Your current Fish tank Setups!

Hello has anyone got any advice for me.

I have kept goldfish for awhile without too much trouble. My mum has a tank and the fish have just started dying i have no clue why. She had 4 gold fish and like a bottom feeding catfish like thing. I said i thought that was enough for a tank of that size.Anyways she didn't listen and got another 2 i noticed a few days ago a lot of the fish being very sluggish. Being very still at the bottom of the tank and barely swimming.

4 of the fish have died in the last 24 hours as well as the catfish thing. Has any one got a clue as to what might have happened.

My theory is something has got into the water or one of the newer fish she got had some sort of disease and its infected the other fish. The water smells a bit more then it normally does and while its still clear its gone a bit cloudy.
The fish we lost this morning i noticed its skin was peeling last night and one of the other fish we lost i noticed like darker bits around its gills.

The 2 fish remain seem healthy enough.
 
Bolivian Ram fisticuffs at feeding time. The Ram on the right is a bit of a sod tbh. He's OK round flake food, but as soon as I drop sinking wafers in, he goes into terrorist mode.

 
NoobCannon said:
Annubias. Any type
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arc@css said:
As above. Java fern is another you could consider.
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Thanks Gents :)

Wood is still afloat at the moment its in a bucket of water with a plate sat on it for now.

When i get the plants how do i kill off any snails etc? I have buckets they can live in for a week or two

Edit: Google reveals bleach 1:20 solution? Annubias for less than a minute and any other plants for 20 seconds at most
 
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At a guess its about 45 liters.

I gave it a good clean today and did a half water change in the hope that it will help

Another fish is sick so moved it to another smaller tank only got one left now :( Seems quite healthy and lively though so hope it will be okay.

I do about a 25% water change every week or 2 and hoover the gravel ect. then a big clean when if feel its needed.

Never had fish just die like that on mass.

The sick fish has the same issues seems to be having trouble swimming, it looks like its skin is peeling off and its fins don't look healthy.

I don't know if its something i done wrong, or the tank was just over stocked and it messed the water balance up. Or my mum bought a sick fish and its infected others.
 
DooMeR said:
At a guess its about 45 liters.

I gave it a good clean today and did a half water change in the hope that it will help

Another fish is sick so moved it to another smaller tank only got one left now :( Seems quite healthy and lively though so hope it will be okay.

I do about a 25% water change every week or 2 and hoover the gravel ect. then a big clean when if feel its needed.

Never had fish just die like that on mass.

The sick fish has the same issues seems to be having trouble swimming, it looks like its skin is peeling off and its fins don't look healthy.

I don't know if its something i done wrong, or the tank was just over stocked and it messed the water balance up. Or my mum bought a sick fish and its infected others.
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Not been following. Hows your tank perameters right now if u test it?
 
Unicorn said:
Not been following. Hows your tank perameters right now if u test it?
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Ran out of test strips ordered some more so no real clue whats going on at the minute water wise :(

If the last fish dies i'm gonna advise them to get rid of the tank.

i cant check on them as much as i would like and they don't seem to have much interest in looking after them besides feeding them.

poor fishes :(

I am a bit sad cause couple of the fish we had 5 years or so.
 
DooMeR said:
Ran out of test strips ordered some more so no real clue whats going on at the minute water wise :(

If the last fish dies i'm gonna advise them to get rid of the tank.

i cant check on them as much as i would like and they don't seem to have much interest in looking after them besides feeding them.

poor fishes :(

I am a bit sad cause couple of the fish we had 5 years or so.
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Bit of basic info for you. 4 goldfish and a catfish in a 45L .. That would have been struggling enough as it is. With goldfish the rule of inch per gallon changes to one fish per 20 gallon. :/ 45L is 10 gallons. So your tank was crazy overstocked but maybe the filter was JUST coping.. The extra may well of killed everything with nitrate/nitrite and ammonia skyrocketing if the filter overloaded.

Id go in with an immediate 25% change twice daily until your strips show up, Do not feed your remaining fish to keep any ammonia (which it sounds like it is if your fish are basically burning) lower (or atleast don't give them daily feeding and drop it to once every 2 days and be very sparing on food)
 
arc@css said:
Strips are better than nothing, though I'd recommend proper test kits which will be more accurate. As above, water change! :)
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This, I use an Api master test kit personally and its been spot on :) Except nitrate ( Nothing is accurate for nitrate so it seems as its such an easy test to skew the results on )
 
I now use a salifert test kit for nitrates, though when I used to have API kits I found them 'ok' for the other readings. :)
 
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Unicorn said:
Bit of basic info for you. 4 goldfish and a catfish in a 45L .. That would have been struggling enough as it is. With goldfish the rule of inch per gallon changes to one fish per 20 gallon. :/ 45L is 10 gallons. So your tank was crazy overstocked but maybe the filter was JUST coping.. The extra may well of killed everything with nitrate/nitrite and ammonia skyrocketing if the filter overloaded.

Id go in with an immediate 25% change twice daily until your strips show up, Do not feed your remaining fish to keep any ammonia (which it sounds like it is if your fish are basically burning) lower (or atleast don't give them daily feeding and drop it to once every 2 days and be very sparing on food)
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Thank you for the advice and tips, that's what thought but i wasn't sure.

we had 2 gold fish and a catfish. then she added 2 more. They seemed happy and healthy cause the fish have a lot of room i guess she figured another 2 would be ok. But i dont think she realized how messy gold fish are.

when i cleaned the tank today the water smelt bad and there was like a build up of brown stuff on the back of the tank.
 
its a Fluval U2 Underwater Filter 400 LPH.

A lot of your set ups make me jealous :)
 
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DooMeR said:
its a Fluval U2 Underwater Filter 400 LPH
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Running a U3 myself so am similar with the setup. 10x turnover was alright for your tank tbh thats probably why it coped with more than 3 fish. But i know from experience of my own filter (and all internals) they are very susceptible to messing around from overfeeding once (or overstocking) and throwing all your parameters slightly out. Seems with externals this is reduced a lot as the filtering is a lot more thorough usually and the waste is dragged out the tank instead of clinging to the side of a sponge (which is still inside the tank)
 
Yeah just massively overstocked to be honest DooMeR. Please don't let her add any more fish to that size tank while its got a goldfish in it. It's a somewhat contentious issue, but as a rule of thumb fancies need at least 100l for the first fish and 50l or more for each additional one. Common goldfish need a pond.
 
King4aDay said:
Yeah just massively overstocked to be honest DooMeR. Please don't let her add any more fish to that size tank while its got a goldfish in it. It's a somewhat contentious issue, but as a rule of thumb fancies need at least 100l for the first fish and 50l or more for each additional one. Common goldfish need a pond.
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This. Main reason i keep smaller fish like tetras (And im not actually allowed a pond according to the mrs)
 
Not much i could do really the guy at the local pet store gives her bad advice.

I only know a little my self and its just stuff i have read.

I think theres a misconception that gold fish are easy to keep and look after when they are not. They need just as much care and love as any other pet.

I was mad when she got the 2 other fish when i told her not too cause the tank was doing fine before then.

I have one question for you guys though a lot of pet stores have a lot of gold fish in a much smaller tanks then the one i have how do they get away with this.
 
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