fish keep dying

[wright824]

Ok, i have a 45 gal which has been up and running for about 6 months. i have 25lbs of live rock, 2 cleaner shrimp, watchman goby, a bunch of turbo snails, these other little snail (cant remember the name) 5 red legged crabs. a bta, 2 green chromis, 1 clown (until this morning

), 1 flame angel (until last night

) 1 royal gamma (added yesterday before i new the flame died). I just added a coralife skimmer 3 days ago.
Now the problem, :notsure: every time i add fish it seems they last anywhere from 3days to 1 week. They are swimming around, eating doing just find and all of a sudden they are dead.

my water is: ammonia 0, nitrate 0, ph 8.2 and nitrite 0.

. I don't know what i am doing wrong. I follow acclimation procedures to the T and they are find at first.
I am to the point where i am ready to call it quits. My husband is having a fit over what i am spending in fish!! and they are dying for no reason that i can figure out

anyone have any ideas?

 

[scsinet]

What kind of a test kit are you using?
The reason I ask is that given that you've only added the skimmer 3 days ago I find it incredibly hard to believe that you have 0 nitrates. I am wondering if your test kit is giving you false readings. Have you had a third party such as an LFS backing up your results?
Also, are you getting all of your fish from the same place?

 

[walmart]

the turbo's will get big for your tank. and it seems like you might be slightly overstocked. and i think you should take the bta out and return it to the fish store.
but anemones need perfect water so it could be something else killing your fish.dont add anymore fish. let everything even out and try to keep the fish you currently have alive... alive.

 

[walmart]

it all seems to that you are adding your fish to quickly how long has your tank been established?

 

[stacyt]

You say you are acclimating to the "T", but can you clarify? Who's guidlines are you following? Also seems to me that you might be rushing things a bit.
My suggestion would be not to add anymore to the tank for now, other than maybe some more LR.
Flame angel should probably not have been added to that new of a tank, with small amount of LR. I would recomend researching before purchasing.

 

[chadman]

he said his tank has been set up for over six months...could there be a very territorial fish in your tank which bothers all other fish? they could be dieing form excessive stress...just an idea...also you should add at least 25more lbs of live rock....maybe your fish odn't have adequate hiding places

 

[trigger11]

Doesnt sound to me like you were overstocked as previous post suggested. 2 green chromis, royal gramma and flame angel unless I missed something. What kind of water are you using? Tap water or RO water? If using tap water you could possibly have extra polutants in there that are toxic to the fish. My suggestion would be to do a water change with good RO water and then give the system some time with the fish you have and see how things go. This would also give your protein skimmer a chance to catch up. Good luck and keep your head up. There are so many variables to all this SW hobby it can be challenging to figure out sometimes. You have kept fish alive for 6 mo so I wouldnt just give up. Unless you really wanted to. Doesnt sound like you do though or you wouldnt have asked a question here. Right?

 

[wright824]

I am using the Api master test kit, had the water tested at 2 other lfs and they got the same results, did it again just this morning with the lfs. The fish have been added 1 or 2 at at time. about a week apart. I got the fish from different places not the same place all the time. It seems that the shrimp, goby bta crabs and snails are the only things I didn't have to replace. I only had 3 turbos at first but started to get some brown stuff on the glass and the lfs told me to add a few more turbos that they weren't keeping up (they were small). I did and now it is gone. My water is well but is goes through some sort of filtering system in the basement to remove all mineral, odor and any thing else, it doesn't add any thing to the water and it perfectly safe for the fish. It is always ph perfect.
i acculumate using the drip method. one place i purchased fish from didn't want me to do it that way so i did it their way and i still got the same results..with in a week they died. I have no territorial fish. at least i haven't seen any of them be territorial with any that i have added
I have a freshwater beta that my daughter won on the boardwalk in wildwood nj over the summer sitting in an old vase on top of my desk. That i can't kill!!! I dump him into an old chinese soup container filled with fresh tap water then wash out his vase, fill with fresh tap again and dump him back in. according to all the lfs i should have killed him the first time i did that ... i do it weekly since she won him and he is as happy as can be!!

 

[rbaldino]

Do the fish show signs of being ill and then die? Or is it a case where you wake up in the morning and they're dead? If they're just turning up dead, there might be something in the tank that's picking them off. What do their remains look like? Are there any signs that they've been picked at or injured? I don't think it's a water quality issue, because if there were something wrong with the water the inverts would probably be the first to go. No matter what, I'd stop adding fish for now and see what happens over the course of a month or two.

 

[wright824]

sometimes they are just dead in the tank. this morning "nemo" seemed to be struggling to swim. He was eating fine last night, out in the open and swimming just fine with the other fish. none looked picked at or chewed up. nothing looks wrong with their fins or gills.. at least that i could see. He also looked like he was breathing fast? possibly. I though at first maybe i had too much current in the tank and i was giving them "heart attacks" trying to swim with it but after figuring out my gph and turn over rate i don't think that is the problem either

 

[scsinet]

Occasionally, a tank gets some kind of weird toxin in it from lord knows where...
Do you run activated carbon in the system at all? If you don't, you might consider adding some. Nothing you are doing and nothing that you've said about your system suggests why this is happening. It almost at this point seems to point to one of those fluke situations... something in the water that nobody tests for.
What kind of filtration do you have? All you need to do is rinse some carbon in RODI water, then dump it into a filter sock and drop it into your sump, canister, HOB, whatever you have.

