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One thing I have noticed about these sudden unexplained deaths. They are not confined to one "Country"
Also they seem to happen to the people who are very careful and most have had many years of experience.

My only conclusion is some "Bright Spark" at a chemical company has come up with some thing to clean our water or the pipes that delivers it to our homes.

Another thing I have noticed it can happen in one tank alone even if water changes were done in several tanks at the same time.

In our area Victoria Aust it usually happens early to mid spring.

If you store your water the time it is added to the tank the problem/cause will have ceased and water is back to so called "Normal"

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Keith

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Keith,
I think it happens everywhere. Here in Fayetteville, NC, all the water companies use clorine/ammonia in the water. In May, they shut off the ammonia for a month, then flush the lines. I lost some fish last spring; a wild color female betta, that I was fond of and several others died later. The ammonia burnt holes in some of their fins while killing others outright. The bad thing about it is, the water companies do not seem to care.
North Carolina, just enacted a new state lottery. When I win it, (HA!) I am either going to have a well dug in my back yard or move to Hoke County - preferably out in the woods someplace.

I live in Pennsylvania,USA. Right after summer is over, the water company does something to their water and it gets really alkaline. It has no effect on me since i use Seachems Nutural Regulator. It takes out the chlorine and brings the ph to 7.0. My dad lost some fish to this 5 or 6 years ago. He did not use seachems product. He just used a dechlorinator.

While that may be a cause for those on city water my unknown deaths happened on well water. Since I moved and am on city water now the fact they could do something to the water and not tell me was the final factor in choosing to get an ro system. Well worth it just for the peace of mind.

Well, in my case, hopefully some answers will be forthcoming. I've sent an E-Mail to the School of Veterinary Medicine at Liverpool University, in the hope that they'll take on this case and bring their considerable resources to bear upon it. The SoVM has a fully equipped histology/pathology lab with scanning and transmission electron microscopes among other tools, not to mention the full gamut of visible light microscopy tools including Gram's Test for bacterial types and selective metabolic culturing. Nice when you have access to facilities like that - wish I had my own path lab

I'm also going to send water samples from my aquaria to see if anything unusual crops up in those. Though I'm still puzzled as to what got through my water treatment régime, which has worked very successfully for over 10 years - I mean, I've had an Otocinclus live over 9 years in the same water, so something has most definitely gone pear shaped here ...


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

Unknown deaths are primarily unknown because of the sheer numbers of possible causes being often impractical to investigate within a timeframe that is of benefit.They could include:

1) Bacteria, fungal infections and viruses and retroviruses. Some of these in warm, wet conditions can mutate their properties and become different species within mere hours, this is probably the number one cause of unexplained death. Probably less than 1% of all bacteria on earth are described, fewer are treatable and new strains are formed as I said- hourly , if not daily. Odd as it may seem animals and for that matter people will often become immuno supressed if NOT periodically given exposure to bacteria, as scientists are discoving with our own species and many others. You really can live "too clean".Often the type of bacteria or virus in a tank is relatively unimportant as a fishs immune ssytem and tissue barriers will handle most of it, what is important is the concentration of any given bacteria in a tank, unless the fish is totally immune to a given disease a high concentration will probably eventually infect the fish. Fortunately the culture of water changing will mean that a lot of people will incidentally removing a lot of harmful bacteria with water changes, but hobbyists should be aware of the changes that can lead to increases in harmful bacteria colonisation, namely heat for bacterial reproduction, and that all essential requirement for bacteria - food.The use of chemical agents for the neutralisation of nitrates may lead to people changing their water less often, this in turn could lead to an increase in bacterial and viral deaths.

2) Chemical conflicts and undisclosed product information.A huge number of medications, treatments additives and foods give less than one tenth of their full product contents as they should be labeled, they are only required to give breakdowns on major constituents of products (even in the US) , this does not include huge numbers of stabilizers and other complex filler constituents .This even applies to liquids intended for intravenous injection. If you think you can really know whats in a product because of whats on the label- youre kidding yourself. In addition these products are generally not tested for reactionary qualities when used in conjunction with other additives and medications unless they are all produced by the same company, and even then not always.I guess the arguement about water companies could be added in to this equation, but in no way could the water companies be considered the only ones at fault. Long term chemical testing is also a factor in this, generally very little research is conducted in to long term accumulative toxicity, especially as regards fish. Who's to say a water additive, food, or treatment tested for 2 years wont prove fatal in 5-10 years. We have no way of knowing.

3) selective breeding- I could rant for years on this subject, but generally most animals from limited gene pools (ie a typical breeders resource ) will suffer from degradation of the species, breeding depression, longevity problems and more deformity.

4) The unnatural evolutionary ecosystems within aquaria- nearly 99 of all fish in nature are born to die, in a closed environment more specimens will be likely survive, breed and pass their genetic potential on, if in a every 100 fish in nature 1 is born to survive there is a merciless selection process keeping the breed strong. The moment we take a fish out of that environment the rules change and its only expected that we suffer unexpected deaths as many of the fish we keep would have been those that nature would have selected to be weaker and fall to predators or disease.If lack of longevity is all we notice, weve been fairly lucky. Not all fish posess the fitness required for longevity, in fact I would say that most dont.

