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Hey ya'll! I've got a 20 gallon tank thats been set up with fish for about 7-8 months. Here lately I've had fish just randomly die. Like one a month. They dont act/look any different. One minuate they are fine and the next I come in the room and they are dead. All my test check out ok, were they should be. Any Ideas? Also The last couple months I've had some alge *im guessing* grownin rapidly on all my plants and decor. It's kind of a coffee/tea color. Never had it until a month or two ago.

The brownish algae is probably diatoms, or brown algae. If it is in the form of a tree, its something else, i think its called branch algae, or something of the matter....

Anyway, could you give us specific test results? It could help out a lot!

One reason could be stress from other tank mates, outside interaction with the tank, nitrate buldup, and maybe even a hidden disease! Maybe they were just old specimens? A little more information would help a lot. Also, what is your stocking?

Good luck!

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A sudden rush of diatomic algae is often a sing that something has caused other microfauna to die off, classic among these causes are mini-cycles and various toxins introduced into tanks like flyspray , fleakillers and other insecticides, also a sudden shift in gas exchange. Sometimes the water supply may be at fault.

Might well have been a severe ammonia spike that set things off, though its possible to miss it if the testing comes a bit late.

That can be a problem with testing especially if it is a water supply problem. Even test done different times of the day "can" give a different readings. Also it can and often is the method and equipment used to do the test will be different. Even to the point how good is the person doing the test is. I have even taken the same sample to different LFS on the same day and received different readings.
What you have to do is get a full parameter reading to establish what is causing the problem and then fix it.
I would also like to know a lot more about your tank, filtration brand, size, and how it is maintained, substrate type and depth, total fish count and your feeding program how much and how often, then there is the water is it treated first, what percentage do you change and how often,plants live or fake.

All these details are extremely important in correcting your problem

WHITE SPOT ICH

“White-spot” Parasite, Ichthyophthirius multifiliis

This disease is easy to recognise, as the skin of the infected fish becomes covered with white spots, each the size of a pinhead. Each spot represents the site of one, or sometimes two, parasites. All parts of the body gills, may be attacked.

The causative agent is named Ichthyophthirius multifiliis. It is a spherical and large by protozoan standards, measuring up to 1mm in diameter. Short, hair-like processes known as cilia are spread densely over the surface. A horseshoe-shape nucleus is also present which is clearly visible under the microscope.

By the means of the cilia the parasite rotates vigorously and burrows into the surface layer (epidermis) of its host. It feeds on skin cells and surface debris. The burrowing action causes a local irritation and the epidermis grows across the parasite to enclose it, thus forming a “White Spot”

Reproduction occurs away from the host. After maturing in the skin, which takes a few days to three weeks, depending on the temperature, the parasite bores out, swims away and comes to rest on a submerged object such as a stone, or plant. Here it forms a jelly-like cyst within which a series of rapid cell divisions take place. In a few hours, several hundred daughter cells or swarmers, are produced, which break out of the cyst to find a new host. Alighting on the skin, they burrow in to recommence the life cycle. If they fail to find a host within three to four days, they perish.

Symptoms
If the protozoan is introduced into a tank containing healthy fish, little harm may occur, other than a fleeting infection with a few parasites. If however, the fishes are already weakened for some other reason, e.g. lack of oxygen, the parasite will quickly cover the whole body surface, causing irritation and opening up wounds for secondary infections. The host mobility may become affected. In sever cases, death may result.

Prevention
If white-spot appears in an otherwise healthy tank, the parasite “must” have been introduced either as an adult on a newly acquired fish, or as the cyst form on, for example new stones, a plant or even added water. The only certain method of prevention, is to quarantine all new stock, including stones, plants etc; preferably in water at a temperature of 77F. Allow one week’s quarantine.

Treatments
There are too many treatments today to recommend any specific one. Many can be bought easily at aquarium outlets.


Several very interesting points to think about.

