Help, possible Ammonia spike

Oh no! Sick fish?! Come here and see if someone can help!
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Read this before posting!!

Since this board has been up, we have found there are several questions that routinely get asked in order to help diagnose problems. If you can have that information to begin with in your post, we'll be able to help right away (if we can!) without having to wait for you to post the info we need.

1) Your water parameters - pH, Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrates and salinity (if appropriate). This is by far the most important information you can provide! Do not answer this with "Fine" "Perfect" "ok", that tells us nothing. We need hard numbers.

2) Tank size and a list of ALL inhabitants. Include algae eaters, plecos, everything. We need to know what you have and how big the tank is.

3) Feeding, water change schedule and a list of all products you are using or have added to the tank (examples: Cycle, Amquel, salt, etc)

4) What changes you've made in the tank in the last week or so. Sometimes its the little things that make all the difference.

5) How long the aquarium has been set up, and how did you cycle it? If you don't know what cycling is read this: Fishless Cycling Article and familiarize yourself with all the information. Yes. All of it.

We want to help, and providing this information will go a LONG way to getting a diagnosis and hopeful cure that much faster.

While you wait for assistance:
One of the easiest and best ways to help your fish feel better is clean water! If you are already on a regular water change schedule (50% weekly is recommended) a good step to making your fish more comfortable while waiting for diagnosis/suggestions is to do a large water change immediately. Feel free to repeat daily or as often as you can, clean water is always a good thing! Use of Amquel or Prime as a dechlor may help with any ammonia or nitrite issues, and is highly recommended.

Note - if you do not normally do large water changes, doing a sudden, large water change could shock your fish by suddenly changing their established water chemistry. Clean water is still your first goal, so in this case, do several smaller (10%) water changes over the next day or two before starting any large ones.
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Iliveinazoo
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by Iliveinazoo »

If he's not being pushed around in the current then he's still got a chance - fingers crossed. It's curious that the ammonia rose so sharply after only 5 days - did you drastically change the salinity of your tank at a water change?
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by sarahnya »

He's just been swimming in one place all morning,looks ever so slightly sideways. I have to goto work now so I'll update later and run all the water tests again this evening
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by sarahnya »

No I've not changed it at all yet. I was waiting to make sure the water parameters stayed at 0 for a couple of weeks first. I so wish we hadn't run out while I was away, my other half was texting me daily with the figures but I think it was after the 2nd day he ran out. I'm not even sure it's ammonia now, this new test I got (I think sailfort or something like that) is extremely hard to read under incandescent light, I could have easily missread it yesterday. Today it's definitely clear under sunlight.

There was no ammonia at all this morning, the water looks crystal clear. Is it anything else that could have made him sick? I did worm him but only used a tiny sprinkle of that wormer on his bloodworm so I doubt it's that. It's terribly frustrating!
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by sarahnya »

He's definitely not being pushed around and there's quite a lot of current so fingers crossed!
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by sarahnya »

My other half just text me saying he actually looks worse now and is curled up on the tank floor. I've asked him to double check all water tests again just in case :(
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by sarahnya »

He just text me water tests.
PH 8
AMMONIA 0
NITRITE 0
NITRATE trace amount.

Maurice is still on the bottom looking miserable.
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by Iliveinazoo »

Does he look fat or skinny? If fat then he could be constipated. If skinny then maybe the wormer didn't work or it's something else that's causing it.

I would probably do another 50% water change but add marine salt this time to get the tank to SG1.002@25DegC which will probably work out to be about 1 tablespoon per 5 litres. The increase in salinity might kill off whatever is causing the problem.
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by sarahnya »

Sadly he passed away last night. :(
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by eieio »

:( very, very sorry sarahnya
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by Pufferpunk »

:rip:
You are getting sleepy... you only hear the sound of my voice... you must do water changes... water changes... water changes... water changes...

"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by pufferjkb »

I too am sorry. All living creatures are a wonder. The loss of any of them is a grief.
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by Iliveinazoo »

Sorry to hear that
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by sarahnya »

I know it's so sad, even my partner who wasn't really bothered with getting fish to start with was a bit deflated by the experience.

I'm feeding the aquarium ammonia at the moment to keep the filter bacteria alive after doing a complete water change.

Haven't decided what to do yet, I may get another F8 once I'm 100% sure the tank is stable. At the moment it seems to be clearing the ammonia that I'm putting in pretty fast so I'm not sure what happened here.

Are you guys sure that wormer is safe for consumption, I just sprinkled a bit on the blood worm and stirred before adding to the tank? (I have a thread on here about the wormer, I can't remember the branding the top of my head).
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by Pufferpunk »

Yes, it's safe.
You are getting sleepy... you only hear the sound of my voice... you must do water changes... water changes... water changes... water changes...

"The solution to pollution is dilution!"
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Re: Help, possible Ammonia spike

Post by sarahnya »

Okay thanks that's reassuring.

I'll give it a few days before I decide what to do now!
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