Rebecca1985
- #1
HI guys! I need some help to solve a mystery that’s been going on in my tanks. I will list the parameters for the 6ft tank but there are 3 tanks the problem:
All my shrimp died from a mystery disease and now my favourite 10” discus mysteriously ad QUICKLY died. They symptoms of the discus was that she seemed to have some colour loss on her side and she was very lethargic but had a couple of swims across the tank while I was trying to get a hospital tank heated ready for her, she then just stopped breathing but she still had lots of colour and wasn’t dark but she was a blue discus and I’ve noticed they don’t seem to be able to turn dark?? I had watched a cherry shrimp who stayed red for quite some days while parts of it turned white. It was like it was still alive but paralysed... here is the background info leading up to the discus death.
As mentioned we have 3 tanks a 6ft and 2 x 2ft. One 2ft had cherry shrimp in it and I was taking plants from the 6ft that were dying because they had so much algae on the leaves and planting them in the shrimp tank and the shrimp would clean them and I would keep swapping plants back and forth. We had placed large feeder shrimp in the 6ft as a clean up crew and thy were having a great time. I also purchased some black worms and started a black worm culture and was occasionally feeding the 6ft tank of 10 discus some blackworms in a cone. I was doing large 50% water changes on the 6ft every 2-3 days as this makes the discus grow well (I’ve since discovered that very good water parameters will do the same job) then I would fill the 6ft with our rain water tank and then siphon some 6ft water into the 2ft cherry tank and then change the black worm water with the cherry shrimp water everyday. After about 3 weeks I was vacuuming the gravel in the 6ft and there was no shrimp... not one... that’s weird. I took out all the ornaments and plants and gave it a much better vacuum and sure enough no shrimp and quite a few bodies that were just shells or parts of shell... that’s weird. Then come to think of it... there didn’t seem to be many cherry shrimp and they weren’t swimming around much ... hmmm so I took the plants out and there was about 5 shrimp out of 15 left, I gave the gravel a good vac and changed the water straight from the rain water tank and put the plants back, they started swimming around again but the next day they were back to slow... I kept changing the water (small changes) in the cherry tank but they just kept dying slowing down and standing still staying red but parts turning white then death. I started separating all the tanks when I refilled I mean I stopped refilling them from one another. I thought perhaps planaria because the gravel was quite dirty, my partner over feeds the 6ft. So I’m now doing daily gravel vac in the 6ft and just changing about 10% water just however much it takes to vacuum the gravel then fill up with rainwater. I have a dipstick perimeter tester which has been saying nitrate is high around 40pp I’ve also banned partner from feeding fish and I’m feeding them only what they consume. The night before the discus died I was supposed to do a gravel vac but decided to to it the next day (as I was doing it daily) and when I did the vac after the discus died I realised that the filter had been off for a day. I’ve done a large change after that and all the other discus are fine. But why did the shrimp die??? And any idea on the discus? We got 5 feeder shrimp to test the 6ft after all the cleaning and they had disappeared by day 2. Any ideas?? Thanks
Tank
What is the water volume of the tank? 600litres
How long has the tank been running? 7 years
Does it have a filter? Canister filter
Does it have a heater? Yes
What is the water temperature? 28 degrees Celsius
What is the entire stocking of this tank? (Please list all fish and inverts.)
8 adult discus
2 adult peppermint Bristlenose
3 3cm baby peppermint Bristlenose
5 Congo tetra
6 rummy nose tetra
2 panda Cory nearly adult size
Maintenance
How often do you change the water? Every day
How much of the water do you change? Enough to vaccine all the gravel about 10%
What do you use to treat your water? I don’t need to, it’s rain water
Do you vacuum the substrateor just the water?
Vacuume and under ornaments too
*Parameters - Very Important
Did you cycle your tank before adding fish? Yes
What do you use to test the water? Test strips
What are your parameters? We need to know the exact numbers, not just “fine” or “safe”.
Ammonia:
Nitrite: zero
Nitrate: 40pp
pH: 6.5-7
Feeding
How often do you feed your fish? 3 times a day
How much do you feed your fish? Enough they consume it all
What brand of food do you feed your fish?
Do you feed frozen or freeze-dried foods? Frozen blood worms, live blackworms, feeze dried blackworms, fish flakes, algae wafers
Illness & Symptoms
How long have you had this fish? About 6 months
How long ago did you first notice these symptoms?
In a few words, can you explain the symptoms? See above and attached photo
Have you started any treatment for the illness?
Was your fish physically ill or injured upon purchase?
How has its behavior and appearance changed, if at all?
