My fish are dying

[kuzyakat]

Hi everyone, I'm new to this forum. I've been having problems with my discus for a while now, and I don't know what's wrong. I've been to 4 LFS and no one knows what's going on with my fish. So I was hoping maybe someone experienced could give me some insight.

1. Please explain the problems with your fish. When did you notice the problems and did anything unusual happen that you think started them?
They appear active and healthy, but one by one they become pale and emaciated within a day or two with ragged fins and die that same night. This has happened to 4 fish. It started a couple of months ago after I first introduced a couple of new discus into my tank with 3 existing discus.

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).
Becoming pale, clamped fins, facing top of tank at 45* angle, dark line across spine and where the fin meets the body, cloudy poo occurs on the day these symptoms show, and they die within the same day they show these symptoms.

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

A LFS suggested I worm the tank, which I did a month ago. 1.25g praziquantel tablets, dose repeated 7 days after treatment.

Tank/Water

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

250 L (approximately 66 gallons I think), the discus are about a year old maybe a bit less. Currently I have: 2 discus, 2 corydoras catfish. The most discus I had in the tank at one time was 5.

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

50% twice a week

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

It has been running since December of 2018, so about a year and a half. It's not bare bottom, it has a gravel substrate. About an inch thick at the front and 4 inches thick at the back to accommodate for my swords.

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

I do not age my water

8. What type/brand water conditioner do you use? Do you add it to the tank or aging barrel? How much do you use?

I use Stress Coat. I add it to the bucket of water before the tank is filled and let it sit for about 10 minutes before I start putting it into the tank.

9. 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 27.5 C currently. It goes between 27.5-28C

- ph 6.4
- ammonia reading 0

- nitrite reading 0

- nitrate reading approximately 10

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.

Municipal water

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

Not recently, but it seems that this started after introducing two new discus to the tank a couple of months ago.

11. 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.

Fluval sinking pellets in the morning, and frozen bloodworms in the evening.

12. 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.

I'm sorry I don't have a picture. I took the fish to one of the LFS so they could look at them closer and for this reason I never actually took a picture.

Thank you so much for any help.

[Oxboy]

I am an amateur but a few things stand out: nitrates a bit high, did you quarantine the new fish, thick gravel could be harboring a lot of nasties, diet is not varied enough, water temps a bit low.

[peewee1]

Adding to the above. I did not notice the size of tank. Maybe put the remaining two into a smaller tank for treatment? When you change water are you adding Prime? Prime works well with tap water and without aging the water. Adding salt to your water would not hurt. I do not know exactly but 1 tablespoon for 2 gallons to begin with. There has been some recent concern about the frozen blood worms. You might read those recent postings. Discus seem to be picky eaters while at the same time seem to eat almost anything, depending on the individual fish. I moved away from beef heart and more recently blood worms to frozen brine shrimp and some of the pellet foods. Also freeze dried black worms has become more popular. What I do is mix black worms with Bug Bites and Tetra Color. Each day I change water, the percents are up to you, and I feed two feedings of my blend, one feeding of only black worms, and one feeding of brine shrimp. There seems to be enough variety in food that the picky eaters get something they will eat and the pigs get everything and then get huge.

[14Discus]

A few things to consider......

Your temp (81-82) is (imho) a tad too cool. 84 is the lowest with 86 being my preferred temp.

Also, your PH of 6.4 could be a problem if it’s not stable. What is your KH of both tank and tap water going in? What is the PH of the tap water going in?

Lastly, not aging water means you must indeed be careful of chlorine/chloramine, PH and KH going into your tank. My water is always aged, aerated, and heated to one degree above tank temp. Gotta be careful w municipal water. Four inches of gravel is too deep. 3/4” is better. The swords can be put into pots. Deep gravel has always meant trouble for me in the past.

Just a few thoughts that came to me after reading your post. Also, imo, 10 for Nitrate is ok, or close to a “realistic ideal” as I see it.

[kuzyakat]

I did not quarantine the new fish. I think my understanding of when to quarantine fish was incorrect. As per the advice of my LFS, I was under the impression that I don’t need to quarantine fish coming from the same store. I now understand I should quarantine the fish no matter where they came from.

I have a 20 gallon tank free at the moment, so I may put the remaining two in there and do the things you have both suggested (raising the temperature, ageing the water, feeding a more varied diet). I’ll see how they go. I’ve never used Prime before, so it is alright to use Prime rather than age the water? Or if ageing the water, how long do I need to let it sit for before I use it? Is one day long enough?

The pH of our tap water is exactly 7. The kH of both the tank and tap water are between 20-50ppm. While the discus are in the smaller tank I’ll adjust the gravel height. I keep the nitrates at 10 for all of my plants. I notice that when nitrates are <5 the leaves of my plants start yellowing.

