Claireh703
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
- Joined
- Jan 13, 2021
- Messages
- 13
Hi!
I'm relatively new to all this as I was given an aquarium in May 2020 when a friend was concerned that her fish wouldn't survive a cross-country move. Unfortunately, the fish haven't had the best survival rate staying with me either. I'd love to have any advice on how to improve that survival rate before we invest in more fish.
We have a 20 US gallon tank with gravel substrate, a few live plants and some ornaments. The temperature remains at about 79 degrees. Whenever we test the levels of the water (sporadically!), they are all ok. We have never treated the tap water because it's well water but I'm now curious as to whether it's also chlorinated. We have a light that is turned on for about 12 hours a day.
We use an Aqueon QuietFlow 30 filter - we upgraded in size from the one I inherited because we had regular algae bloom and my husband thought the tank capacity was far larger than it is. (I measured it to write this post and pointed out his mistake!) We put the filter on the one side at the back so that there was a difference in water flow for the fish. The fish tend to hang out on the opposite side for the majority of time but will also swim confidently around the filter end too. We did have a few small fancy guppies that struggled with the flow in their first few days but were fine after that. We still have the original filter (Aqueon Tech 10-20) so can switch back if needed now we've realised our (my husband's!) mistake!
We use a vacuum to pick up poop and excess food without taking any water out once or twice a week. (We were doing it every other day when struggling with algae bloom but have reduced it and it hasn't made an impact on the levels when tested). We change 10% of the water once a week and change 50% once a month.
We feed them TetraMin 3-in-1 every other day... most feeds, just the flakes and I'll add some granules for the bottom feeders. Once a week, I'll use the baby shrimp instead of flakes but have to grind them up as they ignore them whole. I've tried lettuce and blanched spinach but none of the fish will eat it.
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I got the aquarium (in May) with 2 plants, 2 corys, a guppy and another fish I can't remember what it was that we'll call "the white fish". I don't know how long my friend had had these fish. I had a lot of algae bloom (tank was in the window because I didn't know better) to begin with but got over that and all 4 survived. In June, we added 2 more plants and 2 honey gouramis. In August, the white fish died suddenly - no observed illness or strange behaviour. We replaced it with another fish that I also don't know what type that we'll call "the yellow fish" and bought 2 plecos. One of the plecos died a few weeks later.
These fish withstood algae blooms, cooler temps than recommended, overfeeding and bad tank hygeine as I was still learning / experimenting. We gave the tank and all non-living things a good clean (without cycling it... I didn't know that was a thing then) when we moved in early October. (All the above info about the tank, feeding, temp, etc became consistent from then on.) In November, the yellow fish died and we replaced it with a molly.
In late December, we were away for 2 weeks. A few days before we left, one of the gouramis and the guppy began to slow down and be near the top but showed no visible symptoms. We believe the person looking after the fish in our absence didn't vacuum to debris out and we came home to a dirty tank, algae bloom and the gourami and guppy "missing" - the caretaker hadn't noticed or removed them. When vacuuming the tank, we found what we believe to be some very decomposed "bits". The plants are alive but have been in decline since.
In early January, the remaining gourami appeared to have fungus or something on it's anus but was eating and behaving fine and it passed after a week or so. We bought two guppies - one didn't survive 24 hours. I had the water tested at the pet store and they said it was all good and they replaced the guppy and I bought a mystery snail. The replacement guppy died within 24 hours. The snail was incredibly lively and entertaining (who knew?!) for a few weeks and then suddenly died. The gourami got more and more pale over the last 3 weeks but it's behaviour was good until one day this week and then died the next day. Today, the molly looks to have a little fungus(?) on its head but I'm not sure if I'm just being paranoid.
So now we have the original 2 corys, a pleco and a molly that I'm not sure if I should be worried about.
I've really enjoyed having fish (which was a surprise to me!) and I want more but I want to make sure we are doing everything correctly so that they stop dying. All advice welcome! Once we've got a healthy set-up, I'd also like to know how many fish we can have in this tank.
