neon tetras dying.

[claw]

I start to keep a lot of neon tetras lately, and it seems that they die pretty quickly, the water parameters are ok, am I missing something??!

[zilla870]

what size of a tank do you have? how long has it been set up? how many fish are in the tank?

[Blucat]

neon tetras are not the hardiest fish actually, they are th opposite to hardy! Did you just do a water change? what are the water parameteres?

[Kari]

It would help to know what the water parameters are, and what other fish are in the tank with them. Also...you didn't get the neons from Wal-Mart did you? I had alot of trouble with neons from there.

[claw]

The water parameter are 0 ammonia 0 nitrite and around maybe between 20-40 nitrate. I have some shrimps, 3 guppies and a corycat in a 10 gal. The others are all doing fine, but the neon tetras seem to die one by one. No, I did not get them from kmart :P

[zilla870]

how many tetras do u have?? how long has tank been set up?? how long after tank cycled b4 putting tetras in tank???u should wait 8 wks b4 putting sensitive fish in tank!! neons r very sensitive!!

[SteveM]

Originally Posted by claw

The water parameter are 0 ammonia 0 nitrite and around maybe between 20-40 nitrate.

I lost a few neon tetras when my nitrates used to be in that range. Once I got nitrates down to 10ppm the tetras stopped dying. Maybe you just need to do more frequent partial water changes if you want to keep them.

[pitt420dude]

How much do you pay for neons? My lfs has 5 for 7bucks. Is this pretty good? I would really like to not have to replace them. I was thinking of just replacing the school of 7 that I usually keep with German Blue Ram Cichlids but they are finicky too I heard. All my other fish are doing so well i dont get it, it is really frustrating becasue they are such a cool fish and so neat to watch, they are also the only schooling fish I have so I want to keep them. (My four tetras dont school why?)

[SteveM]

All the shops around here have neons for $1.99, so 5 for $7 is better than I paid

From what I have read, to get the neons to "school" takes a group of at least 6 (exact number debatable), and a tank large enough for them to actually feel separated from the others if they don't school. I currently have 4 in my 29G and they usually stick together, but when they were in my 12G they pretty much went their separate ways. I have 3 more in QT waiting to move in with the 4 in the 29G, so I'll know better in a week or so if the larger group improves the schooling behavior. I think I read somewhere that having something else in the tank that they consider a threat improves schooling, but I guess there is a fine line between schooling and being eaten

[claw]

My tank have been set up for like more than half a year, I have 3 guppies in there. I bought like 10 neon tetras, now only have 3.
By the way, I bought 6 small tetras for $2.99 here. But among all the fish in that LFS, they specify that they do not guarantee neon tetras to live within a week time frame.

[SteveM]

Originally Posted by claw

I bought like 10 neon tetras, now only have 3.

My personal theory is that neon tetras take it upon themselves to prevent overstocking your tank. In other words if you put too many in they will die until the tank is no longer overstocked.

Ten neon tetras by themselves in a 10G would be overstocked IMO, and with your other fish I think you just had too many. More frequent water changes or a bigger tank is what you need.

[Kari]

I had 6 neon tetras and 6 red glow tetras in a tank together, with mollies and platies and a few female bettas. They all stayed together alot, and did pretty well until some of the other fish in the tank got sick, and I added a med (or combo of meds) that killed them all off very quickly, within 12 hours. I hope to get more someday, once I know better how to take care of them. They also kinda hung out alot with the harlequin rasboras I had also had in there. (the rasboras died as quickly as the neons did, I didn't lose any of the other types that time though)

[claw]

Die another today.
10 neon for 10 gallons!? Are you sure? They are pretty small though...

[SteveM]

10 neons x 1.5" = 15" fish in 10G, well above the 1" per gallon rule of thumb. Add in your guppies and cory and you're above 2" per gallon.

Neons being a schooling fish I don't think there would be a problem with crowding, so really its a question of the water quality. If you are willing to do PWC often enough to keep nitrates down (below 20ppm IME) and your other params stable, then I suppose you could put in as many as you can fit in the tank. Overstocking isn't necessarily bad, but it does take a lot of work to do it successfully.