Fish Glancing / Flashing

Morning!

I would greatly appreciate some assistance.

I'm new to aquariums and keeping fish. Bought the tank for my 4 year old and became hooked. Got a small livebearer variety tank going for about 2 months now.

On Saturday I bought a pre-soaked piece of driftwood from a pet store. On Monday I noticed that my platys and mollies seem to be itching. I immediately started treating with heal all.

This morning my one platy had died and my guppies seems to be affected as well.

I investigated the deceased platy carefully but could not find any other spots or signs of disease. I did however notice that she lacked a slimy coat.

I have been reading up extensively on the web and the best I could come up with matching the symptoms was Livebearer / Molly Disease but I have no idea how to treat for this.

All and any help and guidance would be highly appreciated.

 

Firstly, Welcome to Tasa.

Fish flashing is possibly a sign of Ick but my guppies flash to lift food off decorations/substrate. Please fill in this questionaire so we can help you properly:

General
Where do you stay?
How long have you been keeping tropical fishes?
How long has the tank been running before you added fish/this fish?
What fish do you have in your Tank (type, number and size)?
When did you last buy any new fish?
Which food are you feeding and how often do you feed?


Disease
Describe the problem that the fish is having (behaviour, breathing, excretion (droppings), food intake, colour)?
Is the fish eating?
Has the problem occurred before?:
Have you treated the problem and how?
Have you had any other problems in the past?
What were they?
Did you treat for these problems?
How?

Your aquarium & Maintenance
How big is the tank. (L x b x h)?
How many litres of water?
What type of filter do you run?
What is IN the filter?
How many litres per hour is the filter rated for?
How often do you clean your tank?
How do you clean your tank?
How much water do you take out for Water change?
Do you prepare your water for water changes? How and what do you add?
What water do you use. (Tap, bore hole, RO)?
What substrate do you have?
What else is in the tank (Rocks, plants, fake plants, shells, anything else)?

Water parameters in your aquarium
Describe the water (smell and colour)?
Temperature of the water?
General hardness (GH)?
Carbonate hardness (KH)?
Ammonia:
Nitrite (No2-)?
Nitrate (No3-)?
pH?
How did you test these? Have you checked the expiry date on the test kits?

Lights
What light do you have?
How long is the light on for?
Do you have lots of plants in the tank (real or fake)?
How do you fertilize the plants?

If possible, can you post some pictures of
(1) The sick fish
(2) A close up of the sick fish, and/or effected area
(3) the full tank.

 

Hope these help

 

Couple of tips, You need to remove your undergravel filter nobody really use them anymore cause they are old school.

Rather get yourself a small internal filter that does around 150 liters per hour add some decent filter media like Seachem matrix and some filter floss.

Also remove the plants from the plastic containers and plant them in the gravel.

Could be that your undergravel filters is not providing clean enough water.

Go measure your water for ammonia, nitrates and nitrites.

Do daily 10-15% water changes until they look better.

You can keep on dosing your heal all for a few days.

HTH

 

Thank you!:nuts:

 

Ps: What do i do with the fish that's currently inside while attempting all these changes?

 

You could catch them and place them in your water change bucket. You can also place your heater in the bucket just make sure it is covered under the water. Wont take you too long.

After removing the under gravel filter you can do a good gravel vacuum.

 

I just saw you got 21 fish in that small tank. I would remove the platies, mollies and the high fin pleco they are to big for this small tank.

Then you can add a few more neons maybe 6 of them.

You should be fully stocked then.

Another thing with the undergravel filter, it does not create enough water movement which supplies oxygen in the water for your fishes.

 

Hello, and welcome to TASA.

I've just been reading through your answers, and while I agree that you should upgrade your filtration - it looks like you've been sold one of the standard starter kits?, I picked up on several other possible sources of trouble.

First, you said you're running the tank at 28 degrees? That is too hot for most fish - generally, for the type of fish you have, 24 - 25 degrees is ideal. This will be adding to your troubles. Get an independant thermometer to check your temp and drop it gradually.

