queenbobby

im feeling sad, tired , fed up nd have a migraine..just to paint you a truthful pic.
i have been advised by my LFS who i dont know are in the wrong or not after cycling my tank for 1 week and adding the cycle product to introduce some hardy fish and a bottom feeder. so yesterday like a child with a new toy i introduced and acclimatised over an hour 5 zebra danios and a rubber nose plec tiny tiny tine plec.

on waking and watching them till midnight as there sooo lovely the plec was dead. it was hovering by the filter intake? im wondering if thats what killed him or if it was dead and got sucked up...arr its so horible to even imagine it,

the filter is a fluval 405 ust to give you an indication of the style of the tubes.

im sad and very deflated and to top it off the lfs seems to be closed today?
should i ask for a refund or is it my fault?
he was aware of my temp 26 before he sold it to me and i made sure that these fish would be ok to add at this stage
please please advise...
my next post mybe to sell my tank as thats how i feel with all the bad luck i hve been having

gonzo127

sorry for your loss

well although i am no expert, from what i can tell of those details your tank probably wasnt cycled fully. especially if you are using 'cycle' as it actually creates a false cycle due to the incorrect bacteria it uses. i beleive it usualy takes up to one month to fully cycle a tank fishless by feeding the tank everyday

you really need to get a test kit to check your water perameters, the API liquid master test kit is great, yes it might cost £20 - £30 but it really is worth it as it lets you know everything you need to know about your tank.

just a quick question how are the danios doing? are they zooming around the tank or are they lathargic?

also your water temp does seem a little high, especially for the danios, from the fish profiles on this site Temperature : 65°F - 75°F (18°C - 24°C)

Lucy

Bobby, I'm really sorry for your loss.

I can imagine how frustrated you are.
It sounds like he had already passed and got sucked to the filter.
If you only had the pleco over night, I can't imagine how this would be your fault.

I like gonzo said, cycle contains the wrong kind of bacteria. It dies off quickly and takes away the nutrients (ammonia) the beneficial bacteria need to grow.

You should get yourself a test kit, I like the API master kit, it's very reliable.
Start with a 50% water change to get rid of Cycle.
After that as soon as you have any ammonia reading, start doing 50% water changes daily. If you use prime as your water conditioner, it will detoxify the ammonia for 24 hours between water changes.
Keep this up until your readings are 0 for ammonia 0 nitrItes with some nitrates showing.

Your danios are hardy little fish and should get through thr cycle. Try to resist add anymore fish until the cycle is complete.

Don't give up! Soon you'll be enjoying your beautiful tank.

Good luck.

jdhef

As stated previously, I think that you really need to get a good liquid test kit, and monitor your ammonia, nitrites and nitrate levels. You will probably see elevated ammonia, since I believe your tank was not properly cycled.

If after testing, you find that you have elevated ammonia or nitrites, your path forward would be to do daily 50% water changes until your tank cycles fully. Using a water conditioner such as Prime, will detoxify any ammonia for 24 hours at which point you will be doing another water change.

I believe that Plecos are pretty sensitive to ammonia and nitrites, but the danios are pretty darn hardy so hopefully you won't lose any during the cycling process.

EDIT: Well I see Lucy beat me to the punch here...

Fishies-for-me

I also say " hang in there" as much heartache as a new tank can give you when you get poor advice from a perstore. It can give you so much more joy once you have the basics down and and healthy tank with vibrant lively fish is a joy to behold! LFS are so bad for giving bad advice. If you know somebody the ahs a healthy established tank you maybe able to get a piece of filter material from them and place that in your tank. A nice dirty piece would be great as that filter material would have the bacteria needed for the cycle to start. Even a handful of gravel or a decoration out of an established tank would work...hang the gravel in a very clean ( make sure there is no soap ) nylon stocking in your tank . If you can do this make sure you keep the filter material and or gravel , decorations wet and warm on the way home and transfer to your tank as soon as possible after removing from donor tank. There are a couple of products out there that some people have had luck with. One is safe start by tetra and the other is stability by seachem. I personally have used stability and it helped but did not " instantly cycle" my tank. My favorite way to start a tank is with used filter media. I set up a betta tank last wekend and I used media out of my 36 gallon tank and literaly cycled the tank instantly as there have been no ammonia or nitites show up in the tank with a reading of a little over 5 for nitrates. Please don't give up...fish are so pretty and such a calming decoration for you home. I love my fish and know if given good advice and a little time you will to....good luck....( ps sorry for the long post)

sirdarksol

Sorry about everything that happened. Hang in there.

I agree with the above statements that Cycle isn't a good product.
However, I doubt it was even that that killed the pleco. It was probably sick before you even got it. Like Lucy said, if it died in one night, it likely wasn't your fault. In a sick fish, a relatively minor change (like the change in pH from store to home aquarium) can cause the poor thing to go into shock.

ohmymod

oh so sad, i had a fish die about 2 weeks ago, i still get teary eyed

pepetj

Queenbobby:

Sorry for your lose. I understand how you feel. I have been heartbroken too (do you see that beautiful female Betta at my signature -scroll down-? she died out of the blue).

I have felt like giving up as well. Take your time, I encourage you to learn from what just happened. Read around. Ask questions. Share your learning. You will be quite an expert in no time if you stay around.

