Ever consider "restarting" your tank stock?

[bloodlucky]

Let's say you start a new tank, whatever size you prefer. You run its nitrogen cycle, put care and logic into your stocking plan, then complete your tank. But then after a few months in, you have an epiphany and realize you want to start your whole stock over. What do you do? I am having this conflict now. My tank may or may not still have a deadly disease which after infecting its host causes it to become skinny and flattened out, and continue "wasting away" until it inevitably dies. I have spent loads and loads of money trying to treat this disease, buying CO2, taking time out of my day for extra water changes to maintain ammonia/nitrite stability for my relatively wide community stock without even getting the complete satisfaction I intended to get out of owning my "ideal fish tank." This is because the tank I have now isn't my ideal fish tank. I'm thinking about going more sophisticated yet more simple at the same time, something I haven't done before, yet should be less time and money consuming compared to my set up now.

But I still have a community of fish that have probably at least a year of their lifespan left. But being in high school, each year becomes progressively harder and more stressful and I feel like keeping up with the tank I have now is going to cause me to snap sooner or later. So I feel the best way is to restart my entire tank stock and change it up to a more simple one which would be easier to maintain (and I already have a specific plan in mind.)

I want to go from my tank which is currently more like this:

To something like this:

None of the above tanks belong to me, I'm just using displaying the contrast between the two kinds of stocking ideals that I was talking about. I guess my biggest question of this thread is HOW would I essentially restart my stock? If I return them to Petco or crappy stores, their lives would most likely meet a short end due to the poor care that those generic commercial pet stores put into their organisms.

For the record my tank is a 40 gallon, with 3 kuhli loaches, 4 gold barbs (1 in quarantine) and 5 neons. If that helps at all. Let me know if any of you have done what I am trying to do. Thanks.

 

[Mebbid]

With that stocking in a 40 gallon tank you should honestly be at about the.minimum maintenance you can expect out of an aquarium. Unless you're fertilizing daily then it can't honestly get any easier.

Looking at your tank care plan can however make your life easier. What do you do on a weekly basis for care? Water changes, feedings, testing, etc.

As to restarting your stock, tank stocking plans evolve over time. I have a privately owned lfs the in town that will take fish in trade. I actually just traded a trio of synodontis petricola for a pair of German blue rams. You could look for a similar shop in your vicinity.

 

[Fresh2o]

The big chain stores IMO do not usually take stock back. If you can locate a decent LFS then they might take back your stock. What happens to them afterwards...who knows. Might be better or it might now be.
I think we've all been through this. I have a few danios and tetras in my tank. Sure I'd like to have something else, maybe something more colorful or interesting. I just don't know what I would get instead. But at this point my tank it more plant centric and the fish are merely nitrate producers. Don't get me wrong, they are nice fish and have been with me for a while (gold tetras since 2007 and longfin blue tetras since 2012).
If you go fishless for a while, then perhaps the pathogen will be gone for good with no host. Idk. Good luck with your venture and keep us updated with any changes.

 

[bloodlucky]

With that stocking in a 40 gallon tank you should honestly be at about the.minimum maintenance you can expect out of an aquarium. Unless you're fertilizing daily then it can't honestly get any easier.

Looking at your tank care plan can however make your life easier. What do you do on a weekly basis for care? Water changes, feedings, testing, etc.

As to restarting your stock, tank stocking plans evolve over time. I have a privately owned lfs the in town that will take fish in trade. I actually just traded a trio of synodontis petricola for a pair of German blue rams. You could look for a similar shop in your vicinity.

I try to do about 2 water changes a week now as more fish are beginning to show rather odd symptoms. Hopefully the quarantine will be the last case of that horrible disease. I forgot to mention I have a 10 gal occupied by some marbled crayfish, and they're very dirty and require water changes often as well. I haven't tested my water in a while, but I found my kit. Not sure if it works anymore. I guess the stress also builds from the amount of fish in the tank I have. For example I have a neon with swim bladder function and I freak out when I see his vertical swimming get a bit more odd than usual. And the constant possibility of fish getting sick or spreading makes me paranoid as well to a certain level. I guess I'm just not completely ready to own an entire community by myself.

I may have made it a bit unclear by only posting the videos, but I sort of want to change my stock from a wide actively swimming variety to more of a central singular stock, moving from small scattered swimming fish to one big central hogger, like a blood parrot or maybe an oscar as seen in the video. By keeping only one alone it would meet the standards of the stocking limits of my tank (40 gallons being relatively intermediate but not big enough to support monster fish) and putting less stress on me and decrease the amount of organisms I have to worry about or treat for.

Not sure if there are any LFS in southern Westchester NY. I've been to one legitimate mom and pop pet store off of Central Ave. where they actually take good care of their fish and the water is crystal clear and the fish are healthy. Perhaps they will consider a trade off of my remaining smaller critters for one of their bigger central fish. After I confirm that the disease is gone, of course.