Also, I'm afraid that several of your plants are not true aquatics, and should be removed from your setup. I can see a draceana (the white and green striped one in the center, and to its right, a Spatiphyllum. If you post pics of all the plants, we can help you by id'ing them. (Its common to accidentally buy non-aquatics, dont feel bad!) The good news is I can see a Java fern in the backround of one pic - its called a Windelov variety.

 

Thank you very much!

 

Just to clarify, remove all the wool around the roots as well.

 

Lol oh yeah forgot to mention this my bad

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 2

 

Hi there, all good answers that you have here. Just a few things, dont be scared of 'old school' .... lots of 'old school' works perfectly well, as in an undergravel filter which probably does better than most standard hobs. The disadvantage of a ug is that if/when the power fails and there is no flow of oxygenated water through the gravel the good bacteria living in the gravel die off fairly quickly and in large amounts which pollutes the tank and can kill fish. This can happen if the power is off for a few hours, and you dont notice. Otherwise its a great filter and lots of 'old school' aquarists swear by them. The bubbles released from the uplift also break the water surface and cause ripples which increase the oxygen content of the water. Remember oxygen is absorbed into the water through the water surface, increasing the water surface(agitation, ripples etc) increases the aeration. An airstone does the same thing, cause water agitation on the surface, its not the 'bubbles' in the water that add oxygen.

The flashing/itching is definitely caused by the water parameters being out, probably a trace of amonia in the water. 21 fish in a 30 L is definitely 'overstocked' and coupled with a bit of an overfeed now and then will definitely cause the tank to crash, fish dying and showing the symptons you have. Adding the wood would have dropped the water volume even further and added more load on the biofilter initially which probably triggered the spike. The only reason it may have been stable before that is because you had an undergravel filter as opposed to a small internal or Hob. The ug effectively has much more 'biomedia' than than the other two and handles a bigger load. So firstly reduce your fish to a max of 10 to 12 in a 30 L(kind of fish you mentioned), change at least 50% of your tank water with properly prepared fresh water(not straight from the tap), reduce the water temp to around 24, and it would be a good idea to add a small Hob filter to the tank to help with filtration, something like a Dophin H80 which is not expensive. Dont worry about the plants unless they are dying, then remove any dead/decaying parts as they will pollute the tank. Do routine 10 to 15% water changes, feed correctly, then sit back and let your son enjoy his fish for years

 

Hmmm...love it when the pet shops direct you in the wrong direction but I guess it increases turnover. Keeps you coming back to solve the problems that arise!

I have taken out the draceana, thank you very much. I will insert the pictures of the other plants below.

I turned down the heater last night and this morning I'm on 26 degrees. Will turn it down a bit more today. Thought it best to do it gradually? (seems I've been par-boiling the fish!)


The fish seem to like this one. They've been nipping on it a lot and it has taken quite some strain. I figured this would be a good one to get more of, but I'm unable to find another one. I have people that I can order from, but not knowing the names of the plants makes it a bit difficult. The closest resembling this plant that I could trace on google was an Amazon Sword.

The fern thing I have no clue about. The second little plant I thought to be an annubias nana. I've got two of them in the tank.

This one I have no clue. Bought it Saturday along with the driftwood.

Thank you very much for your assistance, I really appreciate it.

 

​Thank you!

 

Thank you very much for the information and the model of the filter, it helps a lot. Would a single Betta be suited to my tank?

 

Hey man,

I would leave the temp on 26 my tank is on 26 and all my fish and plants are very happy.

Yeah the first plant is echinodorus Amazonicus.

Good luck, how are the fishies doing?

 

On the fish stocking situation, as I mentioned before you must reduce your amount of fish in the tank.

I agree with Brent that a max of 10-12 fish will be fine for your sized tank.

Personally I think a 30 liter tank will be a waste for a betta only my opinion.

I would get more neons maybe and only keep neons with your few corydoras.

HTH

 

Moring Everyone!

I would just like to thank each and everyone for your assistance. It's really appreciated.

One of my other platys were dead this morning. He was all twisted and hard, which was new to me. I see some of the affected guppies also getting what seems to be spasms.

 

​Thank you!