Ammonia- under .25ppm
Nitrate- under .5ppm
Ph- 7.5
Originally this was a 55g tank that I've had running for a year. Fully cycled and happy tank. 20 Rummynose. 15 black phantoms. 6 serpaes (bought last month) 2 angelfish. 3 electric blue acaras (just bought these last week). Found a good deal for a 75g online. Came with 2 aquaclear 110s, live plants, new substrate unopened bags, driftwood and tons of free biomax balls sitting out. It was a great deal. But the equipment and accessories were horrific. I'm talking 30 minutes deep cleaning 2 filters type of bad. Everything I just mentioned was all used. Full of dried gunk and algae. Full of debris. Conditions of location were not great.
-soaked the biomax ceramic balls in warm water and vinegar. Rinsed and agitated with tap water extremely well. Soaked in dechlorinated solution.
-rinsed live plants in a hydrogen peroxide solution. Dipped in dechlorinated water after.
Did the massive task of transferring fish and tanks. The fish sat in a tote with a bubbler and a heater while waiting for the new home. This was on Saturday, 3 days ago. At this time, I added nothing of the 75g tank accessories except the wood and the new unopened substrate. Everything else was from my 55g.
Last night, Monday, is when I added the extra filter and inserted the new "clean" filter media. I used loctite superglue to mount the "clean" java Fern to some rocks I had and to some of the driftwood. I also soaked some of my preexisting fake plants in hydrogen peroxide/vinegar and rinsed them in tap water agitated the algae off.
Today I get off work and see 1 serpae tetra barely breathing. I poke around with it, it has trouble swimming. I humanely euthanize it. I see 5 black phantom tetras all dead in various spots around my fake plants.
I don't know what caused this. Did something transfer over from the plants? From the biomedia I cleaned? Did any vinegar/peroxide get into the tank and kill them? Were they just stressed and had a delayed reaction from the move on Saturday? My water parameters are great. Temp is at 80. Why only the black phantoms and the 1 serpae? I do have a hunch I have columnaris floating around in the tank, and this is for 3 reasons- 6 months ago 1 rummy had a massive white patch. He died. I didn't do anything to treat the tank as everyone else was fine. A week into owning my new serpae tetras a month ago I did a massive water change and agitated a lot of the sand to clean it up, and one serpae developed the classic massive white patch- he was not going to make it, humanely euthanize him. Last week I noticed 1 serpae had a big white blip on its mouth (not cottony) but it's been getting smaller and smaller. I assume the fish are all strong and healthy and columnaris isn't a problem...until it is. I fear treating the tank with kanaplex currently as none of the fish show any symptoms besides that 1 blip of the mouth and I don't want to medicate when there isn't a 'problem' I guess? Anyways, I don't think the columnaris is related to these fish dying as they didn't show any signs of it.
Was it the transfer? Was it anything I put into the tank? Maybe just an internal illness? Odd how it was just the phantoms and 1 serpae....