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Post by guppyslayer on Jun 1, 2006 8:51:06 GMT 10
last night i walked past our tank and notice there was two dead guppies, i removed them. about an hour later my wife walked past and there was another dead one. this morning when we got up there was another.
what could be killing so quickly?
b
sorry don't know the ph or other, testing gear is not able to be used for a bit (lost in move).
a 25% water change was done tuesday night
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Post by sammigold on Jun 1, 2006 10:27:53 GMT 10
Unfortunately we really need to know water parameters and also were there any noticeable symptoms.... Maybe you can take some of your water to your LFS and get them to do the full barrage of tests.... ph, gh, kh, ammonia,nitrite,nitrate.... If I remember rightly this is a relatively new tank so maybe you have some ammonia issues...This can be very toxic to guppys and you dont get much warning.... Did you notice if your dead guppys looked unusual in anyway before or after they were dead.. ie. any growths or lesions... any fluffy type growths.... was mouth still fully intact.... were tails or fins split.... were they bloated or did scales look like a little pine cone.... If you can give us this info it would help greatly in working out your prob... Guppys are quite sensitive to their water conditions.. just last week I had a problem and found that my KH was extremely high after a few water changes I managed to get it back to normal and my guppies were soon back to normal also.... How are you other gups looking..... When you did your water change did you condition the water to rid of any chlorine and chloramines? sorry for all the questions but all this info can really help....
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Post by Bumblebee on Jun 1, 2006 14:02:31 GMT 10
I would say the same. unfortunatley guppies are prone to dropping like flys before a tank is 6 weeks or so old. good old fishioned carbon filters or zeolite can sometimes help at this stage though. keeping PH and KH high also seems to help.
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Post by guppyslayer on Jun 1, 2006 16:16:13 GMT 10
i checked the fish before they were disposed and they were bloated, the fourth fish that died was i am sure caused by one or possibly both of our cats as she had red lesions and a wedge taken out of the middle of her tail, she also appeared to be bloated. i don't think the first three were interfered with by the cats as the only signs were bloated bellies, no lesions no missing body parts they were all intact. will check water parameters when possible
m
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Post by sammigold on Jun 1, 2006 21:52:05 GMT 10
May be a case of Dropsy hard to say really (im inclined to think its a cycling issue).... If I were you I would try putting a little salt in the water (cooking or rock salt NOT table salt) at a rate of 1 teaspoon per 40litres (dissolve it in a container of some of your tank water and pop it in.... halve that dose if you have bristlenose cats) the salt can help to relax your guppys and I read somewhere that it also helps with cases of nitrite poisoning (which results from high ammonia levels) Salt treatment and an added airstone to help with the oxygenation of the water can help nullify the effects of nitrite poisoning by transferring sodium and chloride ions across the gill membranes and into the fishes blood allowing for easier oxygenation of the blood in the fish...(I read that in an article from this link aquascienceresearch.com/APInfo/Salt.htm ) HTH
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Post by guppyguardian on Jun 2, 2006 12:41:54 GMT 10
for those of you who haven't read the intro's recently, i'm guppyslayer's wife and now have my own account as you cant login in two places, so hi. anyway to the issue of our guppies i finally found our ph test kit and the alkalinity is extremely high in both tanks. i put some alkaline reducer in the tank but i dont know if it is enough, it tells me to do it gradually. advice please our tanks 1) rectangle roughly 72cm x 28cm x 35 high 2)hex 29cm x 24 x 23 high. so for example in teaspoons how many should i put in each tank to bring the ph back to normal. i also did a control by testing the water from the tape before it goes into the tank and that has high alkalinity already. also what increases alkalinity
thanx m
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Post by sammigold on Jun 2, 2006 13:22:57 GMT 10
When you say high alkalinity, how high.... guppys are happy within the range of 7- 7.4 they actually prefer alkaline waters to acidic....
in regard to the amount of reducer I am really not sure..... you can work out the litres of your tank by multiplying length x width x depth of water and then divide by 1000 that will give you your litres... then follow the instructions of your reducer if it has them.... HTH
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Post by guppyguardian on Jun 2, 2006 18:06:03 GMT 10
the comparison chart on my ph kit goes upto 7.4 and the test is bluer than that, instructions are vague, only says change ph gradually to me that is like asking how long a piece of string is. about high alkalinity we have 3 goldfish in with the guppies do they like it like that too
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Post by sammigold on Jun 2, 2006 21:38:46 GMT 10
thats a question I cant answer.... I think goldies dont mind it alkaline.... In regard to the ph is there some way you can find out exactly what it is so that then you know how much you need to reduce it by... maybe your local aquarium could help you... and they may be able to suggest how much reducer you need to put in.... i know that you can use peat (available at most LFS) to reduce your ph naturally although it can change the colour of your water due to the tannins it releases... it goes a nice tea colour for a while until the majority of tannins are leeched... sorry I am not being of much help here... maybe someone else will have some ideas... we will just keep trying.... :-)
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