Very easy to recognise.
Its reproduction cycle.
No host they will die.
If introduced into a healthy tank little harm may occur.
Pay attention to all tank details.
Weakened fish, and lack of oxygen can/may and will cause sever deaths. All this is usually caused by poor tank maintenance and/or incorrect and faulty equipment.
Prevention is the best cure
A Parasite “must” be introduced into the tank.

This information was collected from Fresh Water Tropical Fish

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Calilasseia
POSTED BY Calilasseia

Posted 24-Nov-2006 01:48
The key facts to remember about White Spot (and I'm sure Keith has covered these, but I'll repeat them just in case) are:[1] Only one part of the life cycle of Ichthyophthirius multifiliis, the causative parasite, is susceptible to medication, which means that ...[2] Medication has to be applied even when the symptoms appear to have gone for up to 7 days afterwards, to make sure that all the susceptible stages of the parasite have been eliminated. The parasite in question has a three stage life cycle. The part that manifests itself is the trophont or feeding stage. This stage burrows through the fish's slime coat, attaches itself to the outer layer of tissue or epithelium, and starts feeding upon the fish. This stage is impervious to medication because it forms a protective cyst around itself. The next stage is the tomont stage. This forms when the parasite has ingested sufficient nutrients from the fish to begin reproduction. This stage is largely invisible in the aquarium, because it detaches from the fish, falls into the substrate, and remains encysted while it divides into daughter cells - something like 1,000 daughter cells for each tomont. Because it is encysted, it is impervious to medication again. The third stage is the larval or tomite stage. Each daughter cell becomes a free swimming tomite, which is microscopic and invisible to the eye. At this point in the life cycle, the parasite is vulnerable to medication. The trouble is, of course, that the swarming tomites are microscopic, and so you can't actually see them directly with the naked eye, which means you have to keep medication levels in the aquarium maintained at sufficient concentration to kill the tomites for as long as they are likely to persist. Depending upon temperature, the tomites could mutate into mature trophonts in as little as 3 days or take as long as 7 days. In an aquarium that contains solely Labyrinth Fishes, one means of dealing with the parasite is to increase the ambient aquarium temperature to 85 degrees Fahrenheit during the medication stage. This speeds up the parasite's life cycle, and ensures that the medication can destroy all the free-swimming microscopic tomites before they have a chance to attach themselves to a fish and begin the cycle anew. With NON Labyrinth Fishes, however, this could induce unwanted additional respiratory stresses - Labyrinth Fishes can cope with this because they are able to breathe atmospheric air to compensate for the lower concentration of dissolved oxygen at higher water temperatures, but fishes that rely exclusively upon gill-based respiration cannot do this. Some fishes such as Clown Loaches can be subjected to elevated temperatures as they experience these in the wild periodically, but it's not a good idea to do this with certain other fishes - Panda Corys spring to mind as one species that should NOT be subject to temperatures above 80 degrees F because they're inhabitants of cooler waters in their native Peru, and will die of heat stress if 'cooked' in this manner. So, depending upon ambient temperature, the tomites will appear in as little as 3 days, or you could be unfortunate and the tomites could take 7 days to appear. In cooler aquaria (e.g., a Panda Cory aquarium kept at 72 degrees F) you could be required to maintain medication for up to 14 days. If the fishes can be moved to a hospital tank for treatment, and medicated there, this is preferable because you don't have to subject your main aquarium's biological filter to adverse effects from the medication - you can just destroy the parasites there. Removing the fishes from the main aquarium also has the advantage that any free swimming tomites that arise in the main aquarium are left with no hosts to attach to, and thus starve to death. So, at the end of your medication period in the hospital aquarium, you are free to return the fishes to the main aquarium. Of course, your problem here is that you have to remember to add a small quantity of fish food to the main aquarium as if you were still feeding fishes so that the biological filter in the main aquarium is kept ticking over whilst the fishes themselves are temporarily rehoused. Once the fishes have been removed from the main aquarium, by the way, you can speed things up vis-a-vis destroying remaining parasites by increasing the temperature to 105 degrees F while the fishes are absent, which will speed up the life cycle considerably, and result in the accelerated production of tomites ... which then find themselves bereft of fishes to attach to. And, they starve to death quicker at the higher temperatures, because they use up their reserves more quickly. Get yourself a cheap plastic aquarium that you're never going to use as anything BUT a hospital tank, put your fishes in that, medicate them, then whack up the main aquarium temperature to 105 degrees while the fishes are in the 'hospital'. Once the fishes are free of parasites and have remained so for 7 days, you can return the main aquarium to its normal temperature and reintroduce the now treated fishes. Any watertight container that is safe to house fishes in (i.e., it hasn't ever been used to mix weedkiller or insecticide, and doesn't leach toxic material into the water) can be pressed into service as the 'hospital' for the duration, so long as it is possible to maintain aeration and some basic filtration (e.g., sponge filter) within the container during the medication phase. Oh, and DO NOT use activated carbon filtration or ion exchange resins in the hospital aquarium because that will remove your medication! EDIT : Almost forgot. I use Protozin. Protozin is somewhat expensive, but it is claimed by the makers to be formulated so as to impact as little as possible upon filter bacteria. And, upon the occasions I have had to use it, it works well

