New tank, new cichlids, maybe ick?

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chelle77

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Jan 10, 2011
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I was given a 10 gal tank with 5 cichlids right before christmas. I upgraded the tank to a 36 gal about 5 days ago. I didnt know about cycling or that I needed to wait to transfer my fish. I used about half of the old water in the new tank and also transfered the filter. 4 out of 5 fish died the same day and I bought 6 new ones. Anyway, all the lack of experience is showing right now but I am wondering if my survivor may have ick? It hangs out at the top of the tank and has little white specs mostly on its fins but some on its body too. Is it something form the bad change in tanks or is it ick? I did test the water and the ph was 8.2 Nitrites were 0 and Nitrates were 10ppm and amonia was 0
 

Coler

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Jan 30, 2007
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Welcome to AC :D

Great job upgrading to the bigger tank. There is now absolutely no reason why you cannot sort this out.

I would say the first tank was not cycled anyway so you were probably headed for problems anyway but major, major kudos for getting the bigger set-up.

At this stage it probably seems like you are at the bottom of a very steep learning curve but stick with it it is actually pretty straightforward, and just requires a bit of effort - you clearly have the commitment required to make a great go of this.

First things first, the ich, and yes it does sound like that - can you post a pic ?

If you are confident that ich is what you have (look at pictures on the internet) do a site search here for treatment - heat and salt is your best option.

Next, your tank is almost certainly cycling and you need to manage that too. Can you confirm what kind of test kit you are using ? If its not a good liquid drop kit its pretty useless and you need to buy the API Master Test Kit - the single best piece of kit you could ever buy at this stage.

Your readings are that of a cycled tank if you are happy that you have a good liquid drop kit and that the test is being carried out properly and that your tap water is 0 for nitrates - test that now and come back to us.

On cycling, in short, your fish are producing ammonia, which is extremely toxic to them. Given some time bacteria will develop to transform this to nitrite, also extremely toxic. Given further time, more bacteria will transform this to nitrate, toxic but only in far higher doses.

What you need to be doing is a large water change every time you have ammonia or nitrite at levels of .25ppm or more. You won't know that this is so unless you have a good liquid drop test kit. It might take a couple of large water change (50% or more) per day.

This is going to be very tough to manage with the ich treatment but you have no real option.

I know your test results are showing 0,0 and 10 which doesn't indicate a cycle taking place - if you can confirm your test kit and what your tap nitrates are it might be that you don't have this issue to deal with.

If you didn't have ich in the tank I would be recommending that you bring back the new fish to where-ever you got them and try and manage just the one feller you have left from your initial present through a cycle (presuming that the tank is actually cycling) but that is not really an option with ich in the tank.

As an aside what you never do with an uncycled tank or if you suspect that it is cycling, is add more fish - you don't have sufficient bacteria in the tank to cope with the waste currently being produced, so the last thing you do is add more. Just mark that one down to experience, as you are where you are.

If you can post a few pics of your fish we can also work on identifying them.

What filter and heater are you running ? If the filter came with the 10G you will probably need to upgrade that, and with heaters I always go on the basis that two is one and one is none, i.e. a bit of built in redundancy helps.

And welcome to AC - you found a good site :)
 

chelle77

AC Members
Jan 10, 2011
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Ok, I do have the API freshwater master test kit. And last night when I checked the water the amonia was .50. Its snowing here and i cant get to the pet store yet to get anything to treat it! UGH!
 

chelle77

AC Members
Jan 10, 2011
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Also, I know I have a coblat blue, a maingano, a venustus, and a red fin barleyi. The fish that has ich I believe is an albino red zebra? Also there is one that I believe is another zebra. I am adding some pics when I get this figured out exactly lol
 

chelle77

AC Members
Jan 10, 2011
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I do have the API master test kit and now I am showing .50 ammonia levels. Lost one fish since I turned up the heat and added salt treatment. I'm going out soon to get something to treat the ammonia and prepare for nitrite and nitrate. I bought the upgraded kit with my new aquarium so it had the pump and heater that came with that size tank.
I have a blue cobalt, maingano, venustus, and red fin borleyi. Im not completely sure about the one that has ich. Its pictured above....I think its an albino red zebra? Not sure.
 
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