Nerk2486

Hello!!

I work at a fish/pet store, and one of my customers has been having a problem with her tank. 20g, been established for quite some time. She has/had guppies, neons, black neons, and a couple cories in her tank. She bought a couple of guppies from our store, and they all died within a couple days. The rest of her fish have been dying one by one since then. Started about 3 weeks ago.

Tested her water, everything looked fine except that her pH was a little high. Water is *somewhat* cloudy brown, but she got a piece of bogwood a little while back. Probably clouding up the water. I got to see one of her dead guppies (died when I went to her house. @~@) and there didn't seem to be anything really physically wrong with it. A tiny bit of red along the gills and top of her head. They all have gotten really lethargic before they die. Also noticed the tiniest start of fin rot on a couple of her neons...it was really small and almost unnoticible, but it was there.

Poor little things. I would really really love it if anyone had any ideas!!!! >< I'm at a loss, and I really want to help her!!

~N

armadillo

Wow, you take good care of your customers, going to their houses! Wish my fish stores were that dedicated.

Some questions to perhaps put us all on the right track. Please do forgive me if they are totally obvious. There's no way to tell people's level of knowledge really quickly, so I really don't mean to be patronising if it's stuff you know already, just trying to help. Some people working in fish stores know so little it's a wonder they're even allowed to sell livestock, while others are true afficionados. Anyway, disclaimer over.

Water was tested with paper strips or liquid test kit?
When you say water was fine, what were the nitrites/nitrates/ammonia levels? Red gills is typical sign of poisoning by these substances.
How are the fish in the shop, the ones in the same tank as the ones you sold her? Are they all OK now?

Nerk2486

Tested the water with the liquid drops. Unfortunately, we've only got ammonia, nitrates, and pH here at the store. -_- I'd like to go get more, but the store won't help me pay for them. Nitrates and Ammonia both tested at 0. pH tested at about 7.4. Mind you, these bottles are probably as old as the store itself. I started here a month ago and aren't too entirely happy about the way things were run. And yeah, made me think right away of an ammonia problem; red gills, cloudy water. Hmm....

The ones from that tank I believe were having a problem at the time. Was unfortunately before I got here. As of right now, everyone is doing fine in that tank. No deaths.

And, I'd like to think that if I ever had a problem, someone would do the same thing for me. I'm a firm believer in the 'pay it forward' mentallity. *^^;;;;

~N

(And it's not patronizing. It terrifies me to see the kind of people that work in some pet stores. *shudders*)

COBettaCouple

ammonia poisioning would be my first guess. i'm pretty certain that those bottles won't generate reliable results with how old the chemicals are. you could try testing it out by putting some fish food in a bowl every 12 hours for a couple days and then taking a test of the water to see if it finds the ammonia that you would be certain to have.

another slight possibility is ulcers since the symptoms are: Sluggishness, lack of appetite, open sores with red edges, possible fin rot. since it's a bacterial infection, perhaps it could be spreading to the other fish and the tank would need treated for bacterial infection.

it could be inflammation too, symptoms are: Reddening on or under skin, sudden abnormal behavior. also a bacterial infection.

her best bet would be to clean the gravel, do a big water change, probably 50%. Treat all of the water with Prime and start treating the tank for bacterial infection. This would cover the 2 best guesses i have to the source of the tank's problem.

oh yea.. she doesn't happen to feed her fish the algae wafers, does she? if so, how long does she leave them in before removing them. If she leaves them in for more than 12 hours max, she could have a major nitrites issue happening.

armadillo

So this woman's fish are OK, then she brings some fish from the shop and some of these die, then some of hers follow, but the fish back in the shop in the same tank are OK. My guess of nitrates/nitrates/ammonia is turning into near absolute certainly for me. It could well be that the waste problem drastically worsened from the addition of more fish in the tank. So my guess, but again, just a guess, would be that it's best to do 50% water change and vaccuuming the gravel (not the whole gravel on the same day, or the bacteria may go bonkers).

What's her volume of fish against tank volume? She might need to bring some of the stock back to bring it back down to more comfortable levels? I am thinking that if it was bacterial infection imported from the fish in the shop, then the fish that stayed in the shop in the same tank would have had it too.

I'd say she needs to get herself the liquid test kits too.

Such a shame that your hands are tied in terms of getting better quality test kits for the shop. It's not like you should have to pay for these out of your own pocket for every customer's fish. That just wouldn't be normal.

Nerk2486

Thank you guys so much!!!

armadillo

's alright. Great that you care about the fish so much!

COBettaCouple

yea, the stores i've been to could use people who care for fish like you in their fish departments because the stores sure don't.