EWWW my tank reaks

[Zelda000]

hey my 55g has recently gone under an massive loss of fish do to diesese. i lost about 10 fish and only recoverd about 5, maybe my channel cat has ate some i dont know, well any way my tank smells soo bad i dont know waht to do, i jsut want it to stop its in my room and hard to sleep, someone please help

[pinballqueen]

All you can do is, first of all, find the source of the reak, then get rid of it, keep doing water changes, and invest in an air freshener....

Is it a "dead-fish" smell or a swamp funk?

[wetmanNY]

A couple of water changes, after you've siphoned over the surface of the gravel. Don't go stirring up the gravel at this point. Get some duckweed and floating Water Sprite. Drop the water level and get more splash. Don't cover the tank so tightly.

After you've done all thi,s you can add a capful (no more) of regular hydrogen peroxide from the drugstore, dribbled into the water that is leaving the filter.

[Botch]

Yes, and add activated carbon to your filter. It asorbs the smell. Replace after a week.

[Zelda000]

i am not sure what duckweed and floating water spirit are

[StevieM]

I had the same problem a few months back....listnen to WetmanNY, I did and the stench was gone in about 3 days. I never even had to make it to the Hydrogen Peroxide stage. A 33% water change daily for me, more splash and lightly vacuuming the substrate, gently rinsing filter sponges in de-clorinated water worked for me. Also , I didnt see anyone mention it...but it doesn't hurt to cut back on feeding either...I went to every other day for about a week until the problem was solved. Good Luck,

steve

[wetmanNY]

Stevie, that's very cool to hear! thank you.

Zelda, do you know how to do a word search at www.google.com ? Try "duckweed" first. Then try Ceratopteris cornuta which is Water Sprite (not "spirit" though that's close). Then look for them at you lfs.

Zelda you should have more confidence in us, that we'd answer your question just as fast, in the Freshwater Newbie Forum.