tank help please

[paige2731]

hi i currently have a 55G tank with blue cichlids and 5 pictus and 1 old algae eater the problem is we did a recent water change now our pictus are not eating and the cichlids are only eating a little not the frenzy we are used to we took a test below i will read of the results we are using fluval brand chem's to treat

GH 180
KH 240
PH between 8.5-9.0 it looks too close to tell
NO2 .5
NO3 150-200 another close one
if anyone can help us i would be very grateful

 

[gilpi]

Wow this is tough, temperature drop?

 

[paige2731]

no steady at 82 i actually checked just to make sure we have well water and we usually do a change every other week and of course treat weekly this is the first time we have had this kind of reaction to a water change

 

[paige2731]

update a lot of the fish are swimming at the top which is unusual too. also we had a death my yellow cichlid has died

 

[BigRedsReefs10]

You shouldn't be getting a nitrite reading in an established tank and is the nitrate in ppm?

 

[paige2731]

yes it is measured in ppm does that help?

 

[BigRedsReefs10]

200 ppm can be lethal to fish aswell as ammonia or nitrite. You should really keep them below 50 ppm. Sounds like your tank is over stocked and your not doing enough maintenance to keep up with your large bio load. Large wc's are going to be your best friend (50%+) until you get the levels to where they should be.

 

[paige2731]

okay i read your reply and have done a 50% water change is that what wc means? any way should i do a retreat too and which one the red bottle (nitrite and ammonia ) or the blue bottle (chlorinate treat) or both thanks again you have been so helpful

 

[BigRedsReefs10]

okay i read your reply and have done a 50% water change is that what wc means? any way should i do a retreat too and which one the red bottle (nitrite and ammonia ) or the blue bottle (chlorinate treat) or both thanks again you have been so helpful

Yes wc = water change, sorry. I'd do another 2 50% changes over the next couple days as that should get you to ~25ppm. Not sure on the water treaters your referring to but one should definitely be used when doing a wc, prime is the most popular I believe.

 

[paige2731]

ok did the treat of course checked our number before bed still a little higher than normal this morning all but one pictus is dead cichlids are fine now and did a retest all levels are normal NO2 and NO3 are gone and while our GH is still a little high we figure it is normal for our tank thanks to the well water do you think we should do another wc? i think i know what might have threw everything off the firts wc my husband had me clean all the decorations and scrub all this gunk looking stuff off of them his friend told him that the stuff growing on the decor in our tank was actually harmful to our fish what do you think?

 

[gilpi]

We could all help more knowing some history about the tank... Did you do a full cycle and how many fish do you have in it? What kind of filter? Not knowing much about the tank's history, I would also say water changes are your best friend, and that goes for any tank but more so if you have issues.
If the "stuff" growing in decorations is algae, it's ok, this happens over time with lighting.
The only thing you should never clean too much is your filter and when you do only rinse the floss or fluff in some tank water lightly and use it again, your goal is to never change it and if you do, leave a piece of the old dirty floss with the new one.

 

[paige2731]

what is a full cycle?
we have now 15 cichlids and an algae eater we had 5 pictus but they all died nearly at the same time
we have 2 penguin filters and an aqua clear (i think)
we use fluval brand chemicals and we have had the tank a little over a year now
is there any other info you need? i am not sure what else would be important

 

[gilpi]

What I meant by full cycle is the nitrogen cycle where you put the tank and filter trough the process of building beneficial bacteria to support the fish by turning the fishes waste in the water into a less harmful, cleaner water. The process is way too long for me to get into it here but you'll find many articles on the net on this. I'm assuming you just recently added the fish to the tank not long ago? And did your tank/filter go through this cycle?

 

[gilpi]

I personally don't think 15 small African cichlids is too much in a 55g these fish do better in overstocked (crowded) tanks, I'm on my second 55g African tank, first one is going on 4 years, I started the first one with 15 I now have 10, had to weed out some aggressors, the second one has 14 small mixed African cichlids. Filtration is most important to keep that many fish in a tank, I'm using two small canisters in one and one small canister in the other plus frequent water changes.

 

[paige2731]

no i honestly have never hear of full cycle till you mentioned it. yes we recently added fish 3 pictus and 2 blue electric cichlids the cichlids are fine we did the new addition chem treat which is 10ml per 10 us gal. our penguin filter has a bio wheel on it that i remember my husband saying that it can not be cleaned because it has all the good bacteria that the fish needed so we are always careful with it again we have 3 filters on this tank (personally i think its overkill) we added salt last night because we found an article that said salt can lower NO levels unfortunately another problem is the fish are not very hungry I am used to a fish frenzy now they barely even notice the food

 

[gilpi]

In my opinion, never enough filters!
Not cleaning the bio wheel sounds good, I'm not sure if those bio wheels support enough bacteria though. If there's any floss or sponge material inside the filter, make sure to just keep reusing it after a rinse....very important not to replace it, since that holds lots of good bacteria.

 

[paige2731]

okay the aqua clear has a sponge a bag of carbon and what looks like bits of cork to me so that is good what about them not eating nobody even seems interested at all

 

[gilpi]

okay the aqua clear has a sponge a bag of carbon and what looks like bits of cork to me so that is good what about them not eating nobody even seems interested at all

I can't answer as to why they're not eating but don't drop food in the tank that won't be eaten, that will turn into another problem. These are big eaters and even when they look hungry you must be careful not to over feed. Is strange that none of them are eating at all?
As far as the filters, as I mentioned, do not replace the sponge, just a light rinse every once in a while. The carbon though I believe needs to be changed every couple of months or so? I don't know since I don't use carbon. May someone else can chime in?

 

[paige2731]

most of them are not eating at all out of the 15 only about 6 have ate anything and yeah i agree with you on the big eaters part our daughter comments all the time that they are hungry hungry cichlids(instead of hippo) that is what is worrying me right now is because i am used to a feeding frenzy and now no one even seems interested at all

 

[paige2731]

could they be sick or have gotten some kind of disease the fish we just bought are from walmart