Too terrible to mention in the subject line

[TammyLiz]

Two of my yoyos died overnight. I hate to admit it, but all my fish from the 55 gallon with the damaged stand are still in the smaller 20 gallon tank. They have settled in decently well, and behavior had returned somewhere close to normal, although less activity. A couple of days ago I noticed one of the barbs is losing weight although still eating, and my striata was looking very thin, as well as one of my yoyos which has never thrived. I also noticed some red at the base of one of the gouramis fins. I decided to treat with some antibiotics, but hadn't done it yet since I still needed to purchase them.

This morning I approached the tank with bucket in hand to do a water change, turned on the light to do the normal headcount, and found two yoyos dead. One of them was the skinny one that has never done well, and the other one was a mid-sized one that had been just fine yesterday. He had good shape, eating well, acting fine, a silly little guy and I have to admit, my favorite.

So I removed them and checked them out closely. The small one had the belly ripped out of him and eyes were cloudy. The mid-sized one had red at the base of a couple of his fins. One living fish has a scratch on him possibly from a fight?

Tested the water-
pH 6.0 (not sure when that dropped, I haven't tested in a while)
nitrate 40-80 (very difficult to tell because the colors are so close)
ammonia 0.5

The dead fish did not look decomposed so I'm not sure if the ammonia is definitely from that. Some dead plants may have done it? Some of them are suffering from the lower light. The high nitrate is probably because of the smaller water volume, even though I have been doing larger water changes, they have not been twice as large.

I went ahead and did a 35% change after testing, but didn't mess with the filter because of the ammonia.

I guess I should still treat with antibiotics? I've heard mixed experiences with maracyn I and II affecting the cycle or not. Also, I never did treat with levamisole. My pleco is still fine and I haven't seen any worms in a while. But I know thats stupid and they must still be there. I was just in the middle of so many other things. Bad excuse. After seeing they were getting sick the other day I decided to go ahead and fork out the money to treat them, but I waited a little too late. I still think while they are in the smaller water volume would be a good time to treat since it will cut the cost of the antibiotics in half. Still I will be spending almost $50 that I don't have if I do both that and levamisole, which I think I should.

What a mess. I feel very guilty. I'm almost posting just to confess. I don't feel I can claim innocence since they are still in this smaller tank. I've been doing water changes and feeding them a good diet but that's about it.

[helen nightingale]

hey, tammyLiz, sorry about your loss

[loachmom]

TammyLiz,

I've been a new mommy many times over, and I can tell you that you are only one person and sometimes other things suffer while you are caring for little ones. I believe I read somewhere that you have a toddler, also.

It's a shame that your fish have died, but it's not because you've been neglecting them. It sounds like you have been going the extra mile with water changes and food. I'm sure the fish would rather be in small aquarium, than flopping on the floor because the tank stand gave way!

Your children are the most important, and I can tell that you already know that.

Take care.

[mikev]

Hi TammyLiz,

Very sorry to hear this.

A couple of things:

Ammonia might have been a contributing factor to the fish already weakened by something else. What is your pH? if it is in low 6.x, 0.5 ammonia has very little toxicity, and you can just wait for it to disappear without any drastic actions....just make sure you do have enough buffering.

Levamisole treatment is a must if you have loaches that are not gaining weight.
Antibiotic I'm much less certain about.
Maracyn 1 IME is the single least useful drug on the market, it almost never cures anything and there are some good reasons why.
Maracyn 2 (Minocycline) is good against septicimia, but the red you are seeing may not be it.

If I were suspecting a bacterial problem without any idea of the kind of bacteria involved, I'd consider Furan instead. IME it helps in about half of the situations and it is very gentle on the Filter. Cheaper too.

Good luck.

PS. If you have stomach for it, look inside the skinny fish. The chances are you'll find something.

[LoachOrgy]

sounds like it might be bacterial. i treated my tank with melafix for bacterial ulcerations and about a week later it worked well. i could see fin rot and what appeared to be pink meat hanging out of my pleco. melafix worked well. were the fins deteriorated? if so it could be fin rot.

[TammyLiz]

Thanks Helen.

loachmom, thanks for the encouragement. You're right, its not like I've just been lazing around. I do have a toddler--tomorrow is her fourth birthday. We had a birthday party for her on Sunday. She is such a little princess. Right now she is dressed in a Tinkerbell pajama dress and she's carrying around a sparkling wand with a star on the end of it. And she's asking to go out into the backyard.

Mikev, opening the skinny one up isn't going to do much good since something else already ate its stomach! All I can do is hope it was the fish that died who ate it. Otherwise, if it had a parasite, something else has it now.

The pH is at the bottom of my test kit- 6.0, so you're right about the ammonia. I don't think it was the direct cause of the deaths.

I appreciate your opinion on Maracyn I. I'll skip that. And you guessed right, I don't have a clue what bacteria they have. Something, though. I'll look into the Furan. Otherwise, I'll go with just Maracyn II. I am suspecting septicemia, though, because of the marks on the gourami. I just don't understand why the healthy looking loach would come down with it so quickly and die overnight. Could it have been from the high nitrates? I hadn't realized they had gotten that high.

LoachOrgy, no finrot. I agree bacterial, though, and that's why I was going to treat with antibiotics.

[mikev]

Yuck (someone ate...)

Even if it may be Septicemia, Furan is an option, it is effective against it, and it is effective against many other bugs too.
Check the local store for Furan2 (this is my preferred version), or Furanese (this is the one Martin used on his new loaches).
Furan2 should run about $5 for 8 doses at a store, and much cheaper on the Internet. To treat 40g you'll need 16 doses.
If ThatPetsPlace is within driving distance from you, they have it for $2/pack.

If you really cannot find it, Minocycline is the next option, followed by Tetracycline. Either one should handle Septecemia...but they really don't handle much else.

And you better check kH. If it is near 0, add some buffering asap, otherwise you will never get rid of ammonia.

Good luck.

[TammyLiz]

I got some Furan 2 from an LPS. I was surprised they didn't have it at the chain petstores. Anyways, it was $6 a package but its enough to treat 20 gallons.

It says it'll make the water blue. Is it going to dye my silicone?

They had little yoyos there. I was tempted to get two of them but resisted even though I have an available Q tank. A couple of them didn't look well. Its not a very good store but the only one around besides the chains.

[mikev]

I got some Furan 2 from an LPS. I was surprised they didn't have it at the chain petstores. Anyways, it was $6 a package but its enough to treat 20 gallons.

It says it'll make the water blue. Is it going to dye my silicone?

No, don't worry. It does have some Meth Blue in it, but not enough to leave stains.

Track the water params just in case. A small spike is not common but possible, and you have some param problem already.

It is one of those nice drugs that are not likely to cause problems and _usually_ work.
(Albeit, after a string of successes, it does not work FOR ME right now, along with five other drugs that should have worked too... )

Good luck!

----

As for what chain stores carry: here is a funny one:

Petland stores no longer carry the Nitrite Kit. I asked WHY? -- and was told that Nitrites are not really important for most fishkeepers.
And Petland does not carry Furan2 either....but they carry erithromycin from two different manufacturers.