Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Fishnet

If you have a fish pond, fish tank or are seeking advice about keeping tropical fish, you can find advice on our Fish forum.

Original poster

Finrot :-(

74 replies

pugsandseals · 23/08/2011 10:38

We bought 4 new fish 2 weeks ago which are all doing well (guppies & platys) but the original fish (at least the guppies) are dropping like flies Sad

Our normal fish shop has closed so we went somewhere else (won't be going there again!).

Fish tails seem to be going a pointy shape as all their fins disappear seemingly overnight! Have dosed the tank with finrot treatment, but is there anything else we can do to help save the remaining 30 or so fish? We took the first poorly fish to a local fish shop & he found it very hard to diagnose - thought it was finrot but that is also looked like the fish has been attacked by a bigger one (we don't have anything bigger than guppies). Really annoyed as the only reason we bought some extra fish was to get some more females as we seem to have more male babies being born than females Angry. DD is distraught!

Help!

Apart from a couple of tetras, the only other animals in the tank are assasin snails & tiger snails BTW

OP posts:
Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 12:02

Wow that was a manic morning - several more dead and a HUGE NitrIte spike! Just spent ages doing another big water change - hope it helps!

OP posts:
Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 12:02

Good news is that the ph level is starting to come back towards normal.

OP posts:
Grumpla · 24/08/2011 13:45

Uh oh. Sounds like your tank wasn't fully cycled? Or perhaps the meds have killed off the filter bacteria?

Have you replaced all the filter media in one go recently (some tanks/shops suggest you do this, so that you keep buying expensive new sponges, it's a really bad idea!) or washed it in tap water by mistake (should be old tank water)

If you know someone local with a tank it might be an idea to go and beg a bit of their filter sponge to help boost yours.

Another thought - could the meds have killed off the snails in your tank? If you have a large number of snails (even quite small ones) that die all at once that can really screw your water quality as they decay very rapidly.

Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 14:13

Just done another test - NitrIte levels still very high! Should I do another water change???

OP posts:
Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 14:20

I think it's a combination of meds, lots of new baby guppies in the last few weeks & maybe snails all dying off at once (although I still see a number of them still crawling around).

I wouldn't have thought there would be problems with the tank not being fully cycled as it's been going since xmas - or is that still a relatively new tank in the grand scheme of things?

Amonia level still relatively low.

Just glad it's school holidays so I am off work & able to do the water changes during the day - it's back breaking work lugging the buckets through though!

Another water test in a couple of hours maybe?

OP posts:
Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 14:21

DH changed one of the green pads last night - I hope that didn't upset the balance!

OP posts:
EauRouge · 24/08/2011 14:45

No, you shouldn't be getting ammonia or nitrIte in a tank that's been set up since Christmas. It's not a massively mature tank but it should be coping with the stock. Baby guppies don't produce an awful lot of ammonia unless you've got hundreds of them. Your tank is 180 litres-ish, if I'm remembering rightly?

What other pads do you have in your filter?

Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 14:47

Didn't change any of the other pads - just the fine green one. Hope DH knew what he was doing!

2nd water change of the day done.

OP posts:
EauRouge · 24/08/2011 16:57

Changing one pad shouldn't be too much, I was just wondering if you had a black pad in there.

Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 18:11

Yes we have - why?

OP posts:
Grumpla · 24/08/2011 18:52

The black ones are carbon, right? Racking my brains here but isn't there a point at which they can possibly start releasing some of the chemicals they have previously absorbed? I haven't used them myself but might be worth researching?

You need to keep that nitrite down, two or three water changes a day if necessary. Sorry!

Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 19:02

We had to take the black one out before giving the fin rot treatment. Put it back in last night.

3rd water change time!

OP posts:
Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 19:03

DH can do this one as he's home from work now! Grin
Will save my back!

OP posts:
EauRouge · 24/08/2011 19:58

How old is the carbon one? They need to be binned every 4 weeks ish. I think the jury's out on whether or not it leaches stuff back into the water. I would just chuck it, you shouldn't need it in permanently anyway, aquarium companies just tell you that because they want your money Wink I never use it in any of my tanks unless I need to remove some meds.

Here's a good article on carbon filtration- www.aquaticcommunity.com/aquarium/carbon.php

Original poster
pugsandseals · 24/08/2011 22:14

Very useful thanks EauRouge - we replaced the carbon which sounds like the right thing to do seeing as everything has gone belly-up since the fin rot meds!

Just worrying about the nitrite levels at the moment. It seems to take loads of water changes to make even the smallest of difference to the nitrite level!

OP posts:
EauRouge · 25/08/2011 10:24

What's the nitrIte reading? Are you still getting an ammonia reading?

Grumpla · 25/08/2011 11:38

Cutting down on food might help - the nitrite spike will do them more harm than a diet. That and a LOT of water changes. Have you not got anyone you can nick some mature filter media off to help?

Original poster
pugsandseals · 25/08/2011 13:13

Just checked the nitrite this morning which was still up (but not quite as bad). Did another water change & doing some proper testing right now so will see how it's all going.

No deaths overnight though so thats a start!

Nobody around locally with a tank we can steal from I'm afraid Sad everyone seems to have given up the hobby now the 2 most local suppliers have closed down. How long would the bacteria live for if I asked my Dad to bring some up from his goldfish tank? (about 100 miles away)

OP posts:
Original poster
pugsandseals · 25/08/2011 13:48

Phosphate down to .25 Smile

ph leveling off at around 7.5 Smile

Ammonia back to 0 Grin

Nitrite at around 2.0 Sad

I'm really feeling that it was the meds for the fon rot which mucked everything up now! Did a water change at 10am, do you think another at around 5pm will do the trick or would you try to do 3 changes in a day again?

OP posts:
Original poster
pugsandseals · 25/08/2011 13:50

I am definately going to set up that hospital tank for future meds!

OP posts:
EauRouge · 25/08/2011 20:35

Most meds are fine. What did you use? I normally use Melafix.

Grumpla · 25/08/2011 21:02

If your dad brings the filter sponge in a bucket of his dirty tank water it should be fine. Even better if he could run the filter in transit if he has one of those car plug doodads.

Original poster
pugsandseals · 26/08/2011 11:37

Meds were Interpet - Anti Fungus & Finrot. Never again!

Things seem to be sorting themselves out this morning Smile
Ammonia down to 0.25, Nitrite to 0.3

Will do another water change in a bit. We've also stopped pouring in the new water through the filter (which DH has always insisted on) and we've turned the spout from the filter so it spurts upwards & out of the water. As well as improving oxygen it seems to have stopped it from stirring up all the muck in the gravel by the filter intake (which at last seems to be getting better). I wonder if DH kept making things worse by pouring the new water in through the filter or if we had reached the turning point anyway?

OP posts:
Original poster
pugsandseals · 26/08/2011 11:40

Until 2 weeks ago, the ammonia & nitrite levels had hardly ever moved from 0.0 - I wonder if for some reason the tank didn't cycle properly when we first got it at xmas & we are suffering the consequences?

Thank you both for all your support & advice through this episode! Thank goodness for mumsnet! Grin

OP posts:
EauRouge · 26/08/2011 12:21

What happened during the fishless cycle, did you see ammonia and nitrIte spikes then? When did you add the meds, was it around 2 weeks ago? I'll have a look at the ingredients and see if there's anything that would have killed off the filter bacteria.

Not sure what you mean about the filter. Do you vacuum your gravel when you do a water change? If you've got a lot of detritus then that could be what's causing some of the problems.