Fish Stressed please help!

[dmp100482]

Hi I dont know what to do. I have had my 30 gallon fresh water for 3 years and my fish randomly became stressed. I have a puffer whos colors have darkened and he is randomly swimming into walls and plants and my 3 ciclids are not coming out of their territory to eat the food. I did a water change yesterday of about 25%. Changed the carbon on my filter, and cleaned out the pads. My filter is a fluval 204 and from the tests i have been running, my nitrate is between 40ppm and 80ppm and my ammonia is 0. I added some marine salt yesterday to make my water slightly more brackish to make my puffer less stressed but he is still acting about the same. the salt level is about 1.004 right now.

I know i need to check the pH level but I am out of options. Please help!

 

[sombunya]

Not sure if pH is a problem.

How often do you do water changes? Those Nitrates seem a bit high and water changes are the only way to lower them, other than adding live plants.

Be sure to use PRIME when you change water.

 

[unwritten law]

you should keep the nitrate under 40... that could be it

 

[Lone Wolff]

+1 on using the prime asap. It will de-toxify the Nitrate until you can get the level down to a more tolerable amount.

pH shouldn't be an issue at all if you've had teh tank for 3 years. ASSUMING you haven't changed where you get your water to add to the tank. Your fish will have long since adjusted to the pH levels of your tap water.

 

[dmp100482]

I have never heard of PRIME, i will have to go pick some of that up. I used 2 capfuls of amquel plus to reduce the nitrate today, but i dont know if it will affect anything when my ammonia is already low. My ciclids were swimming around just now when i got home, but my puffer does not look any better.

In regards to water changes, I use my tap water and purify it with the normal amquel products. I have to admit that I do not do many water changes, the last one i did was probably 6 weeks ago.

Changes to note, I just moved the rooms my tank was located in, the current room is my bedroom with very little natural light and i keep my tanks light on 10-12 hours a day.

I also wanted to know about adding live plants. Do i have to change out my rocks with sand and are they complicated? I have never tried the live plants thing.