First Time Tank Owner: Concern for fish!!

[lexicon04]

I’ve been waiting for years to get my own tank and finally my partner and I have started our fish journey! Over the past month my partner and I have been working on getting this 15 gallon tank setup and just got ourselves the first resident fishes on Saturday, a group of 6 ember tetras.

Last night, we noticed one of the tetras hanging away from the others and seeming lethargic. And this evening when I got home from work I noticed the same thing. One of the tetras is hanging by itself and (from my very inexperienced pov) is appearing to “breathe” heavily and has this white stringy substance coming out of him. Doing some googling it seems like it could be behavioral due to the fact we just got them Saturday or potentially something like a parasite/infection. His colors don’t look muted or different than his tank mates. The other 5 in the tank aren’t acting like this either, they are swimming and exploring together.

I checked the water specs with our ammonia strips and our 6-in-1 strips and everything came out normal (nothing at dangerous levels).

Basically, I’m reaching out here to ask what next steps should be for my little guy?? And should I seek parasite treatment, or does it look stress-related?? Any help is appreciated including recommendations on treatments and such as I am a noobie!

Thanks for taking the time to read!!

 

[Nate77]

Can you post the actual readings from test?
How did you acclimate? Dripping? Or float and release?
How did you cycle the tank ?

 

[Andy Sager]

I’ve been waiting for years to get my own tank and finally my partner and I have started our fish journey! Over the past month my partner and I have been working on getting this 15 gallon tank setup and just got ourselves the first resident fishes on Saturday, a group of 6 ember tetras.

Last night, we noticed one of the tetras hanging away from the others and seeming lethargic. And this evening when I got home from work I noticed the same thing. One of the tetras is hanging by itself and (from my very inexperienced pov) is appearing to “breathe” heavily and has this white stringy substance coming out of him. Doing some googling it seems like it could be behavioral due to the fact we just got them Saturday or potentially something like a parasite/infection. His colors don’t look muted or different than his tank mates. The other 5 in the tank aren’t acting like this either, they are swimming and exploring together.

I checked the water specs with our ammonia strips and our 6-in-1 strips and everything came out normal (nothing at dangerous levels).

Basically, I’m reaching out here to ask what next steps should be for my little guy?? And should I seek parasite treatment, or does it look stress-related?? Any help is appreciated including recommendations on treatments and such as I am a noobie!

Thanks for taking the time to read!!

White/ clear stringy poo can happen when a fish doesn't eat. A solid white poo is a sign of an intestinal parasite worm. Your fish's poo appears to be the first one so not a concern about parasites. The concern is why hasn't the fish been eating. There are a few possibilities. It may have been sick when you got it. It may be a younger fish so it was being harassed by the older fish in the group. It may be a subordinate male and with Tetras, even tho they are schooling fish, the males will usually create a pecking order and this one may be low man on the totem pole.
Since you have no other fish in the tank, consider your tank a quarantine tank and don't add any new fish for now. Watch the fish from afar to study their behavior and see if any of the other fish are pecking at this one. If you see that, you will need to isolate the fish from the others in order to protect it. There's not much else you can do for now since the fish are so new and the others are doing fine. ( That helps rule out other things.) Unfortunately, when fish get transported or acclimated into a new tank, some fish get more stressed out than others. Sometimes, no matter what you do, you can't eliminate 100% of the stress. The best you can do is reduce it. In the future, it's best to quarantine any new fish in a separate tank to make sure they are not carrying any diseases that can be contagious to your established tank. This thread can help you with setting up quarantine or hospital tanks: Quarantine tanks and Hospital tanks, are they really different?

Hope this helps.

 

[lexicon04]

Can you post the actual readings from test?
How did you acclimate? Dripping? Or float and release?
How did you cycle the tank ?

Sure!!
NO3 was 0 ppm
NO2 was 0 ppm
Chlorine was 0 ppm
Hardness was about 100
Alkalinity was between 40 to 80
PH was about 7!
Ammonia was 0 ppm as well!


For acclimation, we did float and release. We waited about 30min to release them into the tank.
We had a fish-less tank running w/ driftwood and real plants for about a little over a week while monitoring water quality. Added a mystery snail while continuing water parameter checks. All decorations were rinsed before adding while the driftwood boiled for a half hour and soaked for 3 days. Fertilizer and root tabs added as well as a UV light on a timer! Ran for a little over another week then added the 6 tetras.

 

[lexicon04]

White/ clear stringy poo can happen when a fish doesn't eat. A solid white poo is a sign of an intestinal parasite worm. Your fish's poo appears to be the first one so not a concern about parasites. The concern is why hasn't the fish been eating. There are a few possibilities. It may have been sick when you got it. It may be a younger fish so it was being harassed by the older fish in the group. It may be a subordinate male and with Tetras, even tho they are schooling fish, the males will usually create a pecking order and this one may be low man on the totem pole.
Since you have no other fish in the tank, consider your tank a quarantine tank and don't add any new fish for now. Watch the fish from afar to study their behavior and see if any of the other fish are pecking at this one. If you see that, you will need to isolate the fish from the others in order to protect it. There's not much else you can do for now since the fish are so new and the others are doing fine. ( That helps rule out other things.) Unfortunately, when fish get transported or acclimated into a new tank, some fish get more stressed out than others. Sometimes, no matter what you do, you can't eliminate 100% of the stress. The best you can do is reduce it. In the future, it's best to quarantine any new fish in a separate tank to make sure they are not carrying any diseases that can be contagious to your established tank. This thread can help you with setting up quarantine or hospital tanks: Quarantine tanks and Hospital tanks, are they really different?

Hope this helps.

This is so helpful!!! We’re definitely putting a halt on any additional fish until we figure out what’s wrong with this little guy and getting him sorted (spoiler: next fishes we’re planning on getting are salt and pepper corydoras!) . He is the runt of the group, so many there has been some bullying?? Definitely going to be keeping a close eye on them the next few days. But thank you so much for the response!!!! It’s so helpful!

 

[Nate77]

When you were checking water did you ever get an ammonia reading ? No3 being 0 tells me the tank didn't cycle.

I'm not familiar with aquatic plants to much anymore but I don't think they will cycle a tank. But do know they can skew readings , I'm not sure this is tge case

You are going to want to search up fish in cycle.

 

[Andy Sager]

Sure!!
NO3 was 0 ppm
NO2 was 0 ppm
Chlorine was 0 ppm
Hardness was about 100
Alkalinity was between 40 to 80
PH was about 7!
Ammonia was 0 ppm as well!


For acclimation, we did float and release. We waited about 30min to release them into the tank.
We had a fish-less tank running w/ driftwood and real plants for about a little over a week while monitoring water quality. Added a mystery snail while continuing water parameter checks. All decorations were rinsed before adding while the driftwood boiled for a half hour and soaked for 3 days. Fertilizer and root tabs added as well as a UV light on a timer! Ran for a little over another week then added the 6 tetras.

Just an FYI, you don't cycle a tank without an ammonia source. Letting a tank run does nothing to start the cycling process. ( I hope you are familiar with the cycling process. ) It just lets the filter clean the water a bit. Your hardness level is actually a little low for mystery snails as is your alkalinity and your driftwood is going to make those levels even lower so you really should decide if you want the wood more than the snail or the snail more than the wood and remove the other one. If you keep the snail, you'll need to increase the General Hardness to between 150-300 ppm and your alkalinity to between 120- 200 ppm. You'll also want to increase your pH to about 7.5-7.8 to make sure the snail has the minerals from the hardness to grow it's shell and the pH is not acidic to soften and erode the shell. Snails and real wood are just a bad combination if you don't have the right proportions.