Theres something wrong with my fishies :(

Hiya peeps
Iv had fancy fin goldfish for nearly 3 years and also have 3 tanks of all sizes in total ranging from tropical fish coldwater fish and african dwarf frogs..

I noticed my favourite fancy fin (fred lol) had got fin rot so I treated him and after 3 days he was back on his fins and full of life I was happy thought problem solved (really wouldnt wanna loose him as he was my first ever fish 2 years ago!) then with in the week the water started to look cloudy, so we got some water ready to clean tank out and during the night fred died

the next day we found ANOTHER fish buzz had died too.. so straight away using the water out ready as planned we did a water change 30% as something obviously wrong in the tank and left it for 5 hours and the water was still cloudy!! the other fish also were at water level obviously trying to get more oxygen it seemed so I removed some of the water and put the filter pump on higher speed to help the filtration. this seems to have helped abit.. to get the water level down (just in case) iv added icecubes in a bag too.. I'm so worried the other fish will get ill and not 100% sure what to do next.. this tank has been up and running for 2 months but the fishs ages range from 2 n half years - 6months old so no new tank-mates nothing new at all.. any help would be HUGELY appriciated thanks you!

Megan xx

 

I'm sorry for your loss.

Do you know about the nitrogen cycle? You most likley have ammonia spike. Do you have a test kit to test for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate? What are the parameters if so?

I suggest a large water change of like 50% asap.

Welcome to fishlore.

 

parametres??

(runs to boyfriend to check got details right ) darren says he did 40/50% water change... not the 30% I thought lol so that's been done.

what can cause ammonia spike? would adding fin rot drops previously do it?

xx

 

Welcome to the forum!

First off, what are your water parameters? Your aquarium info says you know about the nitrogen cycle so that's good. If your not 100% sure about it, you can click the word nitrogen cycle to read more about it.

How often do you change your water? Do you gravel vac the gravel? How often? What water do you use for water changes? Do you leave if out for 24 hours before using it or do you use a dechlorinator? Leaving water out in the open for 24 hours will let the chlorine evaporate but not the chloramine if you have that in your tap. Chloramine is just as dangerous if not more.

Also if you cleaned your tank 100%, you pretty much destroyed your cycle. This can cause the cloudy water.
What medication did you use? Some meds will crash your cycle which will cause the cloudy water. Its called a bacteria bloom.

The fish at the surface could mean your water is depleted of oxygen or that there is something else wrong in your water. Ammonia,nitrite,heavy metals, can all cause this.

Answering all these questions will help us help you. Sorry if its a lot.

EDIT: If you don't know what parameters are, I don't think you know about the nitrogen cycle. This is the bare bones of what it is, Fish will poop and excrete ammonia. Ammonia is highly toxic to fish and can kill fast. Over the course of a few weeks, bacteria form and convert the ammonia to nitrite which is also highly toxic to fish. The bacteria mainly lives in the filter. Over the course of a few more weeks a different form of bacteria form and convert the nitrite to nitrate which is relatively harmless at low levels. This is then removed by weekly water changes.

 

cloudy water that is whitish can mean there is ammonia present, fish are suffering from ammonia poisoning, thus they hangout near the surface. The water clears itself when there is enough good bacteria to handle the fish load. It can get interupted by overcleaning or not enough water changes, overfeeding. Goldfish produce a lot of waste as is.

You need to be doing daily waterchanges until it clears or until you have 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite and less then 20 nitrates.

 

Before I joined FL I had the experience of cloudy water ..... an ammonia spike. +1 to Alyeska Girl. I think that is why I do such massive water changes on tank-cleaning-day. Don't be frightened of doing 50-75% water changes. More important to get that ammonia down.