Gnaw Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 (edited) On Friday I did a large water-change and setup another tank ( 10 gallon ). After doing so, I dosed it heavily with some Prime and let it sit for a day then added a single cichlid. The fish in the 10 and 20 seemed fine, that is until today. The cichlid in the 10 gallon is near the surface of the water, almost gasping like. The filter is functioning correctly, it is a filter used for 20-30 gallon tank. I don't think he is oxygen starved? The larger Electric Yellow in the 20 gallon is upright now (after an emergency water change ) but is hiding under his rock. There seems to be nothing effecting his buddy, he is showing no signs of distress. I noticed as I was draining the water in the 20 that along the glass, above the water, there was a 'milky-bubble-like' film. Is this due to the large amount of prime? My test kit is sort of useless, as it is still indicates NH and NO because of the large dose of prime. But not as much as yesterday. I just took another look at at my sick yellow, he's out from under his rock and seem to be swimming normally. Think I may do a change for the 10 as well. Edited February 20, 2009 by Gnaw Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnaw Posted February 17, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 Now they are all gasping at the surface... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnaw Posted February 17, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 :cry: The sick electric yellow started to thrash around the tank, bumping into the glass and rocks, then died. I'm really upset now. I just flushed another 50% of the water. Now I need to start doing a change on the 10 gallon because he is starting to show symptoms. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blue Ram Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 Were these tanks cycled before you added the fish? How much prime did you use? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boom Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 (edited) Why are you using alot of Prime? You need very little, like a few drops for a 10 gallon tank. "Dosing heavily" like you said, is probably killing your fish. And let me guess, every time you do a water change your adding more and more prime right? Take a 5 gallon bucket and add a few drops of Prime until you get a zero reading on your chlorine test. That's all you need! I believe it says right on the bottle not to averdose. Boom :boom: Edited February 17, 2009 by Boom Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thedarkstar Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 Were these tanks cycled before you added the fish? How much prime did you use? They were both cycled, I know that much. Why are you using alot of Prime? You need very little, like a few drops for a 10 gallon tank. "Dosing heavily" like you said, is probably killing your fish. And let me guess, every time you do a water change your adding more and more prime right?Take a 5 gallon bucket and add a few drops of Prime until you get a zero reading on your chlorine test. That's all you need! I believe it says right on the bottle not to averdose. Boom :boom: It says only to overdose if you have nitrite/ammonia issues. For every 5 gal bucket I do less than half a cap full. :cry: The sick electric yellow started to thrash around the tank, bumping into the glass and rocks, then died. I'm really upset now.I just flushed another 50% of the water. Now I need to start doing a change on the 10 gallon because he is starting to show symptoms. I'm so sorry Nick, I wish I could help ya but I know 0 about cichlids. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnaw Posted February 17, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 (edited) Why are you using alot of Prime? You need very little, like a few drops for a 10 gallon tank. "Dosing heavily" like you said, is probably killing your fish. And let me guess, every time you do a water change your adding more and more prime right?Take a 5 gallon bucket and add a few drops of Prime until you get a zero reading on your chlorine test. That's all you need! Its the 20 gallon that was dosed heavily... Every time I change the water (depending on the size of the tank) I use about 1/4 a cap or more of prime. This time when I changed the water the tank was 85% empty so I used a little more than what I normally use. I believe it says right on the bottle not to overdose. Every time I use a product that goes into the water, I re-read the the directions. Every-time. Also, there are no warnings concerning over-dosing on the bottle. *** UPDATE *** The rest of my friends are doing fine. They all seemed to have settled down now. I'm still baffled as to why this happened. Edited February 17, 2009 by Gnaw Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnaw Posted February 17, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 I'm so sorry Nick, I wish I could help ya but I know 0 about cichlids. Thanks Tyler. I thought I could save him on the first change and he 'seemed' MUCH better. Then almost an hour later his behavior was irregular and he suddenly died. