Colourless Black Skirt Tetras

bghill

bghill

AC Members
Jan 18, 2007
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Vancouver, BC
I bought 5 Black Skirts about 4 months ago from my LFS. Over the last 4 - 6 weeks I have noticed a few of them losing the black fins and stripes. 2 are now totaly silver, 1 is fading and the other 2 are about the same as when I got them, maybe a bit more faded.
The sales person said they were young and not dyed as I hear some are. Any ideas on why this is happening?
 
Mine would wash out like that when they were stressed.

I would test your water and make sure the parameters are good.

Has anything in the tank changed? New tankmates, aggressiveness in the other fish, change in temperature? Change in diet?

When they are "sleeping" do they revert to their darkened form?

My guess would be that either the water is not ideal or they are being harrassed by another tankmate.

Let us know
 
I have not tested the water recently and no new tank mates. They are the biggest fish in the tank and there are not any aggessive fish. 5 Black Skirts, 6 Zebra Danio's, 13 Neon Tetra's, 4 Panda Cory's, and 2 Oto Cats.

As far as food I did buy a different brand of flake food and they did get food treats for Christmas. They get a variety of freeze dried bloodworms, freeze dried brine shrimp, or colour enhancing "Crab Bit's". I usually give one of these with the evening feed with the flakes. I also feed the corys algae wafers that everybody eats a bit of, including the Black Skirts.

Would it be normal for a few of the fish to be stressed or would all the same species be stressed at the same time if it was something like water conditions?
 
What size tank are they in? They may be crowded or not liking the activity of the Danios?

The Skirts could also be forming a heirarchy of sorts and the smaller, or less dominant are stressed and are washing out.

I would test the water first though to rule that out
 
Just tested the water.

PH around 6.4 While cycling the tank in Sept my ph was pretty conistant at 6.8. Since then I have added more plants and fish obvoisly.
Nitrites at .1
Ammonia at .6 or less. I plan to add some Prime.

All other fish are doing fine. Just the Black Skirts that are losing colour.

Went through a Ich outbreak about 6 weeks ago but everyone pulled through. The fading out started after that.

Certianly a heirachy has established. The dominant fish eat first and higher up in the tank as the food falls. The weaker fish eat lower and smaller bits.

Any help/advice would be welcome.
 
He mentioned in his previous posts that he was crushing a bunch of snails in the tank and letting the fish eat them. I suspect the remains are rotting and causing the Am and NI readings. Remove the dead snails.

It is a 29G
 
You want your ammonia and Nitrites at zero, Do a 50% water change and see where that takes you. I am pretty sure that your skirts are washed out because of the water quality. If there are ammonia and nitrites tomorrow do another water change.

That should take care of it and your Skirts will color up in no time.
 
I have done the 50% water change yesterday with a good gravel vac to suck up any snail bits left in the tank. This morning my water tests are showing no ammoinia or nitrites. (I don't have the reagents to test for nitrates). PH steady.
Still no change in the coloring of the Black Skirts yet but I will be watching.
As far as the snails go I did not really kill that many. Maybe about 5 in total. I was picking out the one's I could and my daughter made her own snail aquaruim with about 30 of the little suckers.
Thanks for all the tips!
 
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