Please help with water conditions

19 years ago

Hello, All!

I have been keeping aquariums for 20+ years and have never encountered anything like this. I would love some help if possible...

I set up a 29 gallon freshwater (with live plants) aquarium in May. The filter (Millenia 2000) was old and had been in the attic for a couple of years, along with the tank and lights themselves. I washed and rinsed everything really well, bought new gravel and live plants, add a bit of old gravel from my 90 gallon tank (which is doing perfectly fine) to start the bacteria going, added water and left it alone for a month or so. Everything was fine - no ammonia and a ph of 7.4 - 7.6. I then added 2 small orandas and a tiny chocolate pleco. Now, I realize that goldfish are messy, but I've had many over the years and they have never created a problem. Within a week, the water was cloudy and smelled "sulphury". I did a 50% water change. Within another week, the same thing happened. Another water change. This happened about 4 times, and then I woke up one morning and both orandas were floating (the last water change was 3 days prior). Pleco was doing fine. At each "cloudy/sulphury" burst I tested the water - ammonia at 0, PH at 7.4 - 7.6. No changes there.

I did a 95-98% water change and left it alone (with the Pleco in there). All was fine for a couple of weeks. Then I added 6 mollies, thinking that if this problem was a fluke, I could add them to the 90 gallon and get more orandas later. Here we go again with the same story only the cloudyness and smell wasn't quite as bad. I did the water change/testing thing again. All was well on the testing every time. After about 3 weeks, I come home from work and all the mollies are dead (4 days after the water change) and the Pleco isn't looking too good. I did a no-no and put the Pleco into the 90 gallon, hoping this wasn't some dread disease that would kill everything in the 90. Pleco recovered and is still going great. So I did another water change and left the blasted thing sitting there. It's been running with no fish and some live plants since about mid to late July. No cloudiness, no smell and no water changes. So I decide to do a water change again, let it sit for another week or so and try fish again. I did the water change (95% or so) on Wednesday night and wake up this morning with cloudy water and and the terrible smell. I tested again. No ammonia and ph of 7.6. What am I missing here? Can someone please give me a clue as to what I'm doing wrong? I don't want to risk fish again until I get this problem taken care of.

BTW - I can't believe it's my water, because I do a 15 - 25% water change on the 90 gallon every week and all fish and live plants are doing great.

Thanks in Advance!

Mandy

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Comments (5)

petiolaris
19 years ago
Was the filter medium new or seasoned? I'm thinking that the problem is that your filter media has not gone through the Nitrogen Cycle yet and is being overwhelmed with Ammonia. Water changes are helpful in staving off deaths, but unless the "good bacteria" (Nitrosammonas)are given a chance to break down the Ammonia, the fish could be in trouble. And after Ammonia is broken down, Nitrobacter bacteria break down harmful Nitrites into safer Nitrates.

Basically, you are probably experiencing "New Tank Syndrome". What needs to be done is go slowly. Don't add any new fish. You may want to consider buying a product that speeds the process along.
mandy_g
Original Author
19 years ago
The filter medium was new, but I did put in used gravel from the larger tank (larger tank has a UGF), so I would have thought that would have sped things along. I would say about a cup or so was added.

I didn't say, but need to add, that I had a ammonia test kit that was fairly old, so at some point during this debacle, I bought a new test kit. Both were (and still are) reading 0 ammonia. Would this be occuring if the tank was being overwhelmed with ammonia?
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james_ny
19 years ago
If your new tank doesn't have a ug filter adding gravel with bacteric is probably hurting the cause. The bacteria will die when it doesn't get the water flow through it. Better to add the gravel to the filter. You said the ammo was 0 [have a store confirm this] Also check the nitrites. Only have 3 or 4 cheap fish and make sure the tank goes through it's cycle. Plattys and some tetras are good for cycleing. Zero ammo means just that. Either the test kit results are wrong [again have pet shop verify] and check the other water parameters that affect fish health [ nitrites and nitrates].
petiolaris
19 years ago
The test kit may not be giving a true indication of what's going on. It could be contaminated. A new kit will verify. I can't say as the gravel would hold much in the way of bacteria. Go with James_ny' advice.
mandy_g
Original Author
18 years ago
Thanks All!

Sorry to be so long in getting back to you - I've been terribly busy at work.

James - I really don't want to add UGF as I'm going to be keeping a couple of orandas and they don't much like the UGFs. And I really don't trust the pet store in my area to go to them for water testing. A Petsmart came in and put all of the local stores out of business. They have 12 year olds working there who know absolutely nothing about aquariums. The closest "local" store to me now is in Memphis - over 80 miles away (and there's not but a couple there). However, I'm using 2 different test kits with the same results on both kits. So I wouldn't think I would have a bad kit.

I will say that according to ammonia and nitrite levels, I do think the tank was going through a New Tank Syndrome. All seems to be well now. I have yet to get any fish for it - again, I've been really busy. But I do plan on getting a few mollies or the like just to make sure everything is fine.

Thanks for all of y'all's help! It was truly appreciated.