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnaw Posted February 17, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 I'm still keeping on eye on both-tanks. I decided not to do a water change on the 10 gallon. I think in my panic I let my imagination run a little wild. The lone occupant of the 10 gallon is just fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thedarkstar Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 I'm so sorry Nick, I wish I could help ya but I know 0 about cichlids. Thanks Tyler. I thought I could save him on the first change and he 'seemed' MUCH better. Then almost an hour later his behavior was irregular and he suddenly died. How long did you have him for? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnaw Posted February 17, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 How long did you have him for? Almost a year now. I got him as a little yellow guy and he grew into a big bulky yellow guy with a white belly. He will be sadly missed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roypark05 Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 All those water changes were adding to the problem. If your test kit is telling you that you have elevated levels of ammonia and nitrite, then you probably do. You know what is another sign of high ammonia? Fish gasping at the top for air. Cycling a tank is a major pain in the @$$, especially when the cycle seemed to be complete but then for whatever reason ammonia builds up in your tank again. I learned this the hard way since moving to Edmonton, but Chloramine is a lot harder to deal with than standard chlorine. Here's some tips for ya. And so you know, I work at the E. L. Smith Water Treatment Plant here in Edmonton. Water chemistry is what I deal with for a living. 1. Chlorine and chloramine will kill your bacteria colonies responsible for converting ammonia/nitrite to less harmful by-products. 2. Chlorine is easy to get rid of (add light lol) while those damn chloramines seem to last forever. You can only add a little bit of water containing chloramine (tap water) to a tank or else the level will be way to high and even dosing the hell out of it with prime isn't going to bind everything up right away. 3. Chloramine is chlorine + ammonia. When you add prime, your ammonia levels actually go up temporarily as the chlorine/ammonia bonds break up leaving free ammonia is your tank. 4. Once your bacteria colonies are dead (yours are DEAD, killed by chloramines in tap water) you must cycle the tank all over again (sucks, I know). I think those are the main points. I feel bad for you losing your yellow lab, I know you tried hard to prevent that from happening, but ironically your hard work was just getting you deeper and deeper in trouble. So anyway, I'm sure you're wondering what to do now... Watch ammonia levels closely and trust your test kit. If elevated levels of ammonia last a long time (a couple hours) then your tank needs to be recycled. You don't need to fly off the handle here, cichlids are tough and can withstand even very high levels of NH3 some times. Just add a couple plants and reduce feeding. If they're looking okay then there's no need to change anything. Don't do water changes above 25% any more either. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnaw Posted February 17, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 Thank you very much for you input Roy, much appreciated. I've never had a problem like this since the tank was setup over a year ago. I'll have to be more careful. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lana Bollers Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 Do you use stabililty at all? You could of used a 1/2 a cap full of prime in the 20gal, and several cap fulls of stability. Do you have airstones? I am very sorry you lost your fish, sometimes things seem to happen for no reason. I hope the rest of your fish are doing well... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnaw Posted February 17, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 (edited) Do you use stabililty at all?You could of used a 1/2 a cap full of prime in the 20gal, and several cap fulls of stability. I am very sorry you lost your fish, sometimes things seem to happen for no reason. I hope the rest of your fish are doing well... The rest of the fish are doing fine. I think my lil'yellow is lonely, he can't seem to find his friend. :cry: Maybe he'll start becoming friends with my new lil'bristle nosed pleco ( in a good way ). Do you mean Seachem Stability? I've seen the bottle around but I've never used it. Let's see: It is safe to use during tank cycling and is ideal for treating unexpected emergency situations. AmGuard™ reacts with free ammonia within minutes and does not alter pH. So this is something to keep on-hand in these type of emergency's or it can replace prime altogether? Do you have airstones? No I don't, I use-too many years ago when I was that kind of person who had skeletons jumping out of treasure chests... What would the air stone have done anyways that my canister couldn't? Edited February 17, 2009 by Gnaw Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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