I know your tiny bottom-dweller died, but how are your Zebra Danios doing? Did you know this is one of the hardiest fish around? Great beginners' fish, and they will likely survive a cycle with fish if you do it carefully.

I had no idea about cycling tanks when I came here.

To be honest with you my first thoughts were that these fishlorians here were trying to sell me something and kind of dramatic over fishkeeping. After all I kept fishes from age 7 to 23 and did so without all their bla-bla-bla, but after 20 years out of my hobby, I came back and believe me I am here to keep on learning. I have 5 stocked tanks, 2 hospital tanks, and one being set up at the moment.

Cycle product = good idea but with wrong type of bacteria = bad product.

Since you have a 350L tank (90 US gallons), there's a lot you can do. Instead of selling it, I suggest you get a small 5gal tank for a Betta.

Get yourself a nice Freshwater Test kit, make some measurements and post them here.

We are here for you queenbobby. Count us in your team.

Pepe
Santo Domingo

queenbobby

thanks for the replies...
but i have yet another problem the danios have now started to go missing .. my initial thought was that they had died and were at the bottom or top of the tank but i have had a good look there no where the only thing that i can think of is that they have probabley got sucked down through the filter tubes? alive or dead they might be inside my external filter....
they dont sell the product prime or stability in my local stores they all sell and promote this stupid cycle product////...
any one know how to disconnect the external fluval 405 while its still attched to the water in the tank... theres is supposed to be a special way to discoonect the tubing...

gonzo127

Hi well unfortunatly i dont know about disconecting the filter, however you might be able to help stop the fish being sucked up if that is what is happening, basically go and buy a corse sponge filter media and then cut it to size and pop it in the end or over the end of the intake tube for the filter, that way creating a 'barrier' or sorts

Sasukii

queenbobby, hopefully you can find your poor fish. Your filtration intake tube, does it have some kind of 'strainer' to block the entrance of larger foreign materails? Mine does, and that is where we found blackey, too.

It's unfortunate that so many pet store owners (especially like at mine, exotic equatics -- it's ONLY a fish store) and their employees are giving out such false information, or not taking the time to explain how things 'really are' or not suggesting test kits to take home. I realize that he only said he would give me the tests for free because each trip back into the store is a potential sale.

Something that my pet store owner told me though, is that when I started my tank he sold me 5 fish. He told me that there is a 72 hour return policy (I realize I am WAAY past that by now) but had they died within that time, he said he would not replace them if they died that soon, but just refund them as that fast would be not my fault. He told me also that most likely they would die (but MAYBE not) through the cycle process. After the first month, I was sure the end was near and since we had not lost any we'd be ok and my daughter named all the fish. Now it's the end of the second month and we lost two (the third I thought died came back after putting him in a different container!) so hopefully we can save the last 3.

Good luck with your tank, but if you lose all your fish maybe consider fishless cycling!

Freshwater Fan

So sorry to hear about your fish. Keep your head up. You're in good company here. I was completely clueless and added fish after 24 hours due to the petco idiots advice. I swear it should be criminal. 24 hours! What a farse. I do still have many of my original fish from that initial 24 hour period- but did loose some along the cycle. My tank is finaly cycled, and my water quality is perfect, but there was a time when I was very frustrated, thinking that it the day would never come and then one evening I tested- and BAM! the water was perfect, and with not doing anything to rash to the tank, I have been able to maintain that perfect water quality, although it's only been 2 or three weeks since I have been cycled, I'm still pretty excitied and forsee years of enjoyment. Don't worry it WILL get better. Patience is key! Oh and btw, if you don't have an API master test kit, or something of similar quality, you might as well not bother with keeping fish. Best of luck!

queenbobby

hi good news i took my water to be tested and its finally cycled!!! yipee!! elation!!
so i have in there 4 zebra danios, 3 neon tetras and 1 id shark
the man in the ;fs store said to wait before adding a plec or catfish which is what i really wanted.....
also any one now anything about fire eels?
so happy

Alessa

Im sorry to tell you thid bobby, but the cycle cannot possibly be complete in one week... it takes like a month, if not more.

what are your exact readings? (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate?)

Sasukii

did you take it to the pet store and they test it using a strip? Keep in mind, some pet store people don't know what they are doing. I took my water in to be tested and they said it was perfect, and even let me walk out with MORE fish. I think that's it - they want you to buy buy buy... if they can get you to buy, then your fish die... they ask you to bring in your water, and find a reason to blame you instead of their mistake. =( I really hope you don't have any more casualties!

Lucy

Sad, but true.

queenbobby

i took it to them and they used a liquid based tsting system to test it ..it had been 2 weeks and i had used cycle?
my fish all seem to be happy but u got me wondering now....

Sasukii

Well I hope the best for you and your fish most definitely! I great investment would be an API master test kit - it's the liquid test kit they probably used then. I need to buy one of these myself as what I'm using is rather inaccurate (not sure if it's in a good way or a bad way yet, but I guess no matter what inaccurate is bad...) I know that the one that I am looking to buy is almost $30... and I'll just be doing daily water changes until I can afford to purchase the kit. Check out Ebay too (may not be able to have it instantly, but saved money is saved money, and partial water changes daily to me sound like they will work in the mean time..)