Explain your emergency situation in detail. (Please give a clear explanation of what is going on, include details from the beginning of the illness leading up to now)
All my shrimp died from a mystery disease and now my favourite 10” discus mysteriously ad QUICKLY died. They symptoms of the discus was that she seemed to have some colour loss on her side and she was very lethargic but had a couple of swims across the tank while I was trying to get a hospital tank heated ready for her, she then just stopped breathing but she still had lots of colour and wasn’t dark but she was a blue discus and I’ve noticed they don’t seem to be able to turn dark?? I had watched a cherry shrimp who stayed red for quite some days while parts of it turned white. It was like it was still alive but paralysed... here is the background info leading up to the discus death.
As mentioned we have 3 tanks a 6ft and 2 x 2ft. One 2ft had cherry shrimp in it and I was taking plants from the 6ft that were dying because they had so much algae on the leaves and planting them in the shrimp tank and the shrimp would clean them and I would keep swapping plants back and forth. We had placed large feeder shrimp in the 6ft as a clean up crew and thy were having a great time. I also purchased some black worms and started a black worm culture and was occasionally feeding the 6ft tank of 10 discus some blackworms in a cone. I was doing large 50% water changes on the 6ft every 2-3 days as this makes the discus grow well (I’ve since discovered that very good water parameters will do the same job) then I would fill the 6ft with our rain water tank and then siphon some 6ft water into the 2ft cherry tank and then change the black worm water with the cherry shrimp water everyday. After about 3 weeks I was vacuuming the gravel in the 6ft and there was no shrimp... not one... that’s weird. I took out all the ornaments and plants and gave it a much better vacuum and sure enough no shrimp and quite a few bodies that were just shells or parts of shell... that’s weird. Then come to think of it... there didn’t seem to be many cherry shrimp and they weren’t swimming around much ... hmmm so I took the plants out and there was about 5 shrimp out of 15 left, I gave the gravel a good vac and changed the water straight from the rain water tank and put the plants back, they started swimming around again but the next day they were back to slow... I kept changing the water (small changes) in the cherry tank but they just kept dying slowing down and standing still staying red but parts turning white then death. I started separating all the tanks when I refilled I mean I stopped refilling them from one another. I thought perhaps planaria because the gravel was quite dirty, my partner over feeds the 6ft. So I’m now doing daily gravel vac in the 6ft and just changing about 10% water just however much it takes to vacuum the gravel then fill up with rainwater. I have a dipstick perimeter tester which has been saying nitrate is high around 40pp I’ve also banned partner from feeding fish and I’m feeding them only what they consume. The night before the discus died I was supposed to do a gravel vac but decided to to it the next day (as I was doing it daily) and when I did the vac after the discus died I realised that the filter had been off for a day. I’ve done a large change after that and all the other discus are fine. But why did the shrimp die??? And any idea on the discus? We got 5 feeder shrimp to test the 6ft after all the cleaning and they had disappeared by day 2. Any ideas?? Thanks
Tank
What is the water volume of the tank? 600litres
How long has the tank been running? 7 years
Does it have a filter? Canister filter
Does it have a heater? Yes
What is the water temperature? 28 degrees Celsius
What is the entire stocking of this tank? (Please list all fish and inverts.)
8 adult discus
2 adult peppermint Bristlenose
3 3cm baby peppermint Bristlenose
5 Congo tetra
6 rummy nose tetra
2 panda Cory nearly adult size
Maintenance
How often do you change the water? Every day
How much of the water do you change? Enough to vaccine all the gravel about 10%
What do you use to treat your water? I don’t need to, it’s rain water
Do you vacuum the substrateor just the water?
Vacuume and under ornaments too
*Parameters - Very Important
Did you cycle your tank before adding fish? Yes
What do you use to test the water? Test strips
What are your parameters? We need to know the exact numbers, not just “fine” or “safe”.
Ammonia:
Nitrite: zero
Nitrate: 40pp
pH: 6.5-7
Feeding
How often do you feed your fish? 3 times a day
How much do you feed your fish? Enough they consume it all
What brand of food do you feed your fish?
Do you feed frozen or freeze-dried foods? Frozen blood worms, live blackworms, feeze dried blackworms, fish flakes, algae wafers
Illness & Symptoms
How long have you had this fish? About 6 months
How long ago did you first notice these symptoms?
In a few words, can you explain the symptoms? See above and attached photo
Have you started any treatment for the illness?
Was your fish physically ill or injured upon purchase?
How has its behavior and appearance changed, if at all?
Explain your emergency situation in detail. (Please give a clear explanation of what is going on, include details from the beginning of the illness leading up to now)
