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I have a male and female German Blue Ram. The female is usually more active than the male. Today though, the female has been staying at one corner of the tank and instead of having the red colored eyes, it has very dark red colored eyes. The female is still moving it's fins and opening and clothing its mouth, but I don't like it. Is there a possibility she could be dying?

I assume that this is the 10 gallon in your thread in General Freshwater that has all the fish in it.

I have a few of questions, first:

1. Is her other coloration normal?

2. Are any other fish acting strange?

3. Do any fish appear to be "gasping"?

4. Is any fish rubbing itself against aquarium decor or anything like that?

Okay, all that being said, here are some possibilities given the information in your post.

1. The water conditions could be very poor (high ammonia, high nitrite, really high nitrate, etc.). Please post your parameters if you have a testing kit and then do a water change for good measure. If you don't have a testing kit, take a sample in a jar before you do your water change and then get it tested by your LFS.

2. If it looks like she's "breathing" heavier than normal, she may suffering from hypoxia (not getting enough oxygen). With that many fish in the tank, it wouldn't surprise me at all. Add an airstone if you haven't already. Even if it's not hypoxia, an airstone can't hurt. Hypoxia can be caused from not enough oxygen in the water for all the fish or it can be caused from high nitrite -- the nitrite actually causes the fish's blood to carry less oxygen via binding to the hemoglobin.

3. She may have gotten into a territorial dispute with either the male German ram (from being in so small a tank) or, if they're still in the tank, the other pair of rams. She just may be sulking, although I think this is the least likely possibility.

Hope this helps, and I look forward to you posting your water test results.

Joe Potato

I tested for nitrite. On the card it shows really dark red is 3.3-33 mg/l, red is 1.6 mg/l, light red is 0.8 mg/l, orange is 0.3 mg/l and yellow is <0.3 mg/l. Those colors are just from the solution droplets in the test tube. As for what I got, it is in the orange color range. So I added a tiny bit of Tetra brand Easy Balance after seeing that reading. The female has changed locations in the tank once in a while.

All the other fish look fine and healthy.

As for fish, I got less now.

1 pair of German Blue Rams
2 Marble Hatchets
6 Neon Tetras
4 Panda Cories
2 Shrimp
1 King Tiger Pleco.

So the other fish are gone now. I stopped by the LFS on a Sunday and they said I couldn't get store credit for them since it was the weekend, but it didn't matter to me, I just wanted to fish to be fine, so I gave away those other fish for free.

I tested for ammonia now. on the card it showed Blue was 5.0 mg/l, sea green is 3.0 mg/l, green is 1.5 mg/l, lighter green is 0.25 mg/l and yellow-green is 0 mg/l. It looks like I got 0 mg/l. As for ph level, wow I'm shocked by that results. My 10 gallon tank has been at my house since the second week of May. The water at my college is much different than at my house cause at college I was getting 7.0. With the reading I got right now, not sure but it is either 7.5 or 8.0. I have a chemical called wardley Essentials Bullseye 7.0 which is a Neutral ph regulator that automatically adjusts and buffers ph to 7.0. Should I add that stuff now?

Your answer is simple, you have water conditions that arent really suitable for putting rams in, as I warned before, overstock has its problems, you have both ammonia and nitrate levels which indicates mini cycles. Your filtration is severely overloaded, and simply not handling all the waste, as predicted.

Any detectable ammonia level can kill a fish as sensible as a ram.

Its also possibly that you have been too reliant on products such as tetrabalance, which although it may help a little, is no replacement for water changes despite the manufacturers claims, and on average delays the need for a water change by about a week at best. I've used it myself for years, and I use it just as literally a balancer, and when using it in conjunction with a relatively clean tank it acts a s a little elbow room as regards changing conditions. Never would I use it as a true replacement for water changes though.


What your seeing is gasping because of the ammonia/nitrite burn to the fish's gills, should it continue the fish may suffocate, so you either need to buy an ammonia binding product or change out some water and replace it with thoroughly conditioned water to get the ammonia down. Worry about the ammonia before the ph, ph is to some degree , negotiable, the presence of ammonia is not.

Well done on getting rid of some of the fish, but there is still more to be done. Try a series of 20% water changes every 3 days for 4 occassions ans see if things pick up, then do at least 30% water changes every week after that.

I have been doing weekly water changes for months, and what I use is those automatic siphons that connects to a water facet. If you go back and read my earlier posts, there is some nitrite detected, but not ammonia.

So your saying I should do water changes more than weekly and I should change it right now? Also two days ago, I changed the cartage filters in both my power filter and under gravel filter.

Also two days ago, I changed the cartage filters in both my power filter and under gravel filter.

There's a problem right there. Since you changed both of the filters, you took away a large amount of the beneficial bacteria in your tank. Right now, you're going through a "mini-cycle" because there's not enough bacteria to metabolize all the fish waste into nitrate.

