a big mistake

[twocat]

I did a 75% water change on a 90 gal at 7 am. At 8:30 everything looked ok. At 10:30 I came home to feed the discus and something seemed wrong. The discus did not seem interested in the food. At 1 I had 3 dead discus and several more on their side. I used Prime when I did my water change and the only thing I did diffrent was I used a new garden hose that I just bought. It had to be the garden hose. I took all of the discus out and put them in other tanks. As of now I have five dead ones but the rest seems ok. I have a few angels in the 90 and theystill seem to be ok. At this point I threw out my old garden hose and all I have is the new one.
Now I have to figure out how I am going to do water changes.

[macc44]

How much difference in temperature was there in the new water that you put in the tank? Was it the same or close to the temperature that you already had in the tank before your WC process? What was the source of the new water? Tap? Aged? Was there any kind of residue in the new water hose?

[Jennie]

for future ref. go buy a python at petsmart or petco

[William Palumbo]

A wrong garden hose will do it. Sorry to hear. Any hoses/tubing have to state for "potable water" use...Bill

[twocat]

The water change was the same temp. as the tank. The water was straight from the kitchen sink, This is how I have been doing it for sev eral months.

The rest of my discus seem to be eating ok now. I think the "danger time zone" has past. I just did not think about the new hose. I am kicking myself. At this rate I am not going to get many adult discus.

[macc44]

Sorry for you loss. Try not to beat yourself up too bad. Nothing like getting new discus to help me get over the ones I lost. :)

[pekored]

+ 1 to the previous post. Good commentry on the sign of our times. Lots of chemical processing and short cuts for low cost. Who knows where that hose was made and what chemicals they used to aid in the molding or extruding process. End of rant.

[ericatdallas]

That sucks... sorry to hear about the losses.

I used two brand new hoses on my discus with no problem over the last two months. The first one I bought for $8 but it was too short (it reached the tank but it would slip more than I would like) so I bought a non-kink one that was twice as long for three times the cost and no die-off or illness.

I don't doubt it's the hose, so in the future I'll make sure to run my in the lawn for a while before using it. One thing I did do with the second hose was run a siphon with it. So I drained 50G of water out to the toilet with it first which might have helped with the chemicals. The first one I ran it from the tap to the tank...

The main reason I'm skeptical about the potable and non-potable water hoses is that I grew up as a kid drinking out of a garden hose. I know times change and we know better and blah blah blah, but still... I think running a good amount of water through it to flush it is fine enough.

[snowflake311]

I bought this swan hose at home depot
http://www.swanhose.com/p-marinecamper_spec-hose.shtml

it's perfect I have 2 of then and never had a proplem.

[x2h]

how can the hose damage the discus?

[kendrid]

how can the hose damage the discus?

Chemicals, bacteria, etc in the hose.

Ace Hardware has 50' drinking water safe hoses for $18.

[Northwoods Discus]

I was looking at hoses yesterday and decided to go a different route. I would assume that if there is hose called potable water and others that are not there must be something in the non potable water hose that can be toxic. Case in point like the silicone issue with anti fungal agents added that kill discus. So better off with a product like a Python made for aquarium use or a potable water hose for boats and campers.
Sorry for your loss. It helps to post these unfortunate events to prevent others from making the same mistake.

[Northwoods Discus]

One other thing I just thought of is I saw pot scrubbers the green ones that have a label on them "not for aquarium" use. I noticed some people suggesting using these for bio media. Probable anti fungal treatment on those too.

[Northwoods Discus]

I just googled the question on the difference in the hoses and one company stated Prop 65 in Ca that was about the garden hose contamination issue. The problem contaminant is LEAD. It is in the recycled plastic used to make the hose. If it was new hose then it was probably not bacteria. Hope this helps

[Frankr409]

I'd recommend a continuous drip system. This sort of thing just doesn't happen with the drip system.

[Frankr409]

My guess is that there is something other than lead that your Chinese hose mfg put in the hose...

