Have you also checked the pH? Hardness? Alkalinity? Some fish may not need exact pH/Hardness/Alkalinity, but if the store's water quality in their tanks is COMPLETELY different from yours, that may be what's causing the poor fish to die. See if you can even take some of their water to test. Great to know you're testing the water, though. I'm actually surprised that there's no ammonia if you've put that many fish in a 10gallon at once. Maybe try another way of testing the water for ammonia? Just in case the test kit you have for it doesn't work.
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Fish keep dying but water is clean =/?
- Thread starter kouneli
- Start date
i want to know if ur aquarium is cycled ?
hopefully u know all these things but still m trying to remind u
adding too much of fish at once even in a cycled aquarium can cause ammonia spikes, due to variation in bio-load... hence it is well established fact that fish should only be introduced in an aquarium in pairs....
zebra danios are very hardy fish... in fact most fish owners use danios to cycle thier new aquarium.
to b on the safe side i provide u with few links on how to's
cycling a new aquarium http://www.firsttankguide.net/cycle.php
gravel vaccum http://www.firsttankguide.net/siphon.php
introduction of fish into the tank http://www.firsttankguide.net/introduce.php
a lil info on fish nutrient needs http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/feedingfish/a/nutrition101.htm
in a cycled aquarium the ammonia readings are always near 0 ppm, nitrite 0, and nitrate below 20 ppm
hopefully this helps
hopefully u know all these things but still m trying to remind u
adding too much of fish at once even in a cycled aquarium can cause ammonia spikes, due to variation in bio-load... hence it is well established fact that fish should only be introduced in an aquarium in pairs....
zebra danios are very hardy fish... in fact most fish owners use danios to cycle thier new aquarium.
to b on the safe side i provide u with few links on how to's
cycling a new aquarium http://www.firsttankguide.net/cycle.php
gravel vaccum http://www.firsttankguide.net/siphon.php
introduction of fish into the tank http://www.firsttankguide.net/introduce.php
a lil info on fish nutrient needs http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/feedingfish/a/nutrition101.htm
in a cycled aquarium the ammonia readings are always near 0 ppm, nitrite 0, and nitrate below 20 ppm
hopefully this helps
TessaStarraphobia
New member
I bought 7 fish on Saturday (I know I should only get 2 or 3 fish at a time, but I wasn't really thinking of that when I bought them. Maybe that could be my problem...). 3 male guppies, 2 ghost shrimp, 1 dwarf gourami, and 1 zebra danio. On Monday morning the first guppy died. On Monday night the first ghost shrimp died. On Tuesday/Wednesday the other ghost shrimp died. On Wednesday the second guppy died.
I am now left with 1 guppy who's barely alive. Sometimes he sinks to the bottom and looks dead, but he gets up and swims around for a couple minutes whenever the zebra danio goes near him. The zebra danio does not nip at him- just chases him occasionally.
I also have the dwarf gourami still. For the most part he seemed perfectly fine. However now he spends the majority of his time resting just below the surface kind of lopsided. Every now and then he'll come down and swim arund the tank. He is not gasping for air when he's at the surface. He seems to have lost his appetite as well.
And then there's the zebra danio. He's the only one I'm not worried about. He glady accepts different types of food. (flake, pellet, freeze-dried, etc.) He's constantly swimming around the whole tank.
I've been testing the water every day. Today was the only day I forgot to do it because I've been asleep most of the day. Going to be testing it in a few minutes though as soon as I rinse out the test tubes. Anyway, every time I've tested the water ammonia has been 0, nitrites have been 0, nitrates are slightly high- around 30.
These fish are in a 10g tank with a 20g filter and about 15 live plants. There is also a heater (temp is about 80*F) and the water has been dechlorinated. I also add a bacteria supplement once a week.
Since there's no obvious problem with the water, I'm not quite sure what to do. Sometime in early November I will be getting a few more zebra danios since that's the only fish I have who seems to be doing fine. If all goes well with the danios, I'll be getting a few guppies in December.
So could someone shed some light on what's wrong here? Is it just the fish, or is there something wrong with the tank?
I've tried testing with both strips and test tubes/drops. The test strips always come out to be lower than the test tubes so I got rid of them. Pretty sure the test tubes are as accurate as I can get. I use the API Freshwater Master Test Kit.
pH has been kind of out of control ever since I first set up the tank. I tried adding a correct pH fizz tab thing to make the pH go to 7.0, but instead of rising it actually got lower. It's at about 6.0 right now =/
The ammonia is at 0.25ppm
Nitrite is 0ppm
Nitrate is at about 20... which is odd because it was at 30 or 40 yesterday =/
The pet store is over an hour away so I'm limited to going there once a month max. And the fish were slowly acclimated to my tank water over the course of about an hour so I don't think that was a problem.
I haven't done a water change, I've only had the fish since Saturday =/ Why would I change the water if the tests come out perfectly fine? And these are the first fish to be in the tank.
I am now left with 1 guppy who's barely alive. Sometimes he sinks to the bottom and looks dead, but he gets up and swims around for a couple minutes whenever the zebra danio goes near him. The zebra danio does not nip at him- just chases him occasionally.
I also have the dwarf gourami still. For the most part he seemed perfectly fine. However now he spends the majority of his time resting just below the surface kind of lopsided. Every now and then he'll come down and swim arund the tank. He is not gasping for air when he's at the surface. He seems to have lost his appetite as well.
And then there's the zebra danio. He's the only one I'm not worried about. He glady accepts different types of food. (flake, pellet, freeze-dried, etc.) He's constantly swimming around the whole tank.
I've been testing the water every day. Today was the only day I forgot to do it because I've been asleep most of the day. Going to be testing it in a few minutes though as soon as I rinse out the test tubes. Anyway, every time I've tested the water ammonia has been 0, nitrites have been 0, nitrates are slightly high- around 30.
These fish are in a 10g tank with a 20g filter and about 15 live plants. There is also a heater (temp is about 80*F) and the water has been dechlorinated. I also add a bacteria supplement once a week.
Since there's no obvious problem with the water, I'm not quite sure what to do. Sometime in early November I will be getting a few more zebra danios since that's the only fish I have who seems to be doing fine. If all goes well with the danios, I'll be getting a few guppies in December.
So could someone shed some light on what's wrong here? Is it just the fish, or is there something wrong with the tank?
I've tried testing with both strips and test tubes/drops. The test strips always come out to be lower than the test tubes so I got rid of them. Pretty sure the test tubes are as accurate as I can get. I use the API Freshwater Master Test Kit.
pH has been kind of out of control ever since I first set up the tank. I tried adding a correct pH fizz tab thing to make the pH go to 7.0, but instead of rising it actually got lower. It's at about 6.0 right now =/
The ammonia is at 0.25ppm
Nitrite is 0ppm
Nitrate is at about 20... which is odd because it was at 30 or 40 yesterday =/
The pet store is over an hour away so I'm limited to going there once a month max. And the fish were slowly acclimated to my tank water over the course of about an hour so I don't think that was a problem.
I haven't done a water change, I've only had the fish since Saturday =/ Why would I change the water if the tests come out perfectly fine? And these are the first fish to be in the tank.