Today started bad for me.
Yesterday, I asked my mom for an unused sponge to clean the algae off the inside of the tank. She did so, and I assumed it would be fine. So I cleaned out the inside of the tank, and scrubbed the algae-covered rock in the tank.
Little known to me, household sponges bought at the grocery store contain perservatives which keep them soft. These perservatives (like most chemicals) are detrimental to fish. This morning, I was rudely awoken by my father, who proceeded to tell me that my mom realized why the fish were acting strange. The snail was clamped shut, and the fish were very skiddish. So I spent a good chunk of my morning emptying all water from the tank, rinsing out the tank three times, rinsing out all rocks and plants.
I kept the fish temporarily in a 1 gallon fish bowl I had. I put an airstone in there to make sure they had enough air. I lost two fish, one tetra due to stress, and my gourami has been looking bad the past few weeks anyway, so it finally passed on.
After rigorous cleaning of the tank, I finally put the fish back in, and they are still quite skiddish. I think this is due to the stress they went through today combined with the fact that, in essence, I now have an uncycled, new tank. And my fish have to go in there, because there is no where else for them to go.
What is even worse is that I just replaced my filter media yesterday, so any bacteria that were on there are now gone.
Overall, it stinks. Very much.
One good thing though is that I was able to go the Boston aquarium with my family today and look at the fish there. Pretty interesting stuff. If you guys are ever in the vicinity of Boston, I highly suggest the New England Aquarium.
