scripted2change

I have had my fish for awhile now and i clean the tank at least once a week and they have done pretty well. In the one tank i put different rocks in for my niece. They are the color rocks (blue and purple). Since i did that a few hours later i noticed that the tales of a lot of them had become clamped. This has never happened before and i have had fish for about a year now. Has happened to my guppies. I have read somewhere about rocks and how some are good and some are bad.. Could this be from the rocks? If so assuming i should remove them from the tank and change the rocks? Hope someone can help and soon. Thanks!

sirdarksol

Basic questions:
What are the ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate readings in the tank?
How many and what kind of fish in the tank?
How many gallons is the tank?
How long has the tank in question been set up? Is it the year that you referenced, or is this tank newer?

If the rocks are aquarium rocks, they probably aren't the problem. I've never had issues with the colored rocks. Not saying it can't happen, though.

scripted2change

I havent done readings honestly and never have. I have a few guppies that are 4/5 months old and then some baby guppies plus 2 platys. They are in a ten gallon tank and i have had the tank set up for about 5 months. Just find it odd that every single time i have cleaned the tank and put them back they were perfectly fine. I was using river rocks and now i put the rocks in that my mother bought from walmart and the fish tales have become clamped. I dont know where i read about the rocks but it's one reason that i didnt really want to put them in.

sirdarksol

I'm not positive on this, but I'm guessing that the problem is ammonia, not the rocks.

I'm guessing that your tanks aren't cycled, as you say you pull your fish out and clean the tanks. This actually isn't necessary. When I had guppies as a kid, they'd always die within a year, and it was because I did pretty much the same thing as you: I'd clean the tank out periodically. Instead of doing a complete clean, you only need to replace some of the water and vacuum the gravel periodically.
http://www.fishlore.com/NitrogenCycle.htm (This article explains some of what I'm going to go into here)
With the number of fish that you have in a 10g tank, it's overstocked. With no nitrifying bacteria, it would take a matter of hours for the water to become toxic. Guppies are hardy fish, so it takes them longer to show the effects of ammonia poisoning, but it still happens as days change into weeks and weeks change into months. The addition of new rocks may have just been an extra stressor that pushed them over the edge.

The basic concepts of setting up an aquarium are:
1)Established nitrogen cycle is a must. Cleaning the tank periodically creates a cycle of poisonous water/non-poisonous water/poisonous water/etc... which slowly kills the fish.
2)One inch of adult fish per gallon of water. This means that you should consider all fish to be of the length that they will eventually grow. Otherwise, you end up with scenarios where the fish have grown and you don't have an extra tank ready for them. This is one of the reasons that people without big tanks are suggested to only get male guppies/platies/mollies, as a smaller tank can't support the constant stream of babies.
3)Weekly water changes of enough quantity to keep the nitrate levels under 20ppm.

There's more to it, of course, but these are the basic concepts and the most important. Because an aquarium, unlike a lake or river, is a closed system, we have to work to mimic the ways that nature removes toxins from the water.

COBettaCouple

Do you have any pictures to post of them?

I would recommend using an API master freshwater kit to test the water, and use Prime to condition all your water. Change about 50% of the water daily until the tank is cycled.