i just added a air stone and small pump sized for a 5 gal to my 20 gal tank and my cichlids started breathing very heavy, there are 4, all babies an inch and under. about 1 min after taking it out they started breathig normal. is this normal? should they not have an air pump?
bubbles and Cichlids?
- Thread starter snowmaker
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Lupin
Registered Member
- Sep 21, 2006
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- Paul
airstone would not cause this effect.
sounds like your tank is either overstocked - what exactly is in there and high big are they - or you have excess nitrates, or you have ammonia or nitrite present.
can you test ammonia, nitrite, nitrate with a good liquid drop test kit ?
sounds like your tank is either overstocked - what exactly is in there and high big are they - or you have excess nitrates, or you have ammonia or nitrite present.
can you test ammonia, nitrite, nitrate with a good liquid drop test kit ?
the only way extra air would cause this IME is if you have sprayed chemicals or smoke in the same room after the airstone was put in.
We have 3 bubble features in each of our tanks, and our cichlids play in them all the time. as stated there must be another reason for the gassping......
the airstone itself wouldn't have caused breathing trouble, but i wonder if it stressed them to the point where they were breathing heavy from fear of it. were they trying to hide from it or swimming all over the tank? did they seem frightened?
Too much oxygen can be a problem. Do you have live plants? If the four fish you mention are the only fish in tank with a few plants then there should be plenty of oxygen without the airstone. Plus your filter can be adding plenty with the flow.
Very possible - my hunch is this member has some baby mbuna in there. I find that mine really hated a bubblewand which I installed. Of course others will get to love 'em.
Small fish - big noise/disruption...if excess nitrates and ammonia/nitrite can be excluded with a good test kit, it is/was probably stress.