dead sidthimunki :(

[zmo63]

My biggest one - the one I rescued from solitary confinement in a fish store. She had just in the past few weeks really begun to school with the others and stop hiding all the time. Just found her dead.

I checked the parameters:

temp - 78F
pH - Between 7.5 - 8 (not usually that high!)
Ammonia - 0
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - 25

Is high pH and Nitrates enough to kill?

I'm doing a water change now. Everyone else in the tank looks good. Fat because they just ate, but good. I'm just so disappointed, because I worked so hard to get these sids healthy after a pretty dire bout of parasites, and they're all doing so great. This dead one is the one I got later, fully grown, with no signs of parasites at all.

Last time I cut open a fish it was a bit of a stringy, messy disaster. The fish was tiny (as is this one), and I had no idea what I was looking for.

Now the body is bloated and there's a big red area on the belly under the skin, but that's typical for a dead fish, right?

[bslindgren]

Sorry about your loss. I would guess she was sick, or you'd think the other fish should have shown some distress.

[mistergreen]

sorry for the loss.

Any signs before the death?
I don't think your water params kill the sid unless it was sudden.

[loachmom]

Sorry zmo63. What a disappointment!

[zmo63]

thanks everyone. No, there were no signs of illness. My husband and I had been out of town for a week, and I'm always panicky about what I'm coming home to, but was pleased to find everyone acting normally in that tank. We'd had a petsitter and I had premeasured the amount of food for each day, so I don't think anything went wrong there. No dramatic temperature shifts either. I just don't know!

She was an adult when we got her, so I have no idea how old she was... maybe it was just old age, but I doubt it. I'll be watching the others closely.