Tank Move

[Fishman_2000]

Hey Everyone on MFT. I haven't posted here in ages. I moved my fishtank to a new house on saturday and have had one fish death so far. I've had problems with the heaters but now I have two heaters in the tank to help get the temp to 78. They are the hagen tronic heaters you preset. Now though all of the fish in the tank look like their gills are swollen and I see a lot of red. It's a 29 gallon tank and 15 of those gallons is the original water from the tank. I tested the water at the new location and it was fine. I wonder if maybe with the rush of moving I forgot to declorinate some of the new water in the tank. I've since then declorinated everything again just to make sure. Has anyone had this happen when moving a tank to a new location? Thanks.

 

[FroggyFox]

Only thing I could think of would be changing the new water like you said red gills can be chlorine, or did you check the pH is it much different at the new house? You say everything is "fine"...meaning ammonia and nitrites are both at 0 right? Just making sure because I think the red gills could be from ammonia poisoning too, and sometime during moves you'll get a spike of ammonia or nitrite because something happened to some of your bacteria. IIRC you have plants in there though right? So thats probably not it.

Glad to see you back on

 

[Fishman_2000]

I didn't even think about any of the bacteria dying. I tested the tap water here first and there was no ammonia. The pH is the same as it was in the aquarium. Right now though i can't find the ammonia test strips. I did test nitrite and it is 0. The tap water in this town is pretty nice, 7 in ph, no ammonia, nitrities, or nitrates. I noticed on the heaters that there is condensation building up inside them again. It's driving me crazy. The hagen tronic heaters are supposed to be really good but it's funny that they both are acting like this. Oh well time to change heaters when I go back to the LFS.

 

[Lotus]

I would assume you're having a mini-cycle. Test the ammonia, and maybe add some Ammo-Lock or do an extra water change or two if the ammonia is spiking. You could also see if the LFS tests water, if you can't find the ammonia tests in all the boxes, etc. The ammonia should only last a few days.

 

[Acei]

I agree with the ammonia idea. I use a sand sustrate and have noticed that when I moved a tank, small pockets of ammonia that were trapped in the substrate worked their way out.

 

[Pure]

I'm of the opinion your having ammonia issues. If you forgot to dechlorinate the water you would not be having these problems and to put it bluntly every one would be dead by now.

What method did you use during the move to keep the biological filter from dying?