Jo Liley

Can Anybody tell me is there is problem with guppies at the moment, I bought 6 guppies from Pets at Home on Sunday, and placed in Quarantine Tank, (Quarantine Tank has been set up since April 2009, keep two fish in there to keep the filter going, when I get new arrivals I place two fish in my main tank) Water changes weekly since it 48 litres must change at least 75% of it. Test Water Weekly, daily when adding new additions, Water Tested Sunday: ammonia 0, nitrite 0, pH 7.4 nitrate 0. Monday Tuesday Wednesday and today tests were the same. But I had 1 fish not looking good on Monday and that was taken back to the shop, rest seemed fine, 1 fish was replaced with 2 female guppies, they seemed fine. but between yesterday and 5pm today 5 fish have died as soon as 2 died I thought it might be a bacterial infection as fish showed no other signs of illness, so I took carbon out of the filter and treated with Interpet No 9.

Anybody got any answers.

Got Platies, Glowlights from Pets at Home before and they have been fine, in fact platies so fine, they breed worse than rabbits. got sick of taking babies back to the shop hence 2 lovely angels

Meenu

Possibly they were already ill?

I notice you have no nitrates - do you have live plants in your quar tank? I'm wondering if your cycle has somehow broken down?

Lucy

Welcome to FishLore
I'm really sorry you lost your fish.
Only things I can see that might have gone wrong is how long did you take to acclimate them? Sometimes if the're a big difference between pH tap to tank or Store to tank it could shock them or you just got a bad batch of fish.
Did you get one gender or mixed?

Here in the US sometimes they're just so overbred it makes the line weak.

Jo Liley

Yes I have bog wood and live plants in my tank and use Nitrafin cycle which keeps the nitrates down, left them for 30 minutes in closed bag then open it, put tank water in the bag 3x10 minute intervals, then released them into the tank.

Lucy

Normally, I'd caution against using Cycle, but I don't think that effected your guppies.
Perhaps you need to acclimate them a little longer. Any idea what the store's pH is?

Jo Liley

No, never thought to ask as I've not had any problems with fish bought from there before.

Lucy

Hmmm, I'm out of ideas.
Perhaps other members will chime in.
Best of luck.

Beth1965

I can say that I tried 4 times to keep guppies alive and was unsuccessful. Each time I tried, they were from different shops.
ABout the 5th time, in a newly cycled tank i was able to keep them and still have them for about a month-6 weeks.
When I posted about this at an earlier date people had suggested that the breed had been overbreed and the fish were not so hardly any longer.

Jo Liley

Thanks for all the replies, found another dead this morning, so now I'm down to one, I don't think they are hardy at all anymore. My other fish (in my main tank) have survived my daughter pouring a full tub of food in, of coarse scooped most of it out and did about 4 water changes that day but fish still perfectly healthy. Looks like I can only admire the beautiful colours of guppies in the pet shop, or go and look at the beautiful marine fish at our local Sealife Centre.

Beth1965

I know how you feel, I love to watch guppies. Howa bout another colorful fish? Sunburst platys?

Lucy

I'm sorry you lost another.
It's really hard to watch and not be able to do anything.
Maybe you can find a reliable breeder in your area?

Meenu

Mu guppies came from Petsmart and have done extremely well so far. I've had them for about 2-3 weeks.