 04-10-2011, 05:03 PM

I am going to have to defer this to someone with more experience with this issue. I AM SORRY

Kat1103 · 04-10-2011, 05:19 PM

How long have u had these fish? And how long has the tank been up and running?

Shadowraven · 04-10-2011, 05:47 PM

Your nitrates look a little on the high side of normal at 20. It is possible that it is nitrate poisoning. Check your water parameters again and if it is the same, do a 50% PWC right away to get those numbers down.

If your fish are exhibiting the following symptoms, it is likely to be nitrate poisoning:

Fish gasp for breath at the water surface
Fish hang near water outlets
Fish is listless
Tan or brown gills
Rapid gill movement

There chemical solutions as well, but try the PWC first and recheck you water again. If it is still too high you may need to use chemicals to get it down until you can get this problem back under control. Once you're done doing that we can go from there.

Let us know.

Shadowraven · 04-10-2011, 06:11 PM

I was just reminded that I am not always as clear as I should be. Nitrates can go as high as 40 or 50, but are better at lower numbers. If fish are stressed in some way, a reading at that level could affect them.

I can't think of anything else right now. What you described sounds like nitrate poisoning. I was having a suspicion that there may have been a problem with your last test. So check it again. We should still try a PWC to see if there is any improvement with your fish.

I was thinking that this could be a case of "old tank syndrome". But once again I typed before I thought and it came out wrong, sorry! I'm also being distracted by my son.

The site at this link has a good article about old tank syndrome.

cubsfan85 · 04-10-2011, 09:59 PM

The tank has been set up for a few months. The fish were purchased at different times, the newest ones being purchased just a couple of weeks ago.

I believe the two guppies left are both the new ones, from a couple of weeks ago. The dalmation molly is one of the original fish I got after the tank initially cycled, so he has been around a while.

The nitrates had crept up a bit high last weekend when I tested before my weekly PWC. Well, high being as in ~40. To my knowledge it has never gone higher than that. I'll test again and do a PWC.

cubsfan85 · 04-10-2011, 10:13 PM

Ok, I re-tested. The nitrates were a little darker than 20, but not quite 40.. so I'm thinking about 30. I went ahead and did a 40% PWC.

Tonight was also the last dose of the medicine.

Deckape · 04-10-2011, 10:16 PM

Good luck and hope all turns out well.

Shadowraven · 04-11-2011, 12:17 AM

I think that was the problem, but I admit that I wasn't 100% sure. I had nothing else from your description. Did those symptoms look like what your fish were doing?

In any case let us know how it's going. If that wasn't it we WILL track down this problem!

cubsfan85 · 04-12-2011, 02:22 PM

I added the last dose of medicine on Sunday night. Last night, I cleaned the gravel really well and did a PWC. I also added the snail back, who was thrilled to be out of his bucket, and scooted all over the tank.

The remaining fish look good right now, but so did the others before they suddenly died, so I'm not letting my guard down just yet.

Shadow - some of those symptoms did fit. Rapid gill movement, listlessness. They didn't really gasp at the surface, though they tended to hang out near the heater for some reason. Would a nitrate level on the high-end of normal really cause a die off? Perhaps in conjunction with something else going on in the tank? If so, I hope the Lifeguard took care of that part of it.

What's a good time period to wait before trying to add back fish? We are not in any hurry as we think some of our new arrivals may have introduced something nasty in to the tank to cause all of this! I just wonder how long we should wait to be sure whatever was in there is gone.

Also, the box of Lifeguard says you can use it when introducing new fish to prevent diseases from spreading (paraphrasing). We just have the one 10-gallon tank and no QT tank... do you think that is a good idea or necessary option? Kind of expensive if you do the full 5-day dose and also a pain since Snail would have to be moved out. But, might be worth it to avoid a mess like I'm in now.

Shadowraven · 04-13-2011, 01:20 AM

I'm not sure if that alone (at 20) would do it, but I was sure that it was a major contributing factor. If they were already stressed, that could seem to be a high level to them. Especially if something was introduced to the tank

The prevailing standards on nitrates say up to 40 or 50 is within parameters, but not as far as I'm concerned. I like to keep them below 20. IME it helps to alleviate a host of problems.

Also, the fish don't have to exhibit all the signs of a problem for that to be it. Just as long as they are meeting a majority of them and yours were.

Check through your gravel (something could be in/under it), under ornaments, around plants, etc. Something is keeping the nitrates up. Your fish have been out of the tank for a while, so I don't think it should be staying that high without something to fuel it.

Begin introducing your fish back to the tank soon. We can't keep leaving in the bucket, because it probably be starting a cycle of it's own and then we will have problems coming from that.

cubsfan85 · 04-13-2011, 09:37 AM

Oh, no, the fish have been in the tank the whole time. Just the snail lived in the bucket because he couldn't get the Lifeguard.

I meant replacing our losses with new fish.

cubsfan85 · 04-22-2011, 07:01 PM

Sigh, found another guppy dead today. The snail was eating it.

I didn't notice anything wrong with him, but I've been out all day. We are down to the dalmation molly and one guppy. I'm beginning to think I'm just not cut out for fishkeeping.

Nitrates have been kept around 10. I have no idea what I'm doing wrong.

maxwellag · 04-22-2011, 07:46 PM

I think it's a sickness from the new fish from the pet store. Try doing a 100% water change and get that tank cycled asap, it might help if you have some medication for cycling fast.