Fish slowly dying?

[Tobykourtney]

I have a 75 gallon with pressurized co2 and a finnex ray 2 with an dual T5ho aquaticlife fixture. My tiger barbs are slowly dying off my parameters are ammonia 0 nitrates 20 phosphates 1.5 nitrites 0 ph 7.2. I was running 3 bps the last 3 days and they are dropping one by one so I started to lower it now I'm down to 2 bps and they are still spending a lot of time at the top. My drop checker was lime green in the beginning and now it is a really dark green when I got home today. I use a Rex grigg 27 inch reactor made of 2 inch pvc. Can someone please help me figure out what is wrong.

 

[jwh0818]

Are you turning your co2 off at night?

 

[Tobykourtney]

Are you turning your co2 off at night?

Yes co2 goes off an hour before the lights do and turns on 1.5 hour prior to the lights coming on. An aerator comes on while the lights are off. Ty don't start gasping til the end of the photoperiod

 

[Rivercats]

Turn your CO2 bps down if they are gasping at all. What color is your drop checker showing?

Also you phosphates are high. I specifically run mine at 5-10ppm due to all the non green plants I keep but 20 is really up there. I'd do some WC's to lower it down to about 5ppm and if your dosing phosphates lower the amount your dosing.

 

[Khuligirl93]

I think they meant nitrates are 20, and phosphates are 1.5

 

[Tobykourtney]

Turn your CO2 bps down if they are gasping at all. What color is your drop checker showing?

Also you phosphates are high. I specifically run mine at 5-10ppm due to all the non green plants I keep but 20 is really up there. I'd do some WC's to lower it down to about 5ppm and if your dosing phosphates lower the amount your dosing.

Phosphates are 1.5. Nitrates are 20 sorry for the confusion drop checker is showing dark green now, but 2 bps seems really low to me does anyone else think so?

 

[Rivercats]

If the fish are gasping then it's too much. I run my 55g at 1bps and the plants do fine.

 

[Tobykourtney]

If the fish are gasping then it's too much. I run my 55g at 1bps and the plants do fine.

That's good to know I guess my starting point was to high. How much light does your 55 have?

 

[Rivercats]

I'm running medium light with an Aquatic Life 2 bulb T5HO fixture and have 1 6000K Midday Geisemann bulb and one Aquaflora Geisemann bulb.

 

[Tobykourtney]

I'm running medium light with an Aquatic Life 2 bulb T5HO fixture and have 1 6000K Midday Geisemann bulb and one Aquaflora Geisemann bulb.

I'm running the same fixture and bulbs plus a ray 2 on my 75.

 

[Tobykourtney]

I'm running medium light with an Aquatic Life 2 bulb T5HO fixture and have 1 6000K Midday Geisemann bulb and one Aquaflora Geisemann bulb.

I'm running the same fixture and bulbs plus a ray 2 on my 75.