Newbie - need some help

[dwencel24]

Hello everyone,

I'm a new owner of a freshwater aquarium. Most of the basic info about my tank is on my profile. I have lots of problems right now in my tank and I need professional and advance advices from you.

This will be long. Please bear with me.

I had a 10 gallon before. Had an ich infestation (an injured fish started - that fish died along with my pregnant fish - both of them are mollies). On this case, I used medication but didnt work. Other fishes survived including the scaleless. I decided to upgrade to 20 gallons because I believe I have over stocked. So, I have same number and type of fishes including 3 mollies. Two of them were new. The next day after the purchase, the two new pregnant mollies had ich. I increased the temp to 85. It didn't work because those two died long with one molly that survived the first ich infestation in the 10 gallon. The remaining fishes I have are the ones listed in my profile. I'm currently observing for another possible infestation. In this case, no medication. I'm not a big fan of medication. I am a chemist major so I know these stuff in medications.

1. First question. How long should I observe my fishes just to be sure ich infestation won't occur again? It been two weeks since the last infestation.

2. Based on my profile, do you think I still have overstocked? I just went today in an aquatic shop for water test. They said that my nitrate and nitrite are high and advised to add more bacteria since the aquarium is new and since I just changed 25% water yesterday. They also mentioned that I have too much bottom feeders.
I added about 20 ml of bacteria supplement in my tank now.

Here's another problem. I bought the water wisteria and anacharis yesterday and decided to soaked them in water with bleach due to snail, parasite and ich anxiety. Now, my wisteria' leaves are kind of melted - some have holes and some lost there green part. The anacharis have the worst case. Majority of the leave turned transparent. I rise them many times after the bleach like 5-6 times and soaked them to decloronated water before introducing to my 20 gallon tank.

3. Will they survive? I immediately turned on the lights. I am planning to buy the API leaf zone hoping for my plants to regenerate or survive.

4. My water wisteria by the way have small white salt-like grain under some of the leaves. Looks like a plant pest on normal garden plants - if you know what I mean. What are those?

Just to inform you, I love bottom feeders especially cory catfish. I have three different types - peppered, emerald and albino. They do school most of the time.
I also have two different types of khuli loaches - black and stripped. I also have 4 ghost shrimps.

5. Based on my profile, will it be bad to add 1 or 2 corries?

By the way, after the last infestation, we decided to buy a quarantine tank and quarantine the cory cat, khuli loach, guppy and zebra danio we bought last week - these areincluded to the list I have except the cory. The cory died by the way. When I woke up this morning, the cory was not in the tank anymore. it might have jump out of the aquarium due to stress of loneliness. The QT is beside the 20 gallon so the cory can see the other fishes and the other cories. Its been a week since we bougt them. It was swimming back and fort last night. I never thought that it would be its last moment. I just added the remaining ones to the 20 gallon today. The QT is a 10 gallon with internal filter and a thermo. No heater yet due to summer high temps here. It still running now without fish. I just hope that the fishes I added to my 20 gallons don't have any illness whatsoever.

Thank you very much in advance for any advise you can give. I want to solve any possible problem by this week. You see, I am a very busy student - will be taking a 4-week math class this summer. This will be insane for sure. And I'll have less time on normal semester - but will have enough time to do maintenance though.

[dwencel24]

I just received the water quality test (TDS tester) that I ordered online today. It measures in ppm. So I checked the available water in our house now. Carbon-filtered drinking water is 29 ppm. Tap water from kitchen sink is 78ppm. The QT water coming out the filter is 92 ppm. And the worst, 20 gallon tank water that is coming out from the filter is 102 ppm!!!

I don't know what kind of stuffs this thing measures. But surely, based on the ppm measurement, the 20 gallon tank has more stuff than the carbon-filtered drinkable water. It could be bad or good. Heres a factor I have in mind: the high ppm from my 20 gallon might be due to the high nitrate and nitrite (as the person from the aquatic store mentioned) and probably other stuff such as conditioners ingredients.

Does anyone have experienced using water quality tester? Based on the given accepted ppm measurement, the 102 ppm measurement on my 20 gallon tank is under the acceptable water.

Here's the given table:
0-50 ideal drinkable water, RO, DI, distillation etc.
50-100 carbon filters, mt. Springs, aquifers.
100-~200 hard water
~200-400 acceptable tap water
400-500 high TDS from tap or mineral springs
500+ US EPA's max contaminated level

[Surfer]

I have cranked my tank up to 90 degrees before, to eradicate a heavy ich infestation. I left it at that temp for 5 days, probably a week I don't remember. All of my fish survived and are healthy. I keep my tank at a warm 80 degrees at all times, so the ich go through their cycle much faster and I'm able to see the beginnings of an "ich attack" quickly. I have a Molly, cories, and plecos and a bunch of other fish that were affected. It's risky to raise the temp that high, but as long as you have strong water flow you'll be ok.

[dwencel24]

Thanks.

As of now, I dont have any ich infestation. What I am worried about is that I might come again. Anyways, my temp is the same as yours ~ 80. Actually, my temp never come down from 80 - usually it's around 80 to 86 due to summer heatness here. I put cold water with ice on a plastic bag, wash it and let it float in the aquarium whenever the temp increase more than 86 along with running a small fan.

[Coyne]

Originally Posted by dwencel24

I just received the water quality test (TDS tester) that I ordered online today. It measures in ppm. So I checked the available water in our house now. Carbon-filtered drinking water is 29 ppm. Tap water from kitchen sink is 78ppm. The QT water coming out the filter is 92 ppm. And the worst, 20 gallon tank water that is coming out from the filter is 102 ppm!!!

I don't know what kind of stuffs this thing measures. But surely, based on the ppm measurement, the 20 gallon tank has more stuff than the carbon-filtered drinkable water. It could be bad or good. Heres a factor I have in mind: the high ppm from my 20 gallon might be due to the high nitrate and nitrite (as the person from the aquatic store mentioned) and probably other stuff such as conditioners ingredients.

Does anyone have experienced using water quality tester? Based on the given accepted ppm measurement, the 102 ppm measurement on my 20 gallon tank is under the acceptable water.

Here's the given table:
0-50 ideal drinkable water, RO, DI, distillation etc.
50-100 carbon filters, mt. Springs, aquifers.
100-~200 hard water
~200-400 acceptable tap water
400-500 high TDS from tap or mineral springs
500+ US EPA's max contaminated level

I think TDS stands for Total Dissolved Solids, and the test youre using is basically just a measurement of the amount of "stuff" in general thats in your water. I suppose its nice to know, but you'll need tests that measure more specific things, such as ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. Ich and other illnesses are usually a symptom of a larger problem in the water chemistry.

[Cactuspixie]

Fish are more prone to illness when water quality is low- I would advise against adding anything else to your tank until it has finished cycling and has been stable for several weeks. Are you changing out about 50% of the water weekly?

[dwencel24]

Sorry for late reply..
I do 15% water change every other day. I also add some small amount of biozyme to help the tank cycle.

I returned the TDS and bought the API freshwater master kit (will be arriving next week).

I am planning to decorate my fish tank and put nthe fishes in my 10 gallons. My plan is to have some of the fish in my 20 gallons after I finish the decoration and transfer fishes little by little to my 20 gallons (this is due to help my 20 gallon cycle).