URGENT: Fish Dieing!

barbuto

barbuto

AC Members
Nov 28, 2008
261
0
0
Fort Lee, NJ
I noticed lately that my Tiger barbs were acting strange, and rubbing their bodies up against the clay pots in my tank. I was sure these were the signs to an upcoming outbreak of Ich. So I went out and bought some Salt and Maracyn I and II. However, I went to work today and when I came back I noticed that my Pleco was looking terrible. He was peeling all over and had red wounds all over his body, his eyes were as cloudy as can be and he was barely moving. I spring to action and quarintined him immediatly. In addition to this one of my Tiger barbs was dead.

About 30 minutes after Quarentining my pleco he passed. My remaining tiger barbs were acting odd, 2 of which have cloudy eyes, one looks healthy, and the other is barely alive, he is flipping about and can barely keep balance. I put them into a new quarentine tank and starting medicating with Maracyn I and II.

I don't know what else to do, I did a 50% water change on my 29gal with my two remaining convicts in there. They look alright so far, but I am worried about them. I added some salt as a precaution to ich just incase it gets to them also (which I think it will).

What else should I do!?

Ammonia - 0 Nitrites - 0 Nitrates - 10/15 ish

*Sorry for the long post!*
 
Keep up the maracyn, sounds like a bacterial thing.
What is the water temp in the QT?

And you might have to treat the main tank if you have a bacterial outbreak..
 
I'm with The Zigman, it sounds bacterial, you should probably treat all surviving residents of the tank experiencing the outbreak with the M & M2. But I would add that so long as the ammonia/nitrite/nitrate/pH/kH/gH levels in the tank are where you want them to be, hold off on doing any water changes. The water out of the tap is potable, not sterile. If there's a sickness in the tank, and the fish are already weakened by one disease, putting new water into the tank may expose them to new bacteria that they would otherwise not be susceptible to.
 
Man... I'm so sorry for your losses. Do you know what your parameters were before the water change?

How long has that tank been set up?

What conditioner do you use?

The description of the pleco makes me think your ammonnia might have been really high. What is you water change schedule and how often do you check your parameters?

If not It sounds like some kind of poisoning from some other contaminant.
 
Could you post some pictures of your fish? If you still have the Pleco's body, could you post a picture of him, too. Not to be goulish or anything... it would help to see the kind of sores and peeling you were taking about.
 
Not at all ghoulish

Melody Doucet said:
Could you post some pictures of your fish? If you still have the Pleco's body, could you post a picture of him, too. Not to be goulish or anything... it would help to see the kind of sores and peeling you were taking about.
Click to expand...
That's not at all a ghoulish suggestion, any more than a what a coroner does is ghoulish. How else are we to help the living if we don't examine the dead to figure out what killed them and how to prevent it?
 
Those parameters were from before the 50% water change.

I actually got rid of the pleco, I didn't want him sitting around so I got rid of him right when I took him out of the QT tank. Before and after the water change, My Ammonia and Nitrites were both at 0. and my Nitrates were below 20ppm. So there def wasn't any type of poisoning in terms of the nitrogen cycle. I change my water weekly, and keep on top of all my tanks pretty well.

I use prime in all of my tanks, added to the new water before I add it to the tank. This tank has been up for almost two years now, several different fish, but the tank itself has been up for a while. So it can't be something related to a new tank setup.

I added the tiger barbs about two weeks ago, I suppose they must of brought some kind of problems with them, because when I added them to the tank I noticed my convicts acting strange. I thought they had internal parasites because of their feces coming out white. They seemed to recover rather quickly though and now act normal.
 
sorry for your losses... hope it all works out in the end and losses are minimal for you. good luck.
 
Your water quality is excellent, in regards to your parameters and maintenance. I still wonder about some other kind of contaminant.

Is it possible that the municipal water might have had an increase in the amount of chlorine and/or chloramine they add. Also, what are your ph, gh and kh and has there been any big change in those parameters lately?

It could be some kind of bacterial infection, but another odd thing is the behaviour of the Barbs, rubbing agains the clay pots... that doesn't sound quite bacterial to me, at least not like that is the only problem. It seems like some kind of parasitic symptom to me, or severe irritation of the skin by some other factor or contaminant.

It's not just the Barbs behaviour, but also the Pleco's skin lesions/peeling that suggest something causing discomfort and injury to the skin, whether parasitic or chemical.

Did the Barbs have any of the skin abnormalities the pleco had? The convicts are showing no signs of illness or behaviour change? This is a puzzle.

I think the antibiotic treatment is a good decision whatever this is. I hope things get better. Maybe someone with more knowlege and experience with this set of symptoms will come along.

Oh, and I don't usually worry or feel that it's improper to ask for pics of sick or deceased fish to help with diagnosis... I ask all the time.

I guess I threw that "goulish" in because I had just been reading an old thread where someone was disgusted because a poster had asked the OP to post a picture of their dead fish. Shows how we can be influenced sometimes, but it didn't stop me from asking, lol.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom