Licorice Gourami P. deissneri Untimely Death

Hi all! I have a 10 gal tank that I have had set up and cycled for about a year. I have recently replaced my former stock of neocaridina with several species of "nanofish" who are all doing great, with the exception of my Deissneri Licorice Gourami who passed away last night.

First things first:
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 20 ppm
pH 8.2
TDS 112
Temp 78 F
Stocking: 1 Sparkling Gourami, 1 Peacock Gudgeon, 1 Scarlet Badis, 1 Black Tiger Badis, 2 Ornate Bushfish (Microctenopoma ansorgii), 3 otocinclus, 1 pygmy cory, 2 rabbit snails, 4 nerite snails, 4 neocaridina *** I know this tank is technically overstocked as it will not be big enough for all of them when the fish are full grown, but this is a grow out tank for them as most are young fish about .5-.75 inches each and I will be moving them to my 55 gal nano fish setup for their permanent home. I also know some are schooling fish that do not have enough members but they where the last ones in stock at the LFS and I plan on getting more***

The tank has a heater, 2 sponge filters, 2 LED grow lights, is scaped with low maintenance plants, dragon stone, driftwood, and has floating plants to help diffuse the light. Substrate is layered and includes Seachem Florite, DeponitMix Professional, small pebbles, and fine quarts sand.

I have had the Sparking Gourami, Peacock Gudgeon, Otos, snails, shrimp, and the lonely corry for about 2 months and the little Sparkling Gourami seems to be running the tank, which was a surprise for me. The other fish I ordered online through a respected dealer and have had them for about 2 weeks. The Licorice Gourami in question also came in this shipment. It along with some others where wild caught but had been quarantined, medicated, and acclimated to aquarium life by the dealer and where not overly shy and readily accepted flake food, live baby brine, and freezedried daphnia.

I know in the wild this fish lives in very acidic water, but also read that over time it can adjust to alkaline conditions. Do you think my high pH of 8.2 is too high for this species to survive and thrive? My TDS is also kind of high and is over 100 right out of the tap. I'm worried that some of the other fish that also prefer acidic water may also parish suddenly even though they do not currently show any signs of stress. When I found the body it has been ravished by snails but the fins and eyes where all intact, which paired with the fact that even the badis species remain very peaceful makes me believe it wasn't bullied to death.

I love gouramis and would love to try again with this species, but don't want to harm anymore if they are not a good fit for my tank. If the pH is the issue do you believe that adding more drift wood and some indian almond leaves could lower the pH to an acceptable level? I do not know the exact hardness of my water, but it is very hard as well.

 

If you are certain it wasn't killed by another fish then I'd say it was the pH and hardness of the water. The majority of licorice gourami are wild caught and therefore are very sensitive to water parameters. You simply must have their tank set up to resemble the water where they came from. The more fancy and hard to come by gourami (all licorice species among others) should not be purchased on a whim, for them to do well they need very specific care. Very few will/can do well in community settings, and licorice gourami are not part of those few IMO.

I haven't had my little group of 6 licorice gourami for very long, 2-3 weeks at most, but they are doing wonderfully in their 10gal species only black water setup. I had to use pure water, so I melted snow and am now collecting rain water for water changes. Adding tannins lowered the pH to below 6, lower than my API liquid test kit will measure. My little ones seem perfectly at home with the dark tannin stained water, leaf litter and floating plants. I could not even imagine trying to convert them to my tap water, which is a good 7.8 pH and rather hard. They'd likely die even if I took the time to acclimate them slowly.

I suggest you either give up on keeping licorice gourami are set your mind to it and do all the researching you can. You must use pure water and add botanicals to get the right parameters.

Check out my thread, it has lots of useful links and pretty good info on keeping licorice gourami. I'm stilling learning of course but seeing as mine are doing pretty well so far I must be doing something right!
How would you create soft water/low pH for Licorice Gourami? | Aquarium Water Forum | 518001

 

TDS of 100 isn't even that high, but if you don't know what those are made up of (KH, GH, etc), a TDS-Meter is not useful at all. To be honest, I have doubts if either the TDS meter is correctly calibrated, provided the pH test was correct.
This is a perfect example why softwater (and I mean actuallysoft with GH/KH below detection) species should be kept in such.
People that write something else either haven't handled the really sensitive species before or don't care as long as the fish swim and eat, ignoring all red flags of the fish not feeling well. Especially older "I've been doing this for 50 years and never anything happened"-hobbyists that have just kept hardy species and community tanks, who never bothered to move onward and learn tend to say this.
I witnessed somebody keeping a chocolate gourami in hard water and saying they love the pattern these fish have. Well, it was the stress colouration. That person didn't even know how the fish should have looked in good condition.

What usually happens to such fish in hard water:
- Osmoregulation is heavily impaired. The fish are evolutionary build to retain the few minerals and electrolytes they get in their natural environments (for which they need humic substances by the way). In hard water the amounts are so high, their system can't cope.
- Softwater and especially blackwater fish have likely adapted to these environments as they are very low in bacteria. Hence these fish show a very high vulnerability to bacteria. Harder water has much higher bacteria counts.
Result: They either die slowly of kidney failure, which can take years before becoming acute. Or they die quickly of a bacterial infection, often within days. The more sensitive the species is to these problems, the faster this occurs. So while a tankbred cardinal tetra might make it some years, of course a licorice gourami is bound to be a goner quite quickly.

Bottom line from what I know and experienced: Stay away from such species if you can't provide the fitting water. Period.

I know in the wild this fish lives in very acidic water, but also read that over time it can adjust to alkaline conditions. Do you think my high pH of 8.2 is too high for this species to survive and thrive? My TDS is also kind of high and is over 100 right out of the tap. I'm worried that some of the other fish that also prefer acidic water may also parish suddenly even though they do not currently show any signs of stress.

 

If you are certain it wasn't killed by another fish then I'd say it was the pH and hardness of the water. The majority of licorice gourami are wild caught and therefore are very sensitive to water parameters. You simply must have their tank set up to resemble the water where they came from. The more fancy and hard to come by gourami (all licorice species among others) should not be purchased on a whim, for them to do well they need very specific care. Very few will/can do well in community settings, and licorice gourami are not part of those few IMO.

I haven't had my little group of 6 licorice gourami for very long, 2-3 weeks at most, but they are doing wonderfully in their 10gal species only black water setup. I had to use pure water, so I melted snow and am now collecting rain water for water changes. Adding tannins lowered the pH to below 6, lower than my API liquid test kit will measure. My little ones seem perfectly at home with the dark tannin stained water, leaf litter and floating plants. I could not even imagine trying to convert them to my tap water, which is a good 7.8 pH and rather hard. They'd likely die even if I took the time to acclimate them slowly.

I suggest you either give up on keeping licorice gourami are set your mind to it and do all the researching you can. You must use pure water and add botanicals to get the right parameters.

Check out my thread, it has lots of useful links and pretty good info on keeping licorice gourami. I'm stilling learning of course but seeing as mine are doing pretty well so far I must be doing something right!
How would you create soft water/low pH for Licorice Gourami? | Aquarium Water Forum | 518001

Have you tried to lower your tap water pH from 7.8 with botanicals alone or have you always used the rain water to start? I'm afraid I wont be able to get my pH low enough with tannins alone.

 

Have you tried to lower your tap water pH from 7.8 with botanicals alone or have you always used the rain water to start? I'm afraid I wont be able to get my pH low enough with tannins alone.

Humic substances alone don't do the trick if you have detectable KH. Read Demeter's thread and maybe read my Blackwater article as well.

 

What usually happens to such fish in hard water:
- Osmoregulation is heavily impaired. The fish are evolutionary build to retain the few minerals and electrolytes they get in their natural environments (for which they need humic substances by the way). In hard water the amounts are so high, their system can't cope.
- Softwater and especially blackwater fish have likely adapted to these environments as they are very low in bacteria. Hence these fish show a very high vulnerability to bacteria. Harder water has much higher bacteria counts.
Result: They either die slowly of kidney failure, which can take years before becoming acute. Or they die quickly of a bacterial infection, often within days. The more sensitive the species is to these problems, the faster this occurs. So while a tankbred cardinal tetra might make it some years, of course a licorice gourami is bound to be a goner quite quickly.

Bottom line from what I know and experienced: Stay away from such species if you can't provide the fitting water. Period.

Thank you for the insight! I wasn't very familiar with how the higher pH and hardness affected the fishes body and definitely wont be getting any more soft water, acidic loving fish in till I can get my water proper for them. I should have known better than to trust the seller, or to think a fish can change its habitat after acclimating for a few months when it has been evolving that way for thousands of years!

 

Everything Demeter and MacZ said is spot on. This fish was doomed with exactly the wrong conditions, including tankmates. And it sounds like it wasn’t quarantined.

TDS of 100 isn't even that high, but if you don't know what those are made up of (KH, GH, etc), a TDS-Meter is not useful at all. To be honest, I have doubts if either the TDS meter is correctly calibrated, provided the pH test was correct.

It’s unusual, but possible. My tap water is also soft (about 35ppm TDS) but has a high pH because the city adds NaOH to the water. That said, even 100ppm TDS is on the high side for these fish, and the high pH brings other problems.

I should have known better than to trust the seller, or to think a fish can change its habitat after acclimating for a few months when it has been evolving that way for thousands of years!

*Millions of years. But the more important distinction is that they’ve been selected in blackwater. They have no mechanisms to adapt outside of that.

Tough lesson, but it never hurts to research the natural conditions, even if a fish can survive outside of them. If you intend to pursue blackwater fishes, you’ll need to use rainwater or RODI.

 

It’s unusual, but possible. My tap water is also soft (about 35ppm TDS) but has a high pH because the city adds NaOH to the water. That said, even 100ppm TDS is on the high side for these fish, and the high pH brings other problems.

I know, that's why I said TDS readings are useless without knowing what they are composed of.

 

2 Ornate Bushfish (Microctenopoma ansorgii)

These are fantastic little fish! Though keep in mind they can also be little terrors especially as they mature. A tank this size may be fine for them alone but others in the tank may be at risk. I would be concerned with both the Sparkler and the Badis as they would be the likely targets of Ansorgii.
The larger tank may be fine but you never know.