Battle to the death?

[ogre]

I woke up this morning to find my 10" Lion belly up. I've tried everything short of CPR. All other tank mates(Porcupine puffer, 3 Tangs, and a Wolf eel), were fine. Then at around 8PM the wife noticed that the Puffer was acting weird, floating in the corner near the top,tail curled, listless. Usually he flutters about constantly. What would be the effects on the Lion if he got to much Puffer and what would be the effects on the Puffer if he got stung?

 

[crimzy]

Originally Posted by ogre
http:///forum/post/2985647
I woke up this morning to find my 10" Lion belly up. I've tried everything short of CPR. All other tank mates(Porcupine puffer, 3 Tangs, and a Wolf eel), were fine. Then at around 8PM the wife noticed that the Puffer was acting weird, floating in the corner near the top,tail curled, listless. Usually he flutters about constantly. What would be the effects on the Lion if he got to much Puffer and what would be the effects on the Puffer if he got stung?
I SERIOUSLY doubt that aggression is the problem. If the puffer was picking on the lion, you'd see fins nipped and bitten off. If the lion stung the puffer, you'd see a dead puffer with a puncture wound on it. Have you tested your water? Sounds as if you have problems in your tank unrelated to aggression. I'd test your parameters and do a large water change. See if that helps.

 

[ogre]

The test was my first move. Everything great but nitrates are 100, all else at 0. Never any aggression between them. The Lion was twice the Puffers size and I lucked out with a very personable tank mate friendly Puffer. I do all the things needed to lower nitrates but them won't stay down. I have a small fortune in nitrate control with nothing to show for it

 

[crypt keeper]

uhhhhhh do a water change. Clean your filters.

 

[ogre]

I cleaned 1/2 my bio balls about 3 weeks ago, changed my filter pad and cleaned the prefilter sponge on SAT when I did a 25% water change.

 

[ogre]

I run an Aqua C 180 and nitrate sponges(2 kinds). Lots of flow and break up surface tension.

 

[crypt keeper]

somebody may want to chime in but i'm almost certain your fish are being killed by the trates

 

[ogre]

I've got to run but I will check back early in the morning, thanks for the help.

 

[falsepercula26]

what size is your tank? 100 on nitrates yeowzer!!

my god that is off the charts high...you to do some serious water changes on a regular basis to get them trates under 20 IMO. based on the size of your fishes and types you have i'm assuming you have a 125 or greater? Canisters r inefficent for this i would change to a sump and bag the sponges. they collect trates and go natural with culerpa and LV/LS with a great protien skimmer..Hope your remaining stock pulls through

 

[ogre]

The tank is 120gal. The lion was the only large fish at the time. The puffer is med 5-6", the wolf eel,med (about 10"), and the tangs are small enough that I was concerned for their safety with the lion around. Originally there was only going to be one tang but when your wife says get all three and you tell here that means that in a year or two we will have to get a 180-220gal tank and she says o.k., well you tell me you wouldn't get all three. It's like when she said the t.v. was to small. You think I didn't go get a bigger one! The filter is a wet/dry rated for 125gal (wish I had gotten a larger one,or done a sump), I feel good about the skimmer, rated at 180gal, and I been doing the water changes. I have a 5 stage water filter just for fish water. This is no longer a hobby it's now a life style.

 

[steve102571]

Is it possible that cleaning 1/2 of the bio and filters resulted in severe disruption of the nitrifying process. Temp spike in amonia and nitrites weren't caught when they spiked, but no it is showing as high nitrates

 

[kjr_trig]

Nitrates of 100 are not going to hurt a Puffer or a Lion I assure you.....Make sure you are feeding a varied diet with vitamins to these big predators, often people get locked into feeding the first food they readily accept, which often seems to be freeze dried krill.
Nitrite or ammonia could certainly hurt these fish, not nitrates at 100 though.
High nitrates can kill a shrimp or a lot of corals (for example), but they would have to be a heck of a lot higher than that to kill a Lion.

 

[kjr_trig]

Originally Posted by ogre
http:///forum/post/2985745
I cleaned 1/2 my bio balls about 3 weeks ago, changed my filter pad and cleaned the prefilter sponge on SAT when I did a 25% water change.
Just saw this part....Don't believe you should ever clean bioballs, the negative of bio balls is high nitrates, which again do not kill fish. But cleaning them can interrupt your biological filtration.

 

[rcreations]

Yeah, 100 nitrates is high but that's not gonna kill your lion or puffer. Still, work on lowering it, get rid of the bioballs and use LR rubble instead. Set yourself a small fuge in the sump with some chaeto, do regular water changes and don't overfeed.

 

[crimzy]

Originally Posted by Steve102571
http:///forum/post/2985968
Is it possible that cleaning 1/2 of the bio and filters resulted in severe disruption of the nitrifying process. Temp spike in amonia and nitrites weren't caught when they spiked, but no it is showing as high nitrates

Originally Posted by kjr_trig
http:///forum/post/2985983
Just saw this part....Don't believe you should ever clean bioballs, the negative of bio balls is high nitrates, which again do not kill fish. But cleaning them can interrupt your biological filtration.
Depends on how you clean bio balls. The proper way to clean bio balls is to clean them in a bucket of old aquarium water. Doing it this way will not eliminate the denitifying bacteria.

 

[ogre]

I did clean them in the tank water I removed during a water change and only swirled them around, no scrubbing. On the way to the LFS to have them test the water just as a check, be back in an hour. Thanks guys

 

[srfisher17]

Originally Posted by kjr_trig
http:///forum/post/2985978
Nitrates of 100 are not going to hurt a Puffer or a Lion I assure you.....Make sure you are feeding a varied diet with vitamins to these big predators, often people get locked into feeding the first food they readily accept, which often seems to be freeze dried krill.
Nitrite or ammonia could certainly hurt these fish, not nitrates at 100 though.
High nitrates can kill a shrimp or a lot of corals (for example), but they would have to be a heck of a lot higher than that to kill a Lion.

I agree; and have never read anything that show otherwise. Fenner's book talks about fish being kept with nitrates in the hundreds, even thousands of ppm. Every time this subject comes up; I ask if someone can point me to any research that says nitrates harm fish; I still haven't seen any. I do have lots of info on the point Kirk makes. Nitrates at 100ppm will encourage algae, harm some invert life; but will not harm fish. I do think nitrates at 100 or more do reflect a need for more water changes, however. Also; bio-balls should be given a quick rinse in used tank water. Just enough to get rid of loose detritus, never scrum them. (Just saw Crimzy's identical post, so I'll just agree. Gradually replacing bio-balls with LR rubble (or SeaChem Matrix) should help, over time, with nitrates---if you have inverts to worry about.

 

[locoyo386]

Well nitrates are not as toxic to fish, usually they can be ignored on a fish only tank. If you would like to look at an alternative method to lowering your nitrates before you go into vodka dosing (not recomended unless you really know what you are doing, ie. know the chemistry), you might take a look at this thread;
https://forums.saltwaterfish.com/t/330606/mega-powerful-nitrate-and-phosphate-remover-replaces-skimmer-refugium-everything
Once again I do not think nitrates are as toxic as ammonia or nitrites.

 

[caz2022]

I had the same thing happen to me! I had a V. lion, Porcy, Yellow Tang, and an orge toad fish in my 125. I lost power for about an hour the other night and heard a bunch of splashing from the tank. When the lights came on my V. lions dorsals were all broken off and my puffers left eye was messed up. I seperated them and started treating but the lion didnt last the night. The puffer lived for a day and a half. They never showed any agression towards each other before.