 

[bloodlucky]

The big chain stores IMO do not usually take stock back. If you can locate a decent LFS then they might take back your stock. What happens to them afterwards...who knows. Might be better or it might now be.
I think we've all been through this. I have a few danios and tetras in my tank. Sure I'd like to have something else, maybe something more colorful or interesting. I just don't know what I would get instead. But at this point my tank it more plant centric and the fish are merely nitrate producers. Don't get me wrong, they are nice fish and have been with me for a while (gold tetras since 2007 and longfin blue tetras since 2012).
If you go fishless for a while, then perhaps the pathogen will be gone for good with no host. Idk. Good luck with your venture and keep us updated with any changes.

exactly how i feel

 

[bloodlucky]

Here's an update, the quarantined barb is dead. By the time I got home from school he was barely breathing, and his stomach is inverted to an extent that it almost looks like an upside down "V" shape. IF my theory is correct about the disease attacking one host at a time, then the disease should still be in the quarantine tank and separate from the 40 gal community.

If I see any symptoms in the fish in the 40 gal again, then we have a serious problem. Just out of curiosity but does anyone know the most effective way in getting rid of a disease that still may be in your tank after there are NO fish left in it? I'd imagine letting the tank sit would kill it off because the disease would need a host, but I feel like to make sure I would empty all of the insides of the tank including the water and decor and start over entirely, which would mean another painstaking nitrogen cycle and struggling to reach that 0ppm mark for the ammonia and nitrite levels.

Not to mention I'd have to let the whole tank sit to dry afterwards in case the bacteria is still living in the damp areas. I may post a separate thread regarding this concern.

 

[Mebbid]

Here's an update, the quarantined barb is dead. By the time I got home from school he was barely breathing, and his stomach is inverted to an extent that it almost looks like an upside down "V" shape. IF my theory is correct about the disease attacking one host at a time, then the disease should still be in the quarantine tank and separate from the 40 gal community.

If I see any symptoms in the fish in the 40 gal again, then we have a serious problem. Just out of curiosity but does anyone know the most effective way in getting rid of a disease that still may be in your tank after there are NO fish left in it? I'd imagine letting the tank sit would kill it off because the disease would need a host, but I feel like to make sure I would empty all of the insides of the tank including the water and decor and start over entirely, which would mean another painstaking nitrogen cycle and struggling to reach that 0ppm mark for the ammonia and nitrite levels.

Not to mention I'd have to let the whole tank sit to dry afterwards in case the bacteria is still living in the damp areas. I may post a separate thread regarding this concern.

To be absolutely sure you will have to sterilize it. Allow everything to dry out, bleach some stuff, boil other stuff. It's a nightmare. That also means starting over at ground 0 for a cycle.

 

[bloodlucky]

To be absolutely sure you will have to sterilize it. Allow everything to dry out, bleach some stuff, boil other stuff. It's a nightmare. That also means starting over at ground 0 for a cycle.

Jesus. Any non-aquarium materials I may need for the process?

 

[Mebbid]

Jesus. Any non-aquarium materials I may need for the process?

Elbow grease

 

[bloodlucky]

Elbow grease

I feel you. Well hopefully the disease is gone after the quarantine. If it's not, I don't know how I'm going to get rid of my fish before I clean out the entire tank. Not tryna watch healthy fish die one by one, you know

 

[Mebbid]

I feel you. Well hopefully the disease is gone after the quarantine. If it's not, I don't know how I'm going to get rid of my fish before I clean out the entire tank. Not tryna watch healthy fish die one by one, you know

I know exactly how you feel. I've had issues on and off with a lot of problems like that. Columnaris and gill flukes are my enemy.

 

[bloodlucky]

I know exactly how you feel. I've had issues on and off with a lot of problems like that. Columnaris and gill flukes are my enemy.

Sounds nasty just by the name. Hopefully I can convince an LFS to take my non infected fish

 

[Luananeko]

Agreed with above suggestions that if you want to make sure the disease is dead then you need to totally dry out, bleach, and rinse rinse rinse everything.

As for your restocking ideas, don't go with an oscar. They need 55 gallons minimum (ideally 75+) for a single oscar with no tank mates. Same goes with blood parrots and most other S.A. cichlids near that size. A pair of jewel cichlids would work though.

 

[J.Mcpeak]

Which fish gets skinny disease?

A lot of pathogens need a fish host to survive, simply isolating the tank from fish for a protracted period is enough. Naturally of course you will need to maintain a cleaning schedule.

 

[bloodlucky]

ATTENTION ALL

I just thought I'd post this photo of my newly dead barb, which was in quarantine until today.



