whole tank wipe out, help.

psufan43

psufan43

Member
Yesterday i did a big water change in my tank. When i was with done that i moved my pearscale angel, which i had with a 9 inch queen trigger, a 7 inch undjulated and a 6 inch clown trigger and 5 inch minatus, I decided to move him, becasue the other monsters were getting bigger and i didnt want him to be a victim. But anyway i woke up today, and my red tail trigger, my pearscale and rusty dwarf were all dead. I checked the ammnoina this morning it was sky high, this is a day after a water change. And my koran is really sucking wind,almost in shock, and i doubt he is gonna make it also. Anyone have any idea what would cause this. the tank is a 75 gallon. and has been established for well over 9 months.
thanks
Doug.
 
michaelstern

michaelstern

Member
I am no expert, but it appears you are WAY!!!!! overstocked. Could be a combination of stress and bad water due to overcrowding.
 
psufan43

psufan43

Member
Thanks for reply
I dont know if thats it though.
75 gallons for 2 dwarf angels a 3 inch koran and a 3 inch redtail, i think is ok, they have been together for about 6 months no problem. and there was only 1 dwarf angel until i added the pearlscale yesterday. is it possible pearlscale was sick. but didnt effect my trigger tank, becasue they are not as prone to disease.
 
aarone

aarone

Active Member
well, since the ammonia is high, try to figure out what could have caused this. Myabe a death of something raised it up there. Did you test for ph?
aaron
 
fishy88

fishy88

Member
how long did you wait to add the new salt water? how big was the tank with the queen, clown, and undulated triggers? just curious
 
jp0379

jp0379

Member
Just on a personal note, you ever notice that on this board you can come on here and post that your water too cold, and they'll say "the tank is overstocked" as the reason?
Anyway, I'd have to go out on a limb here and say that the water your added hadn't been treated correctly. Was it tap or distilled? Very sorry to hear about that, by the way.
 
psufan43

psufan43

Member
Thanks for all the replies
I use tropic marine salt in all my tanks. I did a 75% water change in my 75 gallon tank. Other then the water change there was no other changes to the tank. I was worried about putting two dwarfs together, but i did not want to leave the pearlscale in with the big triggers anymore. There was no aggresion towards the pearlscale with the big triggers, though i dont think he was doing as well, the big triggers were eating everything, and I thought he would not get ample supply of food. when i added the fish there was some aggresion between the two dwarfs for about 5 min. then everything seemed to be fine, i monitored very close. My water for the change was fresh mix tap water. I acclimated the pearlscale with a plastic bag, and did the standard process of adding a new fish, by adding the tank water to the bag ect ect.
The tank the pearlscale came from was a 150 gallon.
I did a water change first thing this morning, and the koran seems like is doing better. though he is not eating like he did. Im gonna hold off on food until tommorow and give everything a chance to settle back down.
Doug.
 
dacia

dacia

Active Member
That large of a water change may have caused a mini-cycle which would explain why your ammonia went up. It shouldn't last long though. IMHO.
 
armageddon

armageddon

Member
i would keep the water change size down from 75 to something more like 20 or 25. Please post some pictures of your trigger tank if you could. How big are each of them?
 
T

thomas712

Guest
Even a 25 gallon water change would be 1/3 of the tank, take out for rocks and its even more, there can be times when such a change is necessary, but otherwise 10 or 15 gallons would be all you need to do.
Thomas
 
sheracr123

sheracr123

Member
Why did you feel the need to do such a large water change anyway? Did you suspect something else going on with the water?
 
psufan43

psufan43

Member
i was suspecting ick last wk, some light scratching, i treated with kick ick, didnt notice any scratching, but i decided to do a big water change this wkend to be sure.
i probally should have just left it.
as for pictures, im gonna get my frineds digital camera, this week and ill post some.
the size of my triggers are approximately
queen 8.5-9
red sea undujlated about 7
clown around 6.
The queen i brought around 3 inches about 9 months ago. It has the fastest growth rate i have ever seen on any fish. I was shocked but the undjulate is not as aggresive as the queen.
Thanks guys for your replies.
Doug.
 
dreeves

dreeves

Active Member
Your large water change probably disturbed the bio filtration of your tank. Water change frequency and quantity is a heavily devated issue among hobbyist. Smaller, more frequent changes are less stressfull on the inhabitants and bio filter.
In regards to your possible ich...why would you think a water change of any magnitude would help with the ich? The amount of encapsulated cysts on bottom, sides or anywhere in the tank, versus free floating, would far out weigh any relief you thought you could afford via the water change.
You may consider some Amquel+ (or similar) to aid in your situation...it will de-toxify the amonia while the bio system rebuilds.
Good luck.
 
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