What am I missing?

[DMD123]

:scratch: I get home to a dead fish... the larger of the two red devils. So I break out my water test kit and everything reads good, all at the bottom where you want it.

I am not overstocked at this point at all. The fish started to get reclusive two days ago was not eating like it was at first and then dead. The other smaller red devil has also been acting strange. During this time Ive had trouble with the small zo not eating along with the bocourti being picky. It really has me paranoid like I am missing something. The other fish seem to be thriving and eating well. Did I not kill the plague that hit my tank? What am I missing?

Examining the body I saw it looked pretty beat on, but I have not seen any outright violence in the tank. The new zo started to get pretty assertive with others but in no way worried me. So do I have a killer or was he bit on after death?

Any ideas? :scratch: If I go through another batch of deaths I really am afraid I will just drain the stupid thing and sell it.

 

[fishman09]

geez that sucks :cry: are you salting the water at all when you do changes?

 

[fishman09]

could it be something in the tank? i would stick them all in a bucket drain the tank clean everything including media and filters and re-cycle the tank. its a lot of work but i cant think of anything else. was it possibly aggression related? i think we need to do an autopsy and get to the bottom of this

 

[DMD123]

I have not added salt since the last plague issues. The tank was cleaned very well at that point including the filter media cleaned in boiling water. I have done regular water changes since and used seachem stability to replant the good bacteria. Plus the water tests dont lie, no ammonia spikes no bad stuff going on.

The PH was steady at 7, which it always is. The temp is steady at 80. Just bothers me that the last outbreak began with the same thing. The argentea stopped eating, then was dead and the whole tank infected.

I have taken out the large pieces of wood, gravel vac every time I do water changes. In fact I did my 50% change tonight and there was not a noticeable amount of waste to even clean out. My tank is clean.

 

[DMD123]

Also should add I have an 18w Turbo Twist UV sterilizer in the tank.

 

[fishman09]

maybe its the uv malfunctioning. in a freshwater tank i dont see the point of a uv steriliver

 

[Betty]

Wow, that really sucks, but I hope you don't sell your tank because of it. :cry:

Are those the same silver dollars you had before or are all the fish new? My thought would be that the silver dollars could be carrying whatever caused the problem the first time around and the new fish are being exposed that way.

I hope you can get it figured out soon. I know how discouraging it must be.

 

[DMD123]

The 3 silver dollars are survivors. I recently had 2 out that school have issues that resulted in them getting put down. These 3 are eating and show no signs of issues. I was afraid they could be carriers but with how many meds went through the tank and the clean up it got, I really thought it was done. With the weird mix of some fish ding well and others acting strange, I just cant figure this one out.

When I had the large branches of wood, I did have issue with a slime that was covering the wood and covering the glass. When I cleaned my filters out it was all over in them too. All this is out of the tank and the tank has not had any of these issues since. Not that the wood itself was the problem but the areas underneath would collect food and waste that were not easy to clean up and the wood helped to promote some of the bacterial growth.

The UV is still new and it is on. The effective UV life per bulb is one year. The UV does help with free floating algae which can cause a green tint to the water. Mine is crystal clear. It is not a high enough wattage to kill all the bad organisms but enough to clarify the water.

 

[DMD123]

I think aggression is pretty much ruled out. The tank is huge for how small everyone is and there are a tons of places that are out of sight of other fish. I have lots of tall plastic plants going right now for cover.

The body was kind of beat on though. The fish was alive when I went to work and the wife had a friend over and sat in front of the tank during the morning hours. Whatever happened occurred from 11am to 5pm sometime.

The RD was top dog in the tank, the only one who might have taken him on would be the new zo. He has been assertive with food and inquisitive toward the other fish to see where he fits in the pecking order. He just has not shown that killer instinct, otherwise he would have taken out smaller fish esp the other smaller zo.

So I am leaning toward the plague still lingers in the tank maybe through the silver dollars just like what Betty is thinking.

 

[Zerc]

wow that sucks!

I keep a dose of salt in my tank now, just to preemptively kill anything bad...

 

[Madness]

Call me in the a.m. or tonight before 10. I have an idea. :scratch:

 

[Zerc]

Any news? What do you think it is madness?

 

[DMD123]

Hey madness I will call later today. Got some stuff I have to do in the morning.

I still do not see any real aggression issues in the tank. The Red Devil was the chase you all over the tank on a whim fish. The others all act like they are tolerant of each other with barely a flare here or there. The new pleco is one that is a bit of a meat eater, but he hides during the day and no other fish looks like its been attacked. My last pleco got a hold of a fish or two at night and they had fish "hicky's" on them. Nothing like that showing up here.

 

[DMD123]

The fish not eating is strange because even the frozen treats like brine shrimp are not attacked by the small zo, bocourti and small red devil. The other fish all eagerly eat the frozen treats. Been using garlic guard to thaw the food out in to make it more appealing to the fish.

So my staple foods are Omega One small floating pellet, Xtreme Pee Wee sinking and Tetra Color crisp.

In frozen treats its brine shrimp, beef heart (used sparingly), mysis shrimp, blood worms all thawed out in garlic guard.

 

[fishman09]

maybe too many frozen treats. i would never feed beef heart as i dont think there intestinal tracts are.meants to handle red meat.

 

[DMD123]

Studys have shown long term use of beef heart is bad esp in older fish. The fact is it can and does put size on fish at a pretty good rate. I bought one package and am using it until its done and will not continue with it. The frozen blister pack will probably last a good 6 months at the rate I feed it. For young fish it will not do any lasting damage. Kind of like eating McDonalds hamburgers once in a while. It is just being used to get a bit of size on the fish.

I have only been doing treats every three days or so. I will mix a little bit of all the treats together in a shot glass (thanks for the idea vw)with some garlic guard, thaw and then drain off the water and feed a little at a time so that they are not overwhelmed with a ton of food hitting the tank all at once and having a lot of it get missed and settle into the gravel.

 

[DMD123]

I was going to say I know there is a lot of controversy about the use of beef heart but in moderation with young fish, it really does put size on. I also came from a time in fish keeping (the 80's - yeah I'm old!) where this was used very heavy in fish diets, esp for cichlids. I know its not a good long term food.

 

[Betty]

Was the uv sterilizer in operation when you treated the tank with medications? (Or did you treat in a hospital tank, I don't remember?) I read somewhere that sterilizers should be turned off when using medications.

 

[fishman09]

id rather spend the 5$ spent on beef heart on more water which will always make your fish grow faster than take a risk feeding red meat to a fish. all my fish in my 240 are growing at an incha month and all i feed is pellets. i just change 300 gallons on it weekly which is making them grow.

 

[Madness]

My idea was something Betty brought up. Does he have electricity leaking into his tank. But he has no electrical cords in his tank, so still not sure.