Thank you for your tips and advice, I really appreciate it.

[peewee1]

You do not need to age the tap water if you are using Prime. If you fill a bucket using a shower head some of the local water supply chemicals will be broken up then add the Prime.

[bluelagoon]

You might need to age your water especially if it's coming under pressure and changing greater than 30%. Ph is only one thing, then there are gasses like CO2 and not enough O2. I have to age because of gas and not PH swing. Do you think your fish are showing signs of this disease. Do they have any white webby looking patches on darkened skin or excess mucous?https://thewebsiteofeverything.com/a...ses/Columnaris

[Sturiosoma]

I would stop the use of stress coat I'm thinking that you have a build up of the additives that are in that product, instead I would go with seachem safe

Jeanne

[kuzyakat]

@bluelagoon

The most recent fish that passed did have small white spots on the edges of its fins, and the fins were slightly ragged. Whatever it was worked quickly because the fish appeared physically in perfect shape just the day before. I will definitely start ageing my water.

@Sturiosoma
I only ever add enough to treat the the water I am replacing, rather than the whole tank. Can there still be a build up in this case? If so I’ll take your suggestion on board!

Once again thank you everyone for your insight! This has been a really stressful and unfortunate situation and I’m upset that so many fish have been lost

[Sturiosoma]

Stress coat is more of a specialty product and api recommends using once a month with water changes or in the transportation of fish where there may be stress involved, I personally would use a product just to remove chloramines with my water changes

Jeanne

[coralbandit]

I am with Mervin [bluelagoon] on columnaris .
Few disease kill quickly .Columnaris is the most common one that can kill in one day .
There are at least four strains of columnaris and IMO you likely introduced it with new fish and now it is in the tank ..
Even the fish that recover from it can become sub clinical carriers meaning they have the illness to pass on to other fish even though they no longer show symptoms ..
I always think of it like new comer run over by welcome wagon when adding new fish .
Not quarantining fish is likely how this was introduced to your tank ..
You do need to use safe or prime for your water when water changing and I would recommend looking up articles on how to use Potassium Permanganate for disease treatment .
Many will suggest a 'cocktail' of antibiotics [Kanamycin and furan 2 ] but the disease has advanced for years since those two first worked and they no longer are as effective so I don't recommend them ..
If you decide the fish have columnaris the first step to 'curing ' is to euthanize any and all fish showing any symptoms [it is that hard to defeat ]..
Good luck to me columnaris is the worst thing to have besides one of the issues that we [people] can get also like Mycobacterium or vibrio...

[Oxboy]

Kuzy, before you buy your next batch of discus, read, read read all the stickies in all the major forums (Beginners, General, Water, Food, and Disease) on this site. Read all the articles in the library too. Take to heart the stickies from discuspaul about the 6 Cardinal Rules and the Beginner's Guide. Follow this advice to the letter. You will learn a ton and set yourself up best for success. There will still be failures and illnesses but you will be off on the right foot and develop a solid base to learn from. I got my first batch ever back in Sept and 5 of 7 are still going strong and growing. Use the 'search' function on this site and you will find somebody has always asked any question you could possibly have...and received some good feedback from the vet discuskeepers here.

[pastry]

You do not need to age the tap water if you are using Prime. If you fill a bucket using a shower head some of the local water supply chemicals will be broken up then add the Prime.

PeeWee, I used to agree... but since my old water company was acquired by a larger one, the larger one has messed with our city water (very low TDS... unstable ph big time). I have to age water now. Prime has nothing to do with ph & tds (very very minut) ... predominantly designed to "zap" chloramine, chlorine, and ammonia straight from tap.

OP. need more info:
Know the stability of your tap? (Ph of tap in cup over 3-5 days)
Are the new fish fine? (Just like people,Some can be immune but be a carrier)

[peewee1]

PeeWee, I used to agree... but since my old water company was acquired by a larger one, the larger one has messed with our city water (very low TDS... unstable ph big time). I have to age water now. Prime has nothing to do with ph & tds (very very minut) ... predominantly designed to "zap" chloramine, chlorine, and ammonia straight from tap.

OP. need more info:
Know the stability of your tap? (Ph of tap in cup over 3-5 days)
Are the new fish fine? (Just like people,Some can be immune but be a carrier)

Something I had not considered. The local water is right for my fish. I read on the local water district web page that the water comes from deep springs. I suspect either highly filtered rain, we have a lot of that in the Northwest, or even run off from the nearby mountains. The local water has made it easy for me. I siphon from the bottom of the tank into a bucket. Dump the bucket. Fill the bucket with tap using a shower head. Add the Prime. Dump the water from the bucket into the tank. If anyone would like me to ship to them my miracle water I can do it for $1.00 per gallon plus shipping. I have a disclaimer. Although the water is miracle in nature you will not be able to walk on it.