Keith

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I've got a 20 gal hex tank. With a penguin bio-wheel 150. Fake plants,gravel about 1 1/2" deep. 5 tetra,2otos,1groumai* sorry bad speller* water treated before adding to tank and clean/do a water change once a week about 25%. Feed a pinch or flake food everymorning. Than at night i switch everyother day or so with some frozen cube shrimp.

To start of with the substrate should be at least 3ins deep.
I do not know any thing about a bio wheel. About your filtration material what is it and how often do you clean it and how do you clean it.
As per chat live plants do help a tank to work a lot easer.

I would also change at least 30+% as it is a smaller tank.

Treating water what with and when do you treat the water.

Have a look in [link=My Profile] http://www.fishprofiles.com/forums/member.aspx?id=1935[/link] for my tank info

Look here for my
Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tank Photos

Keith

Near enough is not good enough, therefore good enough is not near enough, and only your best will do.
I VOTE DO YOU if not WHY NOT?
VOTE NOW VOTE NOW

Hi,
We are doing an awfully lot of guessing with very little
real data to go by.
Please read the notes at the top of the page. When asking
for advice please give us real data to go by.

Your initial information should give us the following
information:

What are the pH, GH, KH, Ammonia, nitrite and nitrate values?
What kind of a test kit do you have, how old is
it, who made it?

We know its a 20G Hex, what is the filter? Is it an under
gravel filter, or does it hang on the back? What's in it?
What brand/model is it? You finally told us later after
a few exchanges.

Do you have an airpump and operating airstone?

What kind of light do you have on the tank, is it
an incandescent bulb, or a fluorescent
bulb, what wattage is the bulb, how old is it?

What kind of maintenance do you do on the tank, how often?
Do you own a gravel vacuum, how often do you use it?

Have you added any new fish lately, did you QT them, for
how long?


Diatoms (brown "algae" ) are actually creatures that eat
silica and create a shell out of it. They draw the silica
from the gravel, especially if it was not completely washed
out before it was placed in the tank. Or, they get the
silica from the city water supply. They thrive in places
that have very little circulation in "dead" areas and in
places that have low light. Sometimes just changing the
filter return and increasing the wattage of the light will
get rid of them.
Take a minute and log into the public web site for your
water company. Nearly every one will have a place where
they tell you what chemicals they use to treat the water
and what the values are of the water that they are
they are supplying. Frequently, generally with a change
of seasons, the companies will switch water sources and
with that switch, different chemicals, or different amounts
of chemicals will be used to treat the water. Also with
different sources, you might have an increase in the silica
that is in the water.

As far as the gravel is concerned. You have no real plants
so the only thing the gravel does is cover the bottom glass
and when piled on top of the fake plant trays, hold the
plants in place. You could actually lower the amount of
gravel, if you wanted to, to about an inch deep.
The only time you need 3 or 4 inches of gravel is when you
have live plants and, they are plants that develop very
large root systems, such as some crypts and amazon swords.
You don't need any extra gravel.

Frank


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