No stomach should ever look like that. Not to mention that I'm pretty sure the actual fish shrank in size. Also I'd like to put out there that I lied about him being dead on yesterday's post. He was BASICALLY dead; bent, lying on the ground but gills still moving. Well this morning he was STILL ALIVE, which meant he had suffered almost 24 hours of pain until his inevitable death. I don't think I have felt so much guilt for an organism before...

 

[J.Mcpeak]

Try treating for worms. Internal parasite.


What do you feed them?


That sucks by the way

 

[LogiBear15]

If you want a quicker way then maybe take a 5-gal bucket to keep a tiny bit of water in and then put only 1 or 2 decor items or a handful of gravel in the water.

Then get rid of the rest of the water, and dry out the decor and gravel. You may not need to bleach it if you just pour some tap water in it because the chlorine kills of most bacteria, which is why you use dechlorinated water to allow the helpful bacteria to grow.

Also, you could try to raise the temperature and add aquarium salt. I personally have been lucky enough to only get ick once on 2 baby goldfish in quarantine, but with ick or other parasites, they cant withstand much of a quick change in temperature. Also, the salt may kill them off. But the fish must also be hardy enough to withstand this but they may all be dead anyway from your disease going around.

If you decide to do option 1 (taking everything out except a little water and some decor in a 5) you can bleach the rest or whatever and then you can add some new water along with the old and the decor item in a small quarantine tank. Put in only 1 fish with that. Then see if the fish gets the disease. If it doesn't, you can transfer it all back to your 40 and use those decor thing that you saved to kick start the cycling process. This is personally what I would do. It requires a bit of thinking through but it could make it easier however if it didn't work then you would still need to bleach it all anyways...

That's my 2 cents...?

 

[bloodlucky]

If you want a quicker way then maybe take a 5-gal bucket to keep a tiny bit of water in and then put only 1 or 2 decor items or a handful of gravel in the water.

Then get rid of the rest of the water, and dry out the decor and gravel. You may not need to bleach it if you just pour some tap water in it because the chlorine kills of most bacteria, which is why you use dechlorinated water to allow the helpful bacteria to grow.

Also, you could try to raise the temperature and add aquarium salt. I personally have been lucky enough to only get ick once on 2 baby goldfish in quarantine, but with ick or other parasites, they cant withstand much of a quick change in temperature. Also, the salt may kill them off. But the fish must also be hardy enough to withstand this but they may all be dead anyway from your disease going around.

If you decide to do option 1 (taking everything out except a little water and some decor in a 5) you can bleach the rest or whatever and then you can add some new water along with the old and the decor item in a small quarantine tank. Put in only 1 fish with that. Then see if the fish gets the disease. If it doesn't, you can transfer it all back to your 40 and use those decor thing that you saved to kick start the cycling process. This is personally what I would do. It requires a bit of thinking through but it could make it easier however if it didn't work then you would still need to bleach it all anyways...

That's my 2 cents...?

Believe me I have tried with the aquarium salt, I cured my fish of ick multiple times with little effort in a matter of days by raising the temperature to manipulate disease growth and then killing it off with that good ol' salt, but this one is clearly something internal and immune to salts and such that are meant for curing externally. Not to say it wasn't an excellent suggestion though. As for your recommendation about keeping some of the water and one test fish, I had actually thought of the same exact idea as yours over dinner while contemplating solutions before restocking. Here's the problem, with my 10 gal being occupied by 2 generations of asexual crayfish, the only quarantined tank I'd have left would be the 2.5 in which I quarantined the (now dead) gold barb as shown in the photo. Which means, that this disease is currently lurking around in the filtered 2.5, so I just created a second miniature disaster of the first case >_<. So then I would need to bleach the 2.5, empty its contents, move the decor out into ANOTHER body of water and recycle the quarantine to help cycle the main tank... and I'm losing tack of what I'm saying.. haha.

Anyway this is just one method. Another one that branches directly from your idea would be to put a test guppy in the fishless 2.5 gal that housed the infected barb. If the guppy doesn't die within a few weeks, I'll know that this mystery disease is one that can't survive without a fish for a host, which would make the bleaching and restarting of my 40 gal unnecessary. At any rate, I'm thinking about creating a new thread in the "sick fish" section asking about how to get rid of a disease that can't be cured. And in the event that this "skinny fish disease" is truly one that will die out if no fish are present in the tank, I want to be 100% sure of it before introducing my new stock.

Thanks!

 

[LogiBear15]

Well if it comes down to it, using random household stuff could work as a temporary tank. It isn't see though so it you cant much see what's going on however it could be possible to do it. Even buying a small betta container for 3 dollars and adding a tiny fish like a feeder goldy or something could still give you the information you need.

 

[LogiBear15]

Btw i found that ice cream buckets that haven't been washed with soap, only rinsed very well with hot water will work as a tank if very precisely maintained