help!!fish are dying

[jdcreigh]

i have a 55 gal tank that has been up and running around 3 weeks. fish were taking out of my 29 gal and transfered to the 55 g .the tank cycled for a little more then a week.this go around we added sand(quickcrete playsand from lowes)the water test are ph 8.2,ammonia 0,nitrite 0.2and chlorine 0.05 and i added a little declor after the test.this may sound silly but my mollies eat the sand and spit it out is that normal?oyea i have mollies,2gouramis and 3 danios.i lost 3 mollies about 3 days apart.the other fish seem fine.could it be shock from the transfer?i had these fish little over a year.what do you think?and what do i do to correct the problem? i also have 3 live plants
thank you

 

[Holly9937]

How did you "cycle" the tank? Since you have a reading of nitrite, it may not be cycled completely, but the levels you listed are not harmful, so I don't think that is the problem. Do you have a nitrate test kit? You'll want to pick one of those up so you can tell if you are actually cycled or not. Assuming you were keeping up on maintanence of the 29g tank, there should not have been a "shock" from the transfer. Is anything else different?

 

[jdcreigh]

also i have 2 gouramis and one is loosing his color this started about 2 months ago before the tank change.he dont act sick he just looks like he is getting old.

 

[pwrflpills]

this may sound silly but my mollies eat the sand and spit it out is that normal?
thank you

I think it's totally normal. They're just "sifting" for food. They're not eating the sand.