4) Water perameters - ok some people will be more rigorous than others but if your ph is significantly off, your kh isnt right and your nitrates etc too high, how can you expect your fish to live long. Its like raising a baby in a heavily polluted city, or the reverse is like expecting a westerner to feel fit and strong on a mountain in tibet. Regional variences in gas, pressure and pollutants really matter. It will affect its health,some individuals more than others. A certain fish's visible appearance doesnt have to be affected for its fitness to suffer or for it to have immuno suppression. Unless you have your fish linked up to a heart monitor or something how would you ever know? Most fish will at the very least have some of their athletic nature inhibited by the confines of a tank.This lack of long term fitness could lead to shortening longevities, as could the shortening of its life through increased heart rate under low oxygen conditions.

5) Lack of natural diet. Almost any given omnivorous fish will have several hundred food sources available to it in nature, we can provide the essential components, but we wont be providing a lot of the other thousands of enzymes, trace elements and minerals or even some of the periodical tannin based toxity that most wild fish would experience in nature.Bearing in mind that each live food a fish might eat in the wild may have differing gut contents there may be thousands of variences in diet that our captive fish never see. The long term effects of this are completely unknown. We do our best but we really cant compete with nature for variety.We also cant cope with the lack of natural toxicity that fish experience in nature. What happens if those organs normally used to cope with toxicity have nothing to do?

6)Parasitation or the lack of it.Some fish rely on some worms to aid digestion, pinworm is present to varying degrees in almost all living species, fish and our own race are no exceptions. If you worm a fish you might kill all the worms it has , actually adversely affecting its digestion, by reducing the amount of cellulose a fish can process, and if you dont worm them they might be overcome with roundworm and tapeworm. Some parasites leech blood and without occasional exposure some fish , usually kept slighly anaemic may actually retain too much fat if wormed. Some worms are also proven to keep animals immune systems high, and others low. The possibilities can be endless. Damned if you do, damned if you dont.

7) cross species contamination- the effects of bacteria on fish from different geographic regions can be devastating or subtle, from exterminations through to genetic illness, cariers , and long term maladies. Point is a lot of cross species contamination research is in its infancy. Remember that when you buy a fish from a shop that has one big filter system or think nothing of mixing fish from differing geological locations in your home tanks.


Thats just a few options from someone who isnt even a biologist, so blaming your water company for all ills might be a bit premature, but yes it is a frightening thought as to whatever we may be drinking, let alone keeping our fish in.It is estimated that someone in london may be drinking water that has already passed through someones urinary system 9 -13 times! This is true of a number of big cities, but sewage works use both chemical and biological treatments to refresh the water , and to some extent we do the same with filters and so on, and we are expecting our fish to swim in what was basically fish urine, and for those of us who live in major cities, our urine and organic waste, a myriad of chemical cleaners and products, pollution and a great many industrial chemicals, detergents and petroleum wastes. The fact that we do as well as we do generally means that water companies are largely far from negligent.But the odd cockup is inevitable.I think its too easy to slate water companies when in actual fact its us using a whole array of products that are toxic and living in huge concentrated populations that causes the problem in the first place.Most people think its perfectly ok to throw oil, photographic chemicals, hormones from birth control pills and other medicines , and a whole spectrum of personal hygeine products straight in the loo or down the drain, poeple use pesticides all the time knowing that inevitable it will get to watercourses. Pot calling kettle black is the term methinks.I think we need to address social change before we start trying to sue water works for compensation and blaming them for the deaths of their fish. Its a miracle they do as well as they do, and we arent helping them. Not that we should let them off the hook though

But as previously stated sending your fish to a path lab after death might forward our knowledge quite a bit and is definately worth doing , even if not for yourself but for others.




Last edited by longhairedgit at 07-Oct-2005 21:58

I found something interesting out lately that has a bearing on this. More details in my Hospital thread here, but it's becoming increasingly likely that the cause of death (as correlated with a spate of sudden unexplained deaths in aquaria and ponds in the locality at about the same time as mine) is connected to the possibility that the water company overdosed the water with aluminium sulphate (used as a coagulant in water treatment, and also to kill an assorted collection of nasties that would otherwise result in human water borne diseases). Aluminium sulphate is a known lethal hazard to fish, which is why it should (note, should) be administered with care, and once its task is completed, removed by suitable means prior to the treated water being released into the mains.

A quick perusal of this data sheet should prove enlightening to everyone here. Note how the chemical is described as a hazard to human health under a range of conditions of exposure too ... interesting!

So, I am now faced with the task of devising a suitable means of ensuring that my water in future contains no excess aluminium sulphate in case the water company screws up again. That'll put a damper on my water change policy won't it?


Panda Catfish fan and keeper/breeder since Christmas 2002

Since moving I have had fish die periodically without expalnation. they have breathing problems get skinny some times and die.

my water company clean their pipes, it certainly messes with the pH and the timing was such as it is almost certainly what caused my fish to die.

it is hard to know when they do it as the only send a generally letter saying it happens between x and y month. not great. you tell afterwards = dead fish.

GFG

Last edited by goldfishgeek at 17-Oct-2005 15:37

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