As LHG said, rams are really quite sensitive to water quality. Any ammonia or nitrite is very bad for them. I'd go with his advice on water changes.

Joe Potato

Yeah, ammonia , or nitrite, all pretty much the same ball game as regards toxicity. Nitrate is the one thats less toxic to the tune of some 40 times or so, hence the general need to keep it under 40ppm.

Well it is now 6:27 pm and the female German Blue Ram is still acting strange from its usual behavior and is also still has a darker coloration. When I first noticed the female German Blue Ram acting weird was around 7:12 AM.

Has anything been done about the nitrite levels yet? Her behaviour wont pick up for days until after its sorted. The damage from bad water quality can take weeks to heal, and sometimes its permanent. To you its just water quality thats off , to them its a cause of literal injury. Her behaviour may be off for some time to come. The water changes might not produce an immediate effect, but have to be done nevertheless.

Given that you also had a lot of fish in that tank, and presumably performed no quarantines, theres also a real chance that the nitrite levels may have compromised her immune system, because they will be affecting her breathing and uric waste expulsion. Bacteria and parasites already present in the tank may therefore be beginning to affect her.

In a tank that small, all filter media has to be rinsed in tankwater, not tapwater, and the water changes must be pretty close to the tank temperature, and the water thoroughly conditioned. In another thread you mentioned snails, they are classic carriers of internal parasites and also a general sign that you may be overfeeding, which of course all adds to the impact on water quality.

I noticed the female German Blue Ram was still hanging at the bottom of the tank but her colors got restored to normal. Also she wasn't eating yesterday but when I dropped in a shrimp pellet today, she ate a little bit of it.

This could be a possible reason why the German Blue Rams were acting strange. I got ick!!!

I had ick once before 1 month after when I first got my tank and I treated it with Wardley brand Ick Away which contains Malachite green. So yesterday I added Ick Away, and when I got up this morning, I noticed the ick in my tank got worse! I also saw my King Tiger Pleco looking very sick. His colors are normal except for his eyes which are very dark. Normally he gets scared when a person gets close by and swims away, but he isn't right now. The German Blue Rams though, both male and females are their normal colors. I also did a 15% or so water change too this morning. I believe the culprits that introduced the ick in my tank recently were either Black Neon Tetras or Neon Tetras or both since both of them have a lot of white specs on them right now. I normally get fish only from my LFS but when I got those 2 tetras, I got them from Petco. Bad mistake I believe. I noticed they had some tanks there were quarantined and fish not for sale. That should have been my warning sign there. My King Tiger Pleco flipped on his back side once, but I flipped right side up again. He is still moving his gills, but I fear death may be coming.

I also checked my nirite levels. They were at <0.3 mg/l today which is lower than yesterday and the lowest reading on my test kit. Also it is 8 AM, the LFS don't open till 11 AM.

Adding a new post instead of making a new one just in case someone is replying to this thread right now and it' been 57 minutes since my last post.

I saw the scariest thing with the King Tiger Pleco. His stripes turned white, his eyes went back to normal color. Then his eyes went up, it looked as if it went into shock. Just how a person's eyes go up when they go into shock. Then its stripes became dark again normal color but his eyes became dark again and it stopped moving. It died now... I'm sad to see my fish die Also that I managed to get a discount for him one time and so I paid $20 for it. But if I did get one in the future (definitly no new fish till problems in tank taken care of), I would have to pay $55 or so for it.

General Hague

Im sorry you lost your Tiger King Pleco. However you need to get the ICH under control before you do anything else to this tank. You need to follow the dosing information given on the Malachite Green. Make sure you remove any carbon from the tank as it removes the meds you just put in there.

Also I cant help much on the ICH problem but i can help with the way you do your WC. I agree that you have been going thru mini-cycles. As i have read you have two filters, this is great. However what you need to do is try and clean one filter every two weeks. Thus giving the tank to recover from the loss of the Bacteria.

Secondly you need to split your tank into 4 sections and only vacum one section per week. Again this allows the tank to recover from the loss of the bacteria. Also you only want to remove 20% of the water each week.

Whats the PH of your water? Rams need very clean water and a PH of around 7.0 to live. Also if you can i would do just a 10% WC in the middle of the week to keep the water clean for the Rams. This needs to be done until the Params calm down.

HTH

Thanks for your input as always, Shane
http://thetanklog.blogspot.com/ - [ Thanks to ScottF ]
http://www.natureaquariumclubofutah.com/main.html

Last time I checked the PH, I wasn't sure if it was 8.0 or 7.5, but when I tested it right now, it was definitely 7.5.

Back in college this past school year, I was always getting 7.0 for PH. I think it is definitely because of the water at my house. For example, my family puts salt in some kind of device in the laundry room that makes the water softer. Back in college I bought Wardley Bullseye 7.0 which is the same brand as the Ick Away, but I never did use it once in college. So I added a tiny bit of that to the water now. I'm hoping when I bring my fish back to college, they will be good again and that is where they will be spending the majority of their time for the next 3 years.