 

[uberlink]

Have you heard the one about the guy who goes to the doctor? Tells his doctor, "it's the strangest thing. If I lift my arm over my head and move it back and forth, my shoulder starts hurting. What should I do?" The doctor says, "Stop lifting you arm over your head and move it back and forth."
My point is, if a fish dies whenever you add a fish, maybe you should stop adding fish--at least for a while.
A 45 gallon tank is on the smaller end, and you only have 25 pounds of live rock. As a result, I think you may have a somewhat smaller stocking limit than you might suspect. You have had something like 4-5 fish in there, right? I would stick with four fish for now, and try to add some live rock (maybe get it up around 50-60 pounds). Also, keep that new skimmer working! It will help increase your tank's ability with support your critters.
Also, let me ask, how do you maintain your salinity? Just through top-offs? If so, you might consider adding an auto-top off system. There's a cheap one out there on the web for under $50 complete. That will reduce your fishes' stress level.
All that said, it's weird that your anemone is surviving all this if it's some toxin in the water. Any chance one of the fish you added brought in a disease? (Doesn't sound like there are any realy symptoms, other than sudden death, though...)

 

[wright824]

I have a whisper 3 filter and it has carbon in it.
I usually just top off the tank and i check it daily so i am not dumping a gallon of water at one time. I thought it was weird to that the bta is doing fine! I was told they are picky. I am looking for live rock right now and get that in and take it from there. Hopefully i won't loose anymore fish for right now
I like the idea of the automatic top off system. i have to look into that.thanks i didn't know there was one

 

[uberlink]

I actually think auto top off systems should be part of every tank. Especially in the winter months when the air is dry, I lose up to 3 gallons per day from my 75. The salinity will take off like a rocket at that pace, let alone in my 28. There are several expensive ATOs, but there's a guy at a place called California Reefs who sells a very inexpensive one (similar to something you could build yourself, with a little know how). Great little setup. I have not lost a single animal in the year since I added that to my 28, and I won't be without one now.

 

[wright824]

thanks for the info!

 

[jcarroll]

Hey! I was just telling another guy the other day that I had this same problem. He was in the same situation that you are talking about. I couldn't keep any fish either, and all of my inverts were totally fine too. Anyway, after losing 4 fish, I decided that maybe if I let my tank sit for a long time, whatever was wrong with it would work itself out......and after 3-4 months of sitting there, it did. The only thing I did during those months was water changes and every other day feedings so the inverts would have something to eat. Other than that though, I added nothing. All my levels were testing just fine too. I recommend just letting it sit like I did and then trying again. The first two fish I bought were pajama cardinals because they were only $14.95 and I wouldn't have been losing much money if they died like the other fish had, but they survived and I now have 4 fish and two corals and the tank is doing great.

 

[myrtle beach]

If you want to kill the beta just pour bleach in the vase. Those suckers can live forever, but my girlfriend's only lasted a year, I had one for several years.
I would agree that your bioload may be high. Sounds like a lot of inverts and maybe at night they attack your fish. If there are no signs of that, and your levels are all good, I'd say stop adding fish. Wait a while to see who croaks next, make sure everyone is eating well, keep an eye on it and hope for the best.

 

[scsinet]

Originally Posted by Myrtle Beach
If you want to kill the beta just pour bleach in the vase.

I hope you are kidding!

 

[mikeyfishy]

Welcome to the club! I have the EXACT same problem with my 46g right now. And... it has happened twice. The first time it happened, once all the fish died, I sterilized the tank and started over. For me, I cycled with damsels and the damsels did perfectly fine *while* the tank was cycling. After about a month and a half when the cycling was done, they started dying. Through all this, my inverts have done fine with no problems whatsoever (chocolate chip star, cleaner shrimp, several peppermint shrimp, and small hermits). Every fish I put in the tank dies in 3-5 days max. I'm fishless now and might try the wait-a-month-and-see tactic. I don't know what else to do at this point! I'm really thinking that some type of fish disease gets into these tanks and it doesn't affect inverts. Leave the tank fishelss for a month, two months, and the disease can't survive. My water tests perfect as well.
Mike

 

[mikeyfishy]

Curious if you have a lot of fast growing algae in your tank? I noticed that my die-offs always occur after the first algae bloom. I recently read that algae can deplete the water of O2 and in some cases, algae has been known to release toxins and kill fish in coastal regions, but I don't know if that can also happen in a tank. I just got a UV sterilizer (in all likelihood, another $96 down the toilet) in hopes that would help control the algae and parasites (if I have those) and will see if that helps. Having run out of ideas, I have only my own guesses left at this point. Right now, I'm almost ready to just go outside and start burning $100 bills. It'd save me a lot of grief!

Mike