I don't understand

jsteiert

jsteiert

Member
Ok I can not seem to keep fish in my tank for very long before they die, my corals do fine, crabs, snails and shrimp fine... But fish wont live.
I have a 20g tank with 20lbs live sand, 30 lbs live rock covered with some awesome coraline algea. I have a filter, protien skimmer large enough for a 100gal tank, power head, heater, and 130watts of PC light.
The only fish I have right now is a lawnmower blenny, I have lost a tomato clown, 2 domino damsels, 2 blue damsels, a fire fish, a royal gramma to date. I only keep one or two fish max in my tank at any given time, or at least try to.
My corals are: mushrooms, zenia, ricordia, gorgonia, and I have a feather duster which I know is not a coral.
For the longest time I decided to not keep any fish in my tank and just work on having a reef tank only, during that time with no fish my water quality was:
PH-8.2
Ammonia-0
Nitrite-0
Nitrate - 40
SG 1.026
I have always struggled with high nitrates, I do not over feed, I only feed twice a week. Without any fish in the tank what or how does the nitrates get so high?
Currently with just the one fish and after a 20% water change yesterday my nitrates are still at 20ppm.
My tank is beautiful, but a pain to maintain. Can any one provide guidance please. What am I doing wrong here? I want to be able to have one or two fish in my tank, I want to lower my nitrates and keep them low, but can not seem to figure it out.
 
patandlace

patandlace

Active Member
How are you acclimating your fish? I don't think your Nitrates are high enough to kill all your fish. What kind of test kit are you using? How often do you do water changes?
 
jsteiert

jsteiert

Member
I acclimate by floating the bags in the tank to maintain temps, then do mini water changes replacing the FS water with mine over a period of 1-1.5 hours.
So far the fish live for a week or so after acclimating them, on my other tank I acclimate the same way and have no problems keeping fish, some I have had for a couple of years now.
I only use DI water in my tanks, I get it from work where we have a company maintain our DI system. All of my tanks have this water in it, and only my 20g has these issues. So I do not think it is my water.
I do a 20% water change weekly on my tank as well. My test kit is not a very expensive one, it the generic test kit sold in all LFS. I have compared my test readings to the LFS reading on occasion and we are pretty close in the results.
 
scsinet

scsinet

Active Member
Given that you are not having problems with your other tank, logic would tend to dictate that it's not your source water.
Okay, so that said, I'd still check it out. DI water is a far cry from RODI water, DI is only one of several steps that a full out RODI system performs, and even a full RODI unit does not remove nitrates, phosphates, etc. It's generally regarded that RODI is the only thing to use for saltwater systems. DI is not sufficient, unless you are lucky enough that your water (pre filtered) is nearly perfect to begin wtih.
Just for giggles, run a nitrate test on your source water.
The other thing is that you may be overfiltering. You've got more than enough live rock to provide all of your filtration, and if you have a supplemental filter (wet/dry, canister, bio-wheel, etc) it may be that you are actually over filtering your tank. If you have a full out filter, you might try removing your biological media and see how things go.
 
jmcnaz

jmcnaz

Member
there are only two reasons I can think of.
1. Your tank is overcrowded or,
2. you have an animal in your tank that is killing your fish.
Good Luck,
jmcnaz
 
bang guy

bang guy

Moderator
Originally Posted by jmcnaz
there are only two reasons I can think of.
1. Your tank is overcrowded or,
2. you have an animal in your tank that is killing your fish.
Good Luck,
jmcnaz
I vote #1. It's a 20 gallon tank, 2 fish is more than enough.
 
molly05

molly05

Member
Samething happened to my 30g reef tank. Only 2 perc clown survived so far. No matter how I acclimated the fish, they died 3 days later or a week or so.
 
jsteiert

jsteiert

Member
Well I dont think I have an over crowding problem seeing as I only have one fish in a 20g tank. Correct me if I am wrong though.
If there is something in my tank killing my fish I have never seen it. I have read posts about mantis shrimp and all but I do not think I have one in my tank. What else should I look for?
I tested my water source, Im at work and have access to my tanks. All levels are 0. No nitrites, nitrates, ammonia, all 0
 
jmcnaz

jmcnaz

Member
you use a filter pad?
if so this could be where your nitrates are coming from, pad traps nitrate in.
20 gal. tank is not that big, could limit how much live stock you can put in.
jmcnaz
 
bang guy

bang guy

Moderator
Originally Posted by jmcnaz
you use a filter pad?
if so this could be where your nitrates are coming from, pad traps nitrate in.
20 gal. tank is not that big, could limit how much live stock you can put in.
jmcnaz
Nitrates don't kill fish though.
 
jmcnaz

jmcnaz

Member
I didnt say the nitrates are killing his fish, I was trying to find a solution to his high nitrates.
jmcnaz
 
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