[Herbicidal]

Man, I'm sorry to hear about your Discus. I recently bought a new hose for water changes, but I bought mine for Camping World. It's a white hose used to fill RV vehicles water tanks, so safe for drinking from. Even then, I ran some hot water through it first a few times and initially only used it to drain the tank. The VERY first time I used it, I had my nose near one end and the air that was pushed out by the water smelled bad!!! I can only imagine what comes out of a standard garden hose the first few times it is used and not "seasoned".

[Natives]

Was this your first time with prime?

I used prime once, in an effort to find a cheaper conditioner alternative. It was the only thing I changed in my routine and over half of my fish room died that day. I did more water changes thinking it was something else, and it almost polished off the rest of my fish room. The fish seemed to have died of lack of oxygen, apparent in the body conditions of everyone that died. I e-mailed and wrote, and called Seachem about this, and they've yet to get back to me. My husband says that his best guess is, prime uses oxygen from the water to make the chlorine inert, maybe through oxidation. I'm not alone either.

[ericatdallas]

Was this your first time with prime?

I used prime once, in an effort to find a cheaper conditioner alternative. It was the only thing I changed in my routine and over half of my fish room died that day. I did more water changes thinking it was something else, and it almost polished off the rest of my fish room. The fish seemed to have died of lack of oxygen, apparent in the body conditions of everyone that died. I e-mailed and wrote, and called Seachem about this, and they've yet to get back to me. My husband says that his best guess is, prime uses oxygen from the water to make the chlorine inert, maybe through oxidation. I'm not alone either.

I think prime is made with Sodium Metabisulfite. If that's the case, I do believe it reacts with excess oxygen. I think the Chloramine reaction takes places but if you have too much then you have a reduction in oxygen.. Although there's no reason why it wouldn't react with oxygen if it finds an O2 molecule first...

You can do a quick Google.. apparently they use the stuff in wine making as well (along with Potassium Metabisulfite).

I considered buying some to use but I only need to remove chlorine (which can be done with sodium thiosulfate - $4 and treats well over 100,000 gallons).

So the question is do you have a good air pump and did you overdose? Also, this I think might answer the question I pose earlier, but at higher temperatures there may be less available oxygen too.. so what do you keep your tank at?

[RodneyL001]

Wow, sorry to hear about your tragedy, the only thing I would like to add is as you consider the possibilities of what could have gone wrong, keep your mind open to all the possibilities. I think you said the angel fish in the same tank that the discus died in did not show any signs of stress. That fact alone would make me consider other possibilities. If there was some toxins in that hose, I would think it would affect the angels too. Do you age your water, or did you go straight from the tap to your tank? I really like pythons also, you eliminate the possibility of toxins from a hose, and they are really easy to use, I got mine from Wal-Mart for a decent price. I had to but an extension for mine, because during the winter months I had to change my drain location from outside to inside. Now the weather is warm again, I can take the extension off and run mine out of a window to outside.

[twocat]

I am sure that it was the hose. The angels did not have any problems. I did not do anything diffrent then I usally do except the new hose. I did do a large water change.

[irbenson]

Yes prime does reduce oxygen levels in your tank...the label suggests half dose for higher temps:

"If temperature is > 30 °C (86 °F) and chlorine or ammonia levels are low, use a half dose."

I've always used a full dose on a 55g angelfish(no, not discus :P), 82F, 2 HOBs, no air pump and my fish have been fine

[Ryan]

I use full doses of Prime on all my tanks during water changes and I've never lost any fish. I like Prime better than Amquel, mainly because it requires a smaller dosage and I don't go through a bottle of Prime as fast.

Did you see lots of tiny bubbles in the tank? Could it have been a CO2 problem? I know this will commonly affect discus.

[ShinShin]

Prime can be used at 5 times the dosage without any side effects on discus. It was the hose. Most hoses are chemically treated to prevent mildew and will kill your discus. This is the same as silicone. Whenever you buy any product for aquarium use, always buy "food grade". In the case of hoses - "potable water". I bought mine at Home Depot over 7 years ago.

Mat