Both my under gravel filter and power filter have carbon filtration.

I could test General Hardness (GH) and Carbonate Hardness, but the test cards and instruction papers for those 2 are missing. Either my room mates threw it away or it was missing from my test kit.

Nitrite is looking like <0.3 mg/l right now. Ammonia looks like 0 Mg/l.

As for the Tetras in the tank, still got white specs on them, and behaving well.

Panda Cories look fine, they are behaving well.

German Blue Rams still got their full normal color. The female is acting a little more normal. But every couple of hours though they swim a little sporadic and rub against something. I think it might because of the Ick.

Any ways because I got carbon filtration. Do I have to turn off my filters there for a certain amount of time? I had ick before several months ago, but I just used the same Ick Away and never did any thing with the filter and the Ick got removed from the fish.

The trouble with carbon is of course that it will remove meds, and if the only media you have is carbon then you have a problem. Better filters tend to have both sponge and carbon media, so you can remove the carbon if required and rely on the sponge while using meds, and obviously this is a much better option than turning a filter off. A course of ich treatment generally has to run for 6 days at 82f, obviously in that time with no filtration a small tank with overstock can become an ammonia and nitrite ridden pit, and the fish will be lucky to survive. Any filter media once turned off starts going into bacterial death from 15 minutes to a few hours, so if the filter has to be turned off for the meds to work the tank will require a recycle after the meds are over.

Nightmare scenario.

About the only time its appropriate to use ammolock though.

I bought a more expensive med late yesterday. It is Mardel brand. This med is called Maracide and it says it is used to treat Ich, Velvet, and other external Parasites. Active ingredients are Malachite Green and Chitosan. It says to use 2 capfuls (10 ml) per 10 gallons of water. Treat on days 1, 3 and 5.

It says "Indication: A spot on product that treats the fish, not the water. Biospheres technology transports the medicatio directly to the skin where it is needed. Rea enclosed brochure carefully when using. Use of a hospital tank is recommended. No water changes, pH, or temperature adjustments necessary if readings are in an ideal range. Maintain normal filtration and air."

So I think I can keep my filters on with this stuff? If not, I could go buy a more expensive filter cartage that has some kind of rock or crystal? instead of carbon for my undergravel filter. I don't know if any other kinds of filters cartages though can fit with my power filter since it uses Penguin brand size A.

I have been reading up on your catridges you use in your filter and I have a solution to your issue. From what i can see the carbon is inside the filter catridge. There is foam on the outside of the cartridge.

If my research is correct then this is what you need to do. You will need to cut a slit in the cartride and empty out the Carbon from inside the filter. Your meds will not work if you have any form of carbon in the filters or tankIF you remove the carbon from inside the filter and then put the foam back in the filter. You can still have a biological filter just without the carbon. IF you dont want to do this and can afford it. Take the link below and act as if you are buying the item online. Go to the check out screen and print it off. Then you can take that to the store and get the item in the store for the website price. This is a better filter for your situation and not all that expensive.

http://www.petsmart.com/global/product_detail.jsp?PRODUCT%3C%3Eprd_id=845524441817505&FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=2534374302030112&ASSORTMENT%3C%3East_id=2534374302023693&bmUID=1183914828082&itemNo=2&In=ALL&N=2030112&Ne=2

HTH

Thanks for your input as always, Shane
http://thetanklog.blogspot.com/ - [ Thanks to ScottF ]
http://www.natureaquariumclubofutah.com/main.html

I didn't feel like spending money on a new filter at the moment, so I took one of the filter cartridges for the power filter and cut up the back, so that all the carbon is gone and so it's just that foam/sponge thing. I did that yesterday, was a lot of work. Now late this evening, I removed the carbon cartridges from the under gravel filter and added the 1 dollar more expensive zeolite cartridges. I also got a single air stone. So my pump is flowing air into both undergravel zeolite cartridges and the air stone. I also got aquarium salt. I added like 5 or 6 pieces to the tank. Though it said to use 1 teaspoon for every 5 gallons. So I added less than full strength. This aquarium salt is suppose to add electrolytes which is suppose to improve gill function and promote disease recovery. I also added a tiny bit of my ick med, not the full amount though since I added some early this morning around 7 am. So hopefully, my Ick will be gone by the end of the week since I'm treating with meds and don't have carbon. For the air stone, should it be under the gravel? Or does it not make a difference either way?

If the air stone is down the tubes of the UGF then you need to make sure they are just at the bottom of the tubes and not inside the filter.

If the air stone is just in the tank, just place it out of sight if you want to for asthetics otherwise it doesnt matter.

Thanks for your input as always, Shane
http://thetanklog.blogspot.com/ - [ Thanks to ScottF ]
http://www.natureaquariumclubofutah.com/main.html