Community Tank Death Spiral

[DeepWater]

I started my planted community tank in December (details below).  Stole filter muck to kick off the tank.  Plants doing well; melted plant leaves starting to come back.  Gradually adding smaller fish over time.  Water parameters seem reasonable.

About a month ago, I was suddenly called out of town for over a week.  I came back to an ichy Rasbora and an unwell (but never diagnosed) cherry barb.  Both died in quarantine.  Did 50% water change.

Two weeks later another cherry barb showed puffy eyes, and died in quarentine.  25% water change.

All other fish seemed "fine", added additional cherry barbs and rasboras.

Cleaned filter over the weekend (squeezed it out in tank water removed from the tank).  No soap, and I am probably too comfortable with slime to make any part of my aquarium squeaky clean.

In the last four days, 4 hatched fish, 2 cherry barb, and 2 otocynclus fish have died.  No obvious sign.

What recomendation do you have?

Thanks,

Tank Details:

29 gallons

dirt with gravel on top substrate

Sponge filter

1 rock, 2 hunks of wood

treated well water

Animals:

6 hatchet fish

9 Danios

8 Rasboras

3 cory pandas

3 kuli loaches

3 otocynclus

4 shrimp

4 Nerite snails (and several more small snails)

Plants:

2 Anubius

2 Cryps

lots of Java fern

Moss ball

2 banana plants

2 carpeting plants

red sword

3 mosses

 

Water Parameters:

pH: 8.5 (stable)

Amonia: 0

Nitrate: 0  (struggle to keep this up)

Nitrite: 0

Hard water

Temperature: 73 degrees

These water parameters are rather stable.  

[KBOzzie59]

Those water parameters look suspicious.  What test kit are you using?  Has it expired?

[DeepWater]

Api purchased in January.

[DeepWater]

I should mention, I also have JNW strips.  I didn't believe them at first so I bought the api set.

[Colu]

Unexplained deaths can be caused by bacterial  infections it difficult to no for sure what is going on i would do I water change  treat with maracyn just in case it bacterial infection  and see if it help

[DeepWater]

Giving it a try.

A few noticed changes, the first two may be normal.

1) cloudy water

2) air stone seems to be making more smaller bubbles   

3) several fish are now hanging out nose to the surface

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[darkG]

How does it smell?

[Brandy]

Keep testing. Maracyn can cause a little cloudiness, and a little bubbling, but that looks like a lot? you may want to add an additional airstone. If test parrameters indicate an ammonia spike, change water and redose.

Next I would want to do some basic trouble shooting, sorry for the barrage of questions:

You have a dirted tank--where is the dirt from, topsoil? garden center? what kind? 

You are using "treated well water"--treated with what? And why? 

Where are the rocks and hunks of wood from? Do you know exactly what they are?

Finally, since you are on well water, with hard water, what type of hard water is it do you think? Lots of white on shower heads indicate calcium, rust stains mean iron, green stains mean copper, sulfur scent--you get the picture. 

I am trying to rule out a water quality issue that we are not going to be able to test for. It could be chemical, bacterial, fungal, who knows. If we can be sure that is not the case, humor me once more--has your kit EVER showed ammonia, nitrite, or nitrate? If not, be sure you use both bottles (1 & 2, as indicated in instructions) for the tests, and follow directions EXACTLY. Not common, but everyonce in a while... 🙂

[Streetwise]

Without knowing more, I would add many more plants.

[Pearl]

I also keep dirted tanks and would second that more plants is a good idea. IIRC Walstad recommends at least 75% coverage with plants that are primarily root feeders. 

My mom has high PH well water as well, she ended up switching to r/o for her tanks after having issue after issue seem to compound over time.  There are inexpensive R/O units out there, I think hers was $60? You would need to add back some of the lost minerals for animal and plant health. I dont use R/O water except for topping off tanks, but maybe someone else can chip in with the additives they use if that seems appealing? It has worked for her.
 

Edited March 19, 2021 by Pearl

[DeepWater]

Thanks for the comments and advice.  One additional note, I added ParaCleanse along with the Maracyn.  Time appears to be doing good things, as the tank is much clearer now- though not perfect.

