Tropical Fish Advice

I was wondering whether someone could help, i have a 3 foot tropical fish tank that has 4 neons, 4 glowlight tetras, 2 plecos, 4 corydoras catfish, 4 black neons, 4 platys, 5 guppys, 2 swordtails, 3 rasboras.

I have had this tank set up for about 8 weeks now and the problem is that the ammonia levels are still very high, enough though i change 30% of the water every week, i have only lost 4 or 5 fish in those 8 weeks but i dont know what to do about the ammonia.

I know that when the filter becomes mature and when there is enough bacteria in the tank then it will greatly reduce the ammonia to almost zero or zero.

I have been using filter start to help my filter mature, also i have been using king british safewater to make more of the beneficial bacteria develop.

Everytime i change the water i use aquasafe water conditioner so the water is not unhealthy for the fish, i always wash the filter sponges out in the aquarium water to make sure none of the beneficial bateria is killed.

Hi Harryhill

Me and my husband have been keeping tropicals for over a year now and at the start of keeping them our ammonia was high also. My husband just gave the gravel a good clean and the oranments in the tank and did water change twice a week.

Do you clean the gravel? We have one of the sifen things to do ours with. As ammonia is caused by fish crap maybe just trying what we did would help.

When we had ammonia in the tank we did water change twice a week and after about 2 weeks the ammonia had dropped and we went back to changing the water once a week. Never had high ammonia since.

Kate55

Hi Harryhill

 

Me and my husband have been keeping tropicals for over a year now and at the start of keeping them our ammonia was high also. My husband just gave the gravel a good clean and the oranments in the tank and did water change twice a week.

Do you clean the gravel? We have one of the sifen things to do ours with. As ammonia is caused by fish crap maybe just trying what we did would help.

When we had ammonia in the tank we did water change twice a week and after about 2 weeks the ammonia had dropped and we went back to changing the water once a week. Never had high ammonia since.

 

Kate55

Thanks for the reply kate, i have a gravel hoover so i do clean the gravel.

I read on a website today that the best thing to do is to change 10-15% of the water every day and also to only feed the fish every few days rather than everyday as uneaten food also causes ammonia.

Apparently fish can go without food for several days so feeding them every few days will not do them any harm and should decrease the ammonia so i am going to try this and see what happens.

Yes correct about the food, forgot to mention that.

Well let us know how you get on.

Oh dear, now i have another problem

This tank of mine has only been running for 8 weeks, there is not enough beneficial bacteria established so that it can kill the ammonia, the ammonia levels in my tank were very high but i have managed to reduce it slightly over the last few days.

But earlier today i noticed that one of my mollies has white spot this is all i need as i know putting medications into the tank kills off the beneficial bacteria so i cant win either way.

I am going to have to put in some of the anti white spot formula into the tank to try and get rid of the white spot but then if that kills off the beneficial bacteria then the ammonia and nitrite levels will rise and will be very high again so i'm going to lose out one way or another i think, but then again if i don't treat the white spot i'll probably lose 75% of the fish i have or maybe even all of them and i don't want that to happen.

What you need is another tank (its good to keep one when starting out with tropicals), only a small tank with small filter in case this happens (quarentine tank). If you can get hold of another septerate the molly then he/she will have a chance of survival and so will the others as you will not need to treat the main tank but do keep a close eye on the other fish to make sure non of others get it. We have now got rid of our second tank as we have not had problems for a year now but would have lent it you if we still had it.

Hope everything works out ok and keep me posted as to how you get on.

What you need is another tank (its good to keep one when starting out with tropicals), only a small tank with small filter in case this happens (quarentine tank). If you can get hold of another septerate the molly then he/she will have a chance of survival and so will the others as you will not need to treat the main tank but do keep a close eye on the other fish to make sure non of others get it. We have now got rid of our second tank as we have not had problems for a year now but would have lent it you if we still had it.

Hope everything works out ok and keep me posted as to how you get on.

Thanks for all your help and advice kate

I will let you know how i get on.

I seem to be having one problem after another.

The good thing is about a week ago the ammonia level was very high, it was about 4mg per litre and now it's around 0.8mg per litre which is good, i managed to get the ammonia down by doing a 10-15% water change everyday and then instead of feeding the fish 2-3 times per day i started feeding them once a day which prevents uneaten food from rotting and causing more ammonia.

As i said above there is now white spot in the tank, i have put some anti white spot formula in, only 2 fish have the white spot at the moment, the problem is with white spot you cannot change the water which means the ammonia levels could rise again and i cannot do alot about it as i cannot change the water for about a week or 10 days due to the white spot.

The nitrite levels in the tank are beginning to rise as well and water changes would make this come down but i cannot do anything due to the white spot, i am worried that i am going to lose alot of fish.

I have around 17 baby fish in a breeding net in the tank as well, they are around 6 weeks old and they can be released from the net at about 8 weeks old but i am worried about them catching white spot or maybe even dying from ammonia poisioning.

Dont worry. We go sometimes nearly 2 weeks without changing the water and our fish are always fine. We usually feed our fish 2 one day once the next and so on.

As for releasing the fish at 8 weeks from my experience I would not. We released our 2 (2 out of 10 survived) and within 1 week they had dissapered. We know it was the bigger fish that ate them as not long ago we added a couple of baby neons to the tank and saw one of the angels scoop it up.

You have only been keeping tropicals for 2 month and are bound to loose a few at first. Everyone I know looses them in the first few month. I do suggest that you dont add any more fish for at least a month after the white spot has gone.

A couple of our mollys had white spot in the past so we put them in seperate tanks unfortunatly only one survived so be prepared you may loose a couple of fish.

I do not know what you financial situation is like but if you can afford it invest in a small tank to use for quarantine just for the first 6 months.

Hope Iam of some help to you and dont worry but please keep me posted.

My fingers are crossed for your little fish.

Kate55

Hi Harryhill

Was just wondering how you are getting on with the fish and the white spot.

Kate55

Hi Kate,

I have managed to get the ammonia and nitrite levels right down, also the white spot seems to be clearing up so that's good, things are alittle better now