andrea091674

Hi Everyone - I am new here and I have some questions about my fish.* I have a 10 gallon tank, for about 6 months now - live plants - and 6 fish - all barbs (Red barbs, Zebra Danios, and an algae eater) – The tank was cycled and I test the water regularly (everything is where it's supposed to be) and I do partial water changes when needed .* I have tried twice now to introduce two platties (6 weeks and a partial water change in-between but each time they have died - it seems the only fish that flourish (and they are all VERY healthy and happy) are any types of barbs.* And the platties weren't picked on - I did watch that closely, that was a concern.* Should I just stick with those types?* Any other thoughts, suggestions on what I am doing wrong?* To date, the platties are the only fish that have died in my tank.*

-Andrea

Stradius011

It could be that your platies had a disease when you bought it. Platies are usually hardy fish.

andrea091674

I wondered that too - which is why I waited a few weeks before I tried again (bought them from a diffent store too), and with-in 48 hours they both died.

0morrokh

do you have a quarintine tank?
How many fish do you have in the tank?

andrea091674

No, I don't have a quarantine tank - and I have 6 currently

sasha

Hi Andrea
I found an interesting story which can be quite true in some cases,

A man bought a fish from the pet store took it home, the following day it died, so he took it back to the shop and demanded a refund as he said he bought a sick fish, the shopkeeper refunded his money and gave him a fish for free, so the man took it home , the same thing happened it died the next day.
The man was extremely angry about this and stormed into the shop accusing the shopkeeper that all his fish were sick, the shopkeeper defended himself and said he was proud of the fact he kept his fish so well, and he never sold him sick fish, the shopkeeper begain asking questions about the mans fish tank,The man fiercley defended his aquarium saying that he had the same fish in the tank for years and years and they are perfectley healthy fish never had problems.
The shopkeeper said, there you go that is the problem,because you have had the same fish in the same tank for years without adding any,
The fish in the tank are accustomed to the enviroment of the tank and when you added a new fish for the first time in years, the enviroment (i.e,parameters,ph,etc,etc) were too much of a shock for the new fish as the new fish came from far different condition than your own tank. if you think about how it came from the breeders then to my lfs, and then on to your aquarium.

i thought it was interesting and has some logic to it, maybe it has similarities to your problem,
Thanks Sasha

0morrokh

That sounds like something called old tank syndrome...basically that means that over the years you have started neglecting the tank, and the nitrate levels have gradually risen. The "old" fish get used to the slowly climbing levels of nitrates, but new fish aren't used to is and the shock of suddenly high nitrates kills them.

Not to say that's what is happening. More likely you're just getting unhealthy fish from the store. Pet stores can be pretty bad about keeping fish, especially cheap "disposable" fish like livebearers.

You should set up a small (even 5 gallons would do the trick) quarintine tank. That way you will not risk introducing diseases when you get new fish, and it can serve as a hospital tank if a fish you already have gets sick.