My sick and dying fish...

[Bren]

I am looking for help on what to do now. Here is the story. Two weeks ago saturday our female dwarf Gourami was a little lathargic. Over the next 4 days she and the male died. They looked bloated and the tank was treated with a blue anti-bacterial medicine. Then a day or two after the Gourami died our Corey's started getting sick. We continued treatment and during that time 2 Corey's died. Then the third got sick.

We brought that third corey to the fish store and the guy looked at him. He, like the other two, had inflamation of the gills and didn't show bloating like the gourami. He dies, and we were left with just are 10 neon's(Yes everyone thinks it wierd they were okay while the corey's and gourami died).

Then we treated the tank with a medicine called super ich plus in a green box, it is blue and stains things. It has malachite green and quinine hydrochloride. After two or three days the neons stoped eating. We figured this was due to the stress and the medicine but were worried, they still looked healthy though. That brings us to this morning, the sixth day after treatment(every other day treatment) began.

We went to do a water change before work to start removing the medicine and one of the neon was at the top doing barrel rolls. He is breathing rapidly, and looks bloated. I couldn't get a good look at his gills, but they weren't awful.

Now I have no idea what to do, the super ich plus was given in a dose of 11 drops instead of 14 because the fish guy said 14 might kill the neons. We love these neons, they are the oldest fish in the tank(about 4 months) and we got them as babies. They have just been so wonderful and I hate to have to watch them die and not know why. I am getting desperate, what can I do.

Last thing, we have watched the water over the last two weeks and done regular water changes. PH is around 7. The amonia, nitrate and nitrites are all fine.

We did do a 25% water change this morning and thought we would do another tonight...

Thanks for the help

 

[Somonas]

I don't know what is going on, so I won't try to recommend a cure, but I will suggest how you can prevent any more deaths...

Sorry to hear about the fish deaths, lets see if we can fix things. First I want to double check that the ammonia/nitrite/nitrate are fine - ammonia and nitrate should always be undetectable (zero) and ideally nitrate should be under 10ppm. this is a start.

this is what I would do - do another good waterchange, I don't know how big the tank is, so I'll say 25% for now, put carbon in your filter to pull out all of the medications. We want the water as clean as possible, everything at zero, the PH stable and the temperature steady at 78.

Give it a few days.

Throwing too much medication in a tank right away cannot be good for anything - including your biological filtration. This is why I want to pull out all of the meds, a virtual "reset" button so to speak.

Are these fish eating food?

Are they otherwise OK (no spots, lesions, marks, film on the scales, etc). ??

 

[Vyache]

My fish just got suddenly sick as well. The Nitrates in my tank are a little high (20ppm) but everything else tests great. My fish were breathing rapidly and lathargic then all broke out in ich. The only thing I can remember that coinsides with the start of the problem is that my wife used laquer in the room they are in to make her Holoween costume. When I got back home from the college I could still smell it. Now I give her a bad time when she paints her fingernails in the livingroom with the fish. (the smell makes me leave the room) I remind her that she wouldn't torture her pet rat that way, but I don't think she believes it can affect the fish.

 

[Bren]

More information, more questions

They are not eating.

One of the neons has lightend color, otherwise they are fine as far as I can tell.

So frustrating, thanks for the help.

Also, I currently run only a UGF. I am going to replace it with an Emperor I think. How should I introduce carbon? Should I go buy a Emperor tonight and slap it on the back? Over filtration shouldn't hurt right?

 

[qaffle]

I'm not sure, but if your water looks clean, all your "levels" appear to be fine, and your water hasn't changed, It would be important to keep the stress to a minimum. I'd try and give them a little time before adding a new filter. Then again, it probably is more important to get the meds in check before you do anything else...
If you get the filter I'd turn off whatever's driving the UGF and let the emperor filter work by itself. But I wouldn't take the UGF out, don't want to stress the fish anymore then necessary.

And since I mentioned it, has the water you're using changed at all? Maybe something wierd's going on with your water if none of the treatments are working. I really don't know if this is feasible, but if you live somewhere where you don't need to treat your water, maybe you should check it or start treating it for now.

Don't know how much this helps but, gl

 

[Bren]

Update

Okay I added a Emperor last night. I agree that they don't want to be stressed, but I wanted to get the Chems out of the water. I have not removed the UGF or turned it off(I tried to minimize its impact, but I don't want to recycle the tank).

The neons really seem fine, except they are still not going above 6" above the bottom of the tank. They have been like that for over a week now. It concerns me most because they aren't really eating. They have a lot of hiding places though and that seems to help. Still they just seem scared, if anyone gets within 4 feet of the tank they all go from kinda hinding to really hiding.

Does anyone know if neons take their cue off of other fish. Before the Dwarf Gourami and Corey Cats died they were happy to swim around the tank in the open more, and would go to the top to feed when the other fish did. I wish I could add fish to the tank and test this theory, but I don't think I should since a neon died yesterday.

How long should I wait before adding fish to the tank assuming no other fish die? My local store said two weeks is standard but he would wait three in my case.

What food can I feed the neons that they like a lot, preferably something that will go to the bottom of the tank?

Thanks so much for all the help you have provided, and I appriciate any response to my new questions and problems. Thanks again

 

[RedTurquoise]

Double check your water parameters like ammonia, nitrites, nitrates, temp, ph, hardness!

Do you have real plants and C02 injection?

Just curious!

Waiting 3 weeks is good before adding more fish! Imo, Id wait 4 weeks.

 

[Bren]

Water Tests, plant answers

temp = 77
Ammonia, Nitrites = 0
ph = just over 7.2(maybe 7.3) - This is what are tap water is and after two 25% water changes our tank is there, water in the tank usualy goes down a little because of the wood, usualy get to like 6.9-7 over a period of time(is this a bad thing)
Nitrate < 5 ppm(way below)

RedTurquoise:
I have real plants, I do not have CO2 injection at this time, I do use a water fertilizer(Seachem Flourish) twice a week, but havn't been adding it for the last two weeks since the fish started looking bad... I have mostly stem plants, and some hornwort, but am going to try some ferns and a sword, will see how it goes. I am aware of the bad things people say about mixing a Emperor and a CO2 injection system, I am curious to see if I can work around this because the Bio-Wheels seem really good to me.

 

[RedTurquoise]

Water parameters seem fine. How are you changing water? Straight tap or letting it age? Using a de-chlor?

The ph dropping not a bad thing unless it is happening in 1 day. I am a little concerned about going from basic to acidic though. What is your hardness?

Do you have an airpump or bubbler, any surface movement? Im also thinking that the plants are not producing enough 02 for your fish. I would keep dosing with ferts as your plants may start dying and decaying, causing more problems!

Your fish bloating sounds like dropsy! I had dropsy in my planted and it wiped out all my rasboras. I narrowed the problem down to temperature swings from day to night when the lights shut off. The temp would swing around 5-8F. Possiblility?

 

[clothahump]

Have you added any new decor recently?
Is the wood real Bogwood?
This sounds like a possible bacterial problem.

 

[Bren]

Update

Well another neon died this morning. Good news is the others are looking good, better then they did yesterday.

I use de-chlor for the water changes. The emperor is a bio-wheel, plenty of O2 in the water from it. I don't think the temp is swinging, but I will keep an eye on it.

A couple pieces of wood my wife boiled down and put in. The other piece is from Africa from the fish store. Some kind of root. They have been in there since the tank was set up(about 4 months.)