Sudden Death

[ripa89]

Looking for any information or theories to prevent this from happening again, any help will be appreciated.

1. Please explain the problems with your fish. When did you notice the problems and did anything unusual happen that you think started them?

Last night as I fed my fish for the night all was well, everybody was healthy and eating. This morning when I went to leave for work I noticed my Golden Pigeon blood (Male, which was paired up with a female) was laying in one of the plants, head upwards at a 45 degree angle. I had just turned the lights up a bit so I thought maybe he was just still out of it from the night. I reached in the tank with the net to see his response and he just swam up as normal. I thoroughly inspected him and could not find a thing out of the ordinary, so I left for work. As soon as I got home from work he was laying on the bottom - dead. Just last night he was eating and swimming with his paired female - completely normal behavior. 18 hours later he's dead. I completely inspected his body for any sort of damage, cuts, torn fins, bloating, etc. Could not find anything at all. His colors were still bright and beautiful, looked like he was still alive.

2. Symptoms (i.e. turning dark, excess slime, not eating, clamped fins, flashing, darting, clamped gills, white/yellow/green poop, hiding, headstanding or tailstanding, white on tips of fins, rotting or fungus, blisters/white zits on fish, bloated, cloudy eyes, wounds).

Potential tail standing.

3. What medications/ treatments have you already tried and what were the results. Include dosage and duration of treatment.

N/A

Tank/Water

4. Tank size and ages, numbers and sizes of fish.

125 Gallon. 8 various Discus, 3.5 - 5 inches.
12 Cardinal Tetras, 8 Rummynose Tetras, 5 silver Hatchet fish, 2 Burmese Border Loaches. Singapore Flower Shrimp - all full grown.


5. Water change regime (What percentage and how often).

About 40% once per week.

6. How long has tank been running? Is it bare bottom? If you have substrate, what type and how deep is it?

Tank has been running for 5 months, but was cycled from a 2+ year old tank. Substrate is a combination of black and red Flora-max mixed with small natural colored pebbles.


7. Do you age your water? If you do for how long and what is the ph swing.

Do not age water.


8. Parameters and water source;

Note: Water Parameters are important in diagnosing problems within a tank. If you don't own test kits for the following information, you can purchase them, test your parameters and post this info as soon as possible.


- temp _____85.1

- ph ____6.6

- ammonia reading ___0ppm

- nitrite reading ____0ppm

- nitrate reading __ less than 5ppm

What type of water or combinations of water sources do you use? If it is an RO/tap/well water mix, please list percentages in the mix.

- well water ____

- municipal water ___100%_

- RO water ____


9. Any new fish, plants or inverts added recently.

The Singapore Flower Shrimp are the newest - about 6 weeks ago some plants added at the same time.

10. Please tell us what you feed your fish and how often. This can be critical information for solving the problem so be as specific as you can.

They are fed 3 times per day.
Dry food in the morning - Tetra Color Tropical Granules, Omega One Freeze Dried Blood Worms, and Omega One Super Colored Flakes.
Frozen food (thawed) around 5:00 - 3 Blister Packs of Blood Worms, 1 blister pack of Brine Shrimp.
Dry food about an hour before lights out - Tetra Color Tropical Granules, Omega One Freeze Dried Blood Worms, and Omega One Super Colored Flakes.

11. Include any pictures or videos you have which shows the symptoms. If you can't add them to this post, please provide a link to them.

UPDATE:
After writing this I began doing a water change - started wiping the walls with an algae scraper and i noticed a very small worm swimming at the top of the tank. No longer than an Inch long, and about the width of a very fine thread, after combing every inch of the tank, I found another of the same type swimming and since doing the water change I found about 15 more. all varying from as small as 1/8 of an inch long to 3/4. I will add pictures I took - however the worms appear to be much thicker in the photographs.Worm.jpg

[Filip]

Hi Chris and welcome to the forum .
I'm sorry that your first post here is about
tragic and a sudden loss of discus .
While I never had it happened to me I've read a lot of similar stories here on the forum about sudden death of healthy discus and they are always explained with the "Dash and smash" discus behaviour .
They do get easily spooked from a sudden light change or an unexpected movement in front of the tank and as a result of that they sometimes end up banging hard on the glass which results to death .
I personaly can not think of any other reason or condition or disease that can kill only one healthy looking discus in a matter of hours .


Heads up Chris and try not to worry too much over this accident.

[ripa89]

Hello Filip, and thank you for the quick reply. It is sad to see.
Did you get a chance to look ad my updated information about the Worms I've just found swimming around freely in the tank? I have never noticed them before today and I am wondering not only what they are/where they came from but could that have had anything to do with the death?

[Filip]

I just saw your updated picture Chris.
I used to have them in my old discus tank and other users here also reported them on occasions.
I forgot their specific name , but they are harmless worms just like planarias or detritus worms that can be found in aquarium environment . They are harmless to your discus and have nothing to do with your discus death.
BUT .... Just like planarias or detritus worms they are an indicator of an dirty environment , excess food in substrate , substrate or filter material full of rotting gunk an an overall unhealthy environment for discus to live in .
With all that you have stated in the intoduction questionaire , you really need to improve your current cleaning and water changing routine if you want a long tern success with your discus fish Chris.
You need to change that coarse substrate with thin layer of fine PFS sand and you need to syphon it regulary with every WC. You need to keep your filter materials clean too and most important you need to start changing more water than you currently do .
Sorry if this came too straight forward to you after your loss Chris , but I only want to help you improve your future keeping routines and success with keeping discus .

[ripa89]

No need to apologize, I appreciate any help I can get. However, I did some research and found this( https://www.fishlore.com/aquariumfis...e-worms.41023/ ) is this something you are at all familiar with?
And as far as the substrate goes do you recommend going over top of it with a thin layer of PFS, or did you mean to remove it entirely and have only a thin layer of PFS. Keep in mind it is a planted Discus tank.

[Filip]

No need to apologize, I appreciate any help I can get. However, I did some research and found this( https://www.fishlore.com/aquariumfis...e-worms.41023/ ) is this something you are at all familiar with?
And as far as the substrate goes do you recommend going over top of it with a thin layer of PFS, or did you mean to remove it entirely and have only a thin layer of PFS. Keep in mind it is a planted Discus tank.

Camallanus / nematodes / roundworms are very common discus parasite worms . However, your free swimming wiggling worm has nothing to do with them . When you see a "mop" protruding down your discus anus then youll know you are dealing with camallanus worms.

About the coarse substrate I was thinking of completly removing it and replacing it with very thin layer of fine sand that you will vacuum and keep it clean regularly . You can leave the substrate to limited areas where your plants are or you can pot the plants in substrate and have a PFS sand bottom . It will be much cleaner that way and your discus will be happier .

[ripa89]

Thank you for all of your information. I will be doing an overhaul on the tank soon.

[Ryan925]

Thank you for all of your information. I will be doing an overhaul on the tank soon.

Be sure to remove the fish for the substrate removal