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4 of my little bronze cories died yesterday. A lot more have died in the month or two since they were born. They don't look really sick, the only unusual thing is that their tails aren't fully open (not entirely clamped, just a little bit). They look a bit pale too.

They've been living in my ~30L tank (7 gal?), but I moved them into my 4 foot tank on Saturday. The new tank has 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, 5 ppm nitrate, 6.2 pH, temp 24*C. There are 3 adult cories, 2 platies and 7 guppies in there at the moment.

The little tank they were in before has low ammonia (between 0 and the first colour on the test kit), 0 nitrite, around 5ppm nitrate, pH 6.4 and temp 26*C. It had the cory fry, 7 small guppies, a small platy, 5 neon tetras and 5 cardinal tetras. The tetras were only in there for the last week or two, while I set up the new tank.

The 4 foot tank is new (well, second-hand but new for me) but I set it up with the gravel and filter from my old 2 foot tank.

None of the other fish in either tank have this illness. What could it be?

I like to see Cory fry in a tank that is not entirely well maintained...

This produces infusoria, tiny edible organisms that will support fry until they can be fed live baby brine shrimp.

Or, if possible, you could cultivate your own infusoria.

I would guