last night i made my first post showing my tank that is about 3 weeks into its cycle. every thing was fine last night and when i left this morning. i got home and my nimbochromis venustus is barely clinging to life. he look slike one side of his body was scraped across concrete but the other side looks fine. what could have caused this? aggression? the water parameters are about the same as they were last night. btw the other 2 cichlids look fine. i have not seen any fighting since i got them.
what happned to my fish?
- Thread starter ws66370
- Start date
30 Gall I believe, but I understand an upgrade is in the offing.
I'm going to see your ammonia at .5 and your nitrate at 5 (or.5 if the 5 was a typo) is what is killing your fish (going by your other posts)
You need to do water changes to keep ammonia and nitrite below .25 ppm at all times during the cycle. Rift Lake Cichlids are an exceptionally poor choice to cycle a tank with as they are a) expensive and b) although tough little fish, highly highly intolerant of high ammonia and nitrite - yours is toxic, it needs to be at 0.
welcome to AC btw
edited to reflect the fact that the fish is not in fact dead
I'm going to see your ammonia at .5 and your nitrate at 5 (or.5 if the 5 was a typo) is what is killing your fish (going by your other posts)
You need to do water changes to keep ammonia and nitrite below .25 ppm at all times during the cycle. Rift Lake Cichlids are an exceptionally poor choice to cycle a tank with as they are a) expensive and b) although tough little fish, highly highly intolerant of high ammonia and nitrite - yours is toxic, it needs to be at 0.
welcome to AC btw
edited to reflect the fact that the fish is not in fact dead
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Any source of pure ammonia.
If this is not available to you and you cycle with fish, Ammonia and Nitrite must be kept below .25 ppm or the fish are likely to die, especially African Rift Lake Cichlids. As I said they are severely intolerant of elevated ammonia or nitrite so should only be put in a tank which has established a strong cycle.
Here is a useful link http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=84598
Don't worry about % of water changes - for your surviving fish you simply must do as many changes as are needed to keep ammonia and nitrite as low as possible, that or return them and cycle fishless as described in the thread. Use a good liquid drop test kit to verify parameters.
Sorry he died
If this is not available to you and you cycle with fish, Ammonia and Nitrite must be kept below .25 ppm or the fish are likely to die, especially African Rift Lake Cichlids. As I said they are severely intolerant of elevated ammonia or nitrite so should only be put in a tank which has established a strong cycle.
Here is a useful link http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=84598
Don't worry about % of water changes - for your surviving fish you simply must do as many changes as are needed to keep ammonia and nitrite as low as possible, that or return them and cycle fishless as described in the thread. Use a good liquid drop test kit to verify parameters.
Sorry he died
well i have done 2 water changes today the first one was about 15% and the other was 30%. now i have no ammonia but i can not get my nitrites below 2. what should i do? what about using a product like stress zyme? does it work?
thanks for all of the advice guys
thanks for all of the advice guys
be sure and check out that thread I posted; you don't want to be adding ammonia to a tank with fish in it ! Adding pure Ammonia is for a fishless cycle.
You lower your nitrites by doing water changes; a product like Seachem Prime can also help but is not a substitute for water changes and is reccommended for high nitrities only in emergencies i.e. when you absolutely positively can not do a water change. Stress Zyme does nothing for high nitrites.
You lower your nitrites by doing water changes; a product like Seachem Prime can also help but is not a substitute for water changes and is reccommended for high nitrities only in emergencies i.e. when you absolutely positively can not do a water change. Stress Zyme does nothing for high nitrites.
If you can get ahold of BioSpira it will greatly accelerate your cycle. It may be carried by a LFS, but can be ordered from http://www.drsfostersmith.com/. Also, don't rinse any filter media in tapwater, the chlorine/chloramines will kill the bacteria colonizing in it. Rinse it in tank water while you change water. Don't vacuum the substrate and feed as sparingly as possible right now. Once every other day or 2 is fine for your fish.