So this is the problem I am having. I bought a coral beauty and she was doing great in the tank. Mind you she hid most of the time but was starting to venture out more and more. I then put a kole tang in and within a week the coral beauty was dead. My sixline was caught in my overflow for about a week and a half. Finally got him out on Sunday, only to find him dead today. In the tank is also two maroon clownfish, a lawnmower blenny, a sea hare, and a green Chromis. All fish except tang was doing well in tank before. Is it possible that the tang is committing fishicide? I am afraid to put anything else in there for fear of this repeating. Any suggestion would be appreciated.
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Dilemma
- Thread starter Karenvas2
- Start date
Did you notice tattered fins on the bodies?
Lostinthedark
NJRC Member
Hi Karen
2 things. One. I noticed you just started posting. Is the tank relatively new? Two. Its a 55 gallon tank. How long did you wait in between adding fish. If your tank just
finished cycling it may not have been ready for the additional bio-load of a tang. You might want to test your system for ammonia or nitrites although they would probably have settled back down for now. In either case do a water change just to be safe. I wouldn't add anything for a while. It takes a long time for the natural bacteria to catch up with the bio-load. Everyone here will tell you. Patience is key, especially in a smaller tank. Good Luck
2 things. One. I noticed you just started posting. Is the tank relatively new? Two. Its a 55 gallon tank. How long did you wait in between adding fish. If your tank just
finished cycling it may not have been ready for the additional bio-load of a tang. You might want to test your system for ammonia or nitrites although they would probably have settled back down for now. In either case do a water change just to be safe. I wouldn't add anything for a while. It takes a long time for the natural bacteria to catch up with the bio-load. Everyone here will tell you. Patience is key, especially in a smaller tank. Good Luck
Welcome!
My thoughts here are that the fish are impacted by something environmental and not anything to do with the fish animosity themselves.
Just to be clear - you purchased a pre-owned tank that had live rock and live sand for years and are using it currently? or is this a bare bottom tank?
My thoughts here are that the fish are impacted by something environmental and not anything to do with the fish animosity themselves.
Just to be clear - you purchased a pre-owned tank that had live rock and live sand for years and are using it currently? or is this a bare bottom tank?
so to reconfirm you re-used the sand? It's likely that as that sandbed settled, it was releasing ammonia into the tank. Were you testing the tank for it during the 4 weeks you had it? How deep is the sandbed?
if it's very shallow (e.g. you can see the glass on the bottom) then this theory goes out the window. But if were a few inches, you'd have had air-breathing bacteria on the surface and non-air breathing bac towards the bottom/glass pane. When the tank was moved you undoubtedly probably re-aquascaped and may even have poured the sand back in in who knows what order. What I mean is that some of the sand that was on the "surface" may now be buried, and stuff that was buried would be on top. Not to mention any critters that may have been alive in there. Anyways what i am describing is a potential recipe for lots of dying things releasing ammmonia. It would not happen overnight - it would be slow and exacerbated as fish disturb the bed further.
Fish can tolerate a fair amount of nitrates, but ammonia/nitrite is another story. A jumpy fish in an unknown environment with bad water chemistry could just tip the scales to create what you have described with regards to the fish perishing.
Long story short you probably caused a "cycle" in the tank inadvertently by re-using the sand. Theory #2 would be the fish were purchased from an unreputable dealer.
unfortunately all of these are just theories. UNless you have a regimen where you quarantine every single "wet" purchase (and few of us are truly that dedicated to do so) - a death in the tank could be caused by many factors. My 2 cents are on the live sand from a tank that was "going for years" as you described it.