Hi everyone,

I really need some help. I am new to fish and last week decided to set up my first tropical fish tank.

First of all I washed the tank out with water, I then washed the gravel very well and everything that went inside before filing my tank up with tap water.

I left the tank for just over a week and then put in the (new but washed) filter, heater at air pump. These were set up and the temperature was fine.

The next day I went to the pet store and brought 8 fish (two pink kissers, two barbs, two angel fish, one rainbow fish and a molly) These were fine till the next day when two died, the following day two more so I was left with four fish. The next day another died so I had just three fish (the molly and two pink kissers).

Nearly a week later and I thought these three would be fine when the molly and pink kisser died. Leaving one remaining fish!

I have brought the correct food, checked the water with testing kits, checked the dead fish for any signs of illness and can see no reason why my fish are dying!

Has this happended to someone else? What is going wrong?

I really want to save my one remaining fish!

I owuld be very grateful for any replies.

Thank you.


Jo

Your fish died from ammonia poisoning because your tank wasn't cycled.

Only registered users can see links on this forum! Register or Login on forum!

is a basic explanation of what that is, it isn't letting your tank run empty.

What size tank is this? You should start out with one or two small, hardy fish and let the cycle run its course. You should get ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate test kits so you know what is going on with your water. Then you slowly can add more fish over several weeks, not all at once.

Did you treat the water with dechlorinator? What are the test readings for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, ph, kh, gh and water temp.? The tank has to cycle which takes around 2 months. What happens is the fish produce waste, it takes time for the nitrifying bacteria to form and handle the waste. The ammonia will spike and fall, the nitrite will spike and fall, then the nitrate will rise.

I did use a test kit which tested for things like nitrate, amonia, ph etc.. although the hardness of the water was on the limit the rest all showed up to be fine.

Is there anything I could buy to save my last fish?

What do you mean fine? What are the exact readings? Ammonia and Nitrite should both be ZERO.

They are little colour strips that change when dipped in the water. I'm new to fish so without actually doing one now and comparing the colours I couldn't quote. But to be harmful they would have gone above the colour which they did and i've done a test everyday for the last week and they still remain the right colour.

It is pretty much impossible to troubleshoot your problem without knowing your water readings. You didn't answer to the size of the tank nor if you are using dechlorinator/water conditioner either.

I have to believe that you tested the water prior to adding the fish. If you had tested the water since adding the fish, I'm sure you would have seen spikes in Ammonia and Nitrite. The only thing you can really do to save your last fish is to do almost daily water changes to keep the ammonia and nitrite levels in check. It may lengthen the time your tank takes to cycle though. The guys are right IMHO that you're encountering high levels of ammonia which is pretty toxic and could easily explain the dramatic losses you've experienced. Do you have a friend with an established aquarium? If so, you could speed the cycling process by borrowing some of the gravel and tank decorations to seed your tank with the nitrosomanas and nitrobacter bacteria which convert the ammonia into nitrite, then to nitrate, moving the substances from very high toxicity to low toxicity.
the best of luck
mike

My tank is 3ft and yes I did use a water conditioner before putting my fish into the tank. I didn't actually do a water test until after I put the fish in as unfortunately i'm new to this and had no idea

However, I went out last night and brought some stuff to reduce the ammonia in the tank and tonight I will do a water change, and so far my one fish is still alive!

Thanks for the info.