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Strange Going's On....


wirral sea fishing

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I have a vision 180 (180ltr) tank, it has been set up for 2 years and all has been well apart from the normal getting the water correct in the first instance, since then the water has been ok with good reading in the PH, KH, Ammonia as well as Nitrate and Nitrite.

 

The tank is filled with Barbs, Tiger, Emerald, Rose and 2 others that i have forgot the name of as well as a knife fish. The fish have all grown from thumb nail size to about 2 inches. Last month all but one of the Tiger Barbs died over a week, a water test showed that amonia levels had risen but not to a massive reading, only 0.25 and PH had dropped away to around 6.0, I carried out a 20% water change and all cleared up, however the PH did take it's time to get back to 7.0, this week i have noticed the plants dying off and before this they have always grown well, infact i have had to cut them back on a few occasions and yesterday a rosie barb died, i have carried out a water test this morning and all reveal perfect readings: Ammonia 0, PH 7.0, Nitrate 0, Nitrite 0, so i am at a loss as to why i am loosing fish and now seem to be loosing plants, would this be a result of the problem in the tank last month or do barbs only have a short life span ? I have some torpedo barbs on order and dont really want to introduce them into the tank if i still have a problem (super expensive) even though the readings we all rely on are showing the water to be good - what am i overlooking ?

 

Ta

 

Chris

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I am no expert by any means but I would suggest that it is the actual fluctuations in your water chemistry that are at the root of the problem by causing the fish stress.

 

Before introducing any new fish I would give the tank at least a week or two to make sure that it has stabilised and if possible find and rectify the cause of the sudden changes in chemistry.

 

A PH of 6 seems a bit low to me. I keep my discus which are supposed to be kept at a low PH at 6.8 but when I dropped it to just below 6 on the advice of an expert I had all sorts of problems with them including loosing a couple. Which did not go down very well as they are not cheap at the best of times.

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It would appear that your first problem related to over stocking i.e. the fish had grown in size and were producing more waste than the filter could cope with, check the filter for a dark brown slime, if coated with this you will have to strip and clean it, recharging with a filter fresh start.

 

You may require a larger filter or a second one as you are introducing more fish. The problem with a low water capacity filter is that when over loaded they pack up functioning correctly very quickly some time only a matter of hours.

 

I much prefer a sump tank filter holding the same amount of water as the aquarium plus an under gravel filter with power heads this gives a very balanced system which is hard to over load.

 

A second hand tank will do for the sump but you will have to have the aquarium drilled for a 25mm outlet, a pain when you have the system running.

Edited by Ken Davison South Wales

I fish, I catches a few, I lose a few, BUT I enjoys. Anglers Trust PM

 

eat.gif

 

http://www.petalsgardencenter.com

 

Petals Florist

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Thanks for the reply's, the tank has now settled and is all running well (still not adding the new fish) the problem seems to have been the drop in PH and minerals, the filter was fine to be honest as i change the "pad" each week and squeeze out the blocks each month (in the water that i have removed from the tank) the shop i use was really helpfull and gave me a good telling off as well as i should have taken my fish up to them untill i got the tank correct again (they offer this service FOC) as long as they have tank space, checked the water again this morning and all levels ok, the PH has risen to 7.2 (what it should be), however speaking to a guy from North West Water he tells me that we have very little mineral content in our water and that i should either buy a product or add some broken cockle shells from the beach to help keep the mineral level up........

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  • 3 months later...

hi i rescently had a plant that was growing perfectly then i woke up next morning and it was dead ?? i have no idea what happened? i think mabe if you have xmas lights or speakers next to your tank as its xmas might be something to do with it or temperature or filter ? im just guessing

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