Many thanks in advance!!
I'm relatively new to all this as I was given an aquarium in May 2020 when a friend was concerned that her fish wouldn't survive a cross-country move. Unfortunately, the fish haven't had the best survival rate staying with me either. I'd love to have any advice on how to improve that survival rate before we invest in more fish.
We have a 20 US gallon tank with gravel substrate, a few live plants and some ornaments. The temperature remains at about 79 degrees. Whenever we test the levels of the water (sporadically!), they are all ok. We have never treated the tap water because it's well water but I'm now curious as to whether it's also chlorinated. We have a light that is turned on for about 12 hours a day.
We use an Aqueon QuietFlow 30 filter - we upgraded in size from the one I inherited because we had regular algae bloom and my husband thought the tank capacity was far larger than it is. (I measured it to write this post and pointed out his mistake!) We put the filter on the one side at the back so that there was a difference in water flow for the fish. The fish tend to hang out on the opposite side for the majority of time but will also swim confidently around the filter end too. We did have a few small fancy guppies that struggled with the flow in their first few days but were fine after that. We still have the original filter (Aqueon Tech 10-20) so can switch back if needed now we've realised our (my husband's!) mistake!
We use a vacuum to pick up poop and excess food without taking any water out once or twice a week. (We were doing it every other day when struggling with algae bloom but have reduced it and it hasn't made an impact on the levels when tested). We change 10% of the water once a week and change 50% once a month.
We feed them TetraMin 3-in-1 every other day... most feeds, just the flakes and I'll add some granules for the bottom feeders. Once a week, I'll use the baby shrimp instead of flakes but have to grind them up as they ignore them whole. I've tried lettuce and blanched spinach but none of the fish will eat it.
_________________________
I got the aquarium (in May) with 2 plants, 2 corys, a guppy and another fish I can't remember what it was that we'll call "the white fish". I don't know how long my friend had had these fish. I had a lot of algae bloom (tank was in the window because I didn't know better) to begin with but got over that and all 4 survived. In June, we added 2 more plants and 2 honey gouramis. In August, the white fish died suddenly - no observed illness or strange behaviour. We replaced it with another fish that I also don't know what type that we'll call "the yellow fish" and bought 2 plecos. One of the plecos died a few weeks later.
These fish withstood algae blooms, cooler temps than recommended, overfeeding and bad tank hygeine as I was still learning / experimenting. We gave the tank and all non-living things a good clean (without cycling it... I didn't know that was a thing then) when we moved in early October. (All the above info about the tank, feeding, temp, etc became consistent from then on.) In November, the yellow fish died and we replaced it with a molly.
In late December, we were away for 2 weeks. A few days before we left, one of the gouramis and the guppy began to slow down and be near the top but showed no visible symptoms. We believe the person looking after the fish in our absence didn't vacuum to debris out and we came home to a dirty tank, algae bloom and the gourami and guppy "missing" - the caretaker hadn't noticed or removed them. When vacuuming the tank, we found what we believe to be some very decomposed "bits". The plants are alive but have been in decline since.
In early January, the remaining gourami appeared to have fungus or something on it's anus but was eating and behaving fine and it passed after a week or so. We bought two guppies - one didn't survive 24 hours. I had the water tested at the pet store and they said it was all good and they replaced the guppy and I bought a mystery snail. The replacement guppy died within 24 hours. The snail was incredibly lively and entertaining (who knew?!) for a few weeks and then suddenly died. The gourami got more and more pale over the last 3 weeks but it's behaviour was good until one day this week and then died the next day. Today, the molly looks to have a little fungus(?) on its head but I'm not sure if I'm just being paranoid.
So now we have the original 2 corys, a pleco and a molly that I'm not sure if I should be worried about.
I've really enjoyed having fish (which was a surprise to me!) and I want more but I want to make sure we are doing everything correctly so that they stop dying. All advice welcome! Once we've got a healthy set-up, I'd also like to know how many fish we can have in this tank.
Many thanks in advance!!