Smells like a lake. 

Dirt is from topsoil in back of yard (section we are allowing to go natural).

Water treated with API Tap water conditioner, for heavy metal detoxification.

Wood 1 from store.  Wood 2, driftwood.  Rock from store.

I would go with Calcium, based on the rainbow color options provided above.  I should mention the color options greatly helped.

Below are my recorded metrics for the tank.

Date	Method	nitrate	nitrite	ammonia	hardness	alkalinity	carbonate	pH	copper
1/4	strip	25	1	0.5	100	180	120	9	0.5
1/6	strip			0.5
1/9	strip	25	4		100	100	120	9	0.5
1/14	strip	25	5	0.4	25	100	300	9	0.5
1/18	strip	10	0	0.5	50	80	150	9	0.5
1/18	api	0	0	0.125				8.1
1/23	strip	0	0	0	120	120	180	9	0.5
1/26	api	0	0	0				8.3
1/30	api	0	0	0				8.2
2/6	strip	10	0	0.25	120	160	180	8.2	0.25
3/8	strip	20	0		120	180	180	8.5	0.5
3/13	strip	15	0		120	140	160	8.5	0.25
3/16	api	0	0	0
3/18	strip	0	0	0.25	120	120	180	8.5	0.5
3/18	api	0	0	0.25

With regard to more plants, how are you defining many?  It feels like I have to let a number of mine grow out, or am I just not thinking right.

[Anita]

6 minutes ago, DeepWater said:

Thanks for the comments and advice.  One additional note, I added ParaCleanse along with the Maracyn.  Time appears to be doing good things, as the tank is much clearer now- though not perfect.

Smells like a lake. 

Dirt is from topsoil in back of yard (section we are allowing to go natural).

Water treated with API Tap water conditioner, for heavy metal detoxification.

Wood 1 from store.  Wood 2, driftwood.  Rock from store.

You must be so stressed. 😨 It's an awful feeling when you can't figure out what's wrong. 

Topsoil from your yard? Hmmm... I think I agree with @Brandy. How long have you been allowing the yard to "go natural?" When was the last time you used weedkiller or bug killer? Some herbicides are very slow to break down. Also, some insecticides are harmless to mammals but lethal for birds, fish, and aquatic inverts. What do you know about the history of the topsoil? How long have you lived at the house? Could a previous owner have dumped chemicals/motor oil/paint thinner/rat poison/etc. in that spot? Any chance weed or bug killer drifted over from someone else's yard? Did the previous owners have livestock? I am thinking of dewormer or other meds that would be excreted in the feces. Have you done any construction/remodeling projects that might have left construction materials (tar paper, siding, insulation, sealant, stains, paint, glue, etc.) in the topsoil? 

I wonder if low concentrations of chemicals could be slowly poisoning your fish? Seeing as your water parameters are not showing the usual culprits, that would be my next guess. If it were me, I would remove all the topsoil and see what happens with just gravel substrate. 

Your gravel might also be suspect, although the long time frame before fish started getting sick seems to point to some sort of slow-release mechanism. 

[Brandy]

I am actually ridiculously reassured by all the above. I would MUCH rather see topsoil than "potting soil" that has some time release fertilizer in it.

Your tank looks like it cycled, and I DO get more cloudiness with maracyn + paraclense. I think you are going at this exactly right by using both, and I would do a full round, rather than the one dose and soak method that works well as a preventative, since you are actively losing fish. 

As far as more plants, with a dirted tank, you really want to just pack them in--you can wait for them to grow out, but often that leads to fighting algae until they get going. If you cannot afford to buy a bunch more, one trick is to temporarily throw in some kind of floating plant that will suck up nutrients in the water column. However, you don't have any nitrates, so that is not going to be your primary concern.

[Mike_M]

I personally feel that 73 degrees is pretty cool for a lot of tropical fish. I have better fish health when I aim for the mid to high range of what is recommended for a species. 72 or 73 is usually the bottom.

[Streetwise]

I think of my organic soil as a big, active battery, and I want to plug as much as I can in so the energy goes to plant growth.