Something is going wrong with my tank, I think. Or I just have really bad luck. As a forenote - I'm sorry, this is probably going to get kind of long.
I'm new to fishkeeping. Very new. My tank has only been up and running since the first week of December. I cycled the tank with six zebra danios, two of which died of ammonia poisoning. One more became sick with something else... she lost weight, her stomach became very sunk in, etc. She was still eating up until almost the very end, when I euthanized her because the parasite treatment didn't seem to be working. I'm beginning to think that this problem is still in my tank, because I'm still losing fish.
I added four dwarf gouramis in January (bad idea, they were all male and stressed each other out. I didn't know better. I now do)... and they did fine up until the second or third week of February when I added four neon tetras, four cardinal tetras and three more dwarf gouramis (2 female, 1 male). Oh, and three mystery snails. This completely overwhelmed my beneficial bacteria and I lost all of the neons, all of the cardinals, four of the gouramis and one danio.
When things seemed to have evened out from that disaster and my ammonia and nitrite levels were back to zero, I added four new zebra danios. One of them died the day after I brought him home, but I figured it was stress or shock from improper acclimation or something. Then things seemed to be fine for a couple of weeks.
Then one of my dwarf gouramis started pooping white, stopped eating and wouldn't come out from beneath one of the plants. One night before bed, I looked in and noticed her dead. I pulled her out and kept a close eye on the others. Two or three days after she died, my other remaining female started showing the same symptoms. I euthanized her this past Sunday. Now my remaining gourami is showing these same symptoms.
For the past couple of weeks, I've been busy setting up a six gallon aquarium, and I was going to seed it from my big aquarium and add shrimp. This evening, I went to go dig in my filter and see if there's anything I could pull from it to seed with, and I noticed that one of my danios was laying on the bottom of the tank, dead as a doornail. He appeared perfectly healthy as of last night.
Tank facts:
- 46 gallons
- Ammonia: 0; Nitrite: 0, Nitrate: 5ppm, pH: 8.0
- Set up in December 2009
- Stock: 4 danios, 1 dwarf gourami
- I do weekly 15%-20% water changes.
The nitrates seem a little low to me, but I'm kind of figuring that its because my tank is so lightly stocked. Is that how that works?
I hope somebody can help me out here. I'm so concerned that there's something wrong with my entire tank that I'm considering returning the fish to the store, euthanizing the gourami, emptying the water, and boiling/bleaching everything in the tank and COMPLETELY starting over, cycle and all. I'm definitely not going to seed my little tank from the big one. There's no way I want to risk spreading the problem to another aquarium.
I'm new to fishkeeping. Very new. My tank has only been up and running since the first week of December. I cycled the tank with six zebra danios, two of which died of ammonia poisoning. One more became sick with something else... she lost weight, her stomach became very sunk in, etc. She was still eating up until almost the very end, when I euthanized her because the parasite treatment didn't seem to be working. I'm beginning to think that this problem is still in my tank, because I'm still losing fish.
I added four dwarf gouramis in January (bad idea, they were all male and stressed each other out. I didn't know better. I now do)... and they did fine up until the second or third week of February when I added four neon tetras, four cardinal tetras and three more dwarf gouramis (2 female, 1 male). Oh, and three mystery snails. This completely overwhelmed my beneficial bacteria and I lost all of the neons, all of the cardinals, four of the gouramis and one danio.
When things seemed to have evened out from that disaster and my ammonia and nitrite levels were back to zero, I added four new zebra danios. One of them died the day after I brought him home, but I figured it was stress or shock from improper acclimation or something. Then things seemed to be fine for a couple of weeks.
Then one of my dwarf gouramis started pooping white, stopped eating and wouldn't come out from beneath one of the plants. One night before bed, I looked in and noticed her dead. I pulled her out and kept a close eye on the others. Two or three days after she died, my other remaining female started showing the same symptoms. I euthanized her this past Sunday. Now my remaining gourami is showing these same symptoms.
For the past couple of weeks, I've been busy setting up a six gallon aquarium, and I was going to seed it from my big aquarium and add shrimp. This evening, I went to go dig in my filter and see if there's anything I could pull from it to seed with, and I noticed that one of my danios was laying on the bottom of the tank, dead as a doornail. He appeared perfectly healthy as of last night.
Tank facts:
- 46 gallons
- Ammonia: 0; Nitrite: 0, Nitrate: 5ppm, pH: 8.0
- Set up in December 2009
- Stock: 4 danios, 1 dwarf gourami
- I do weekly 15%-20% water changes.
The nitrates seem a little low to me, but I'm kind of figuring that its because my tank is so lightly stocked. Is that how that works?
I hope somebody can help me out here. I'm so concerned that there's something wrong with my entire tank that I'm considering returning the fish to the store, euthanizing the gourami, emptying the water, and boiling/bleaching everything in the tank and COMPLETELY starting over, cycle and all. I'm definitely not going to seed my little tank from the big one. There's no way I want to risk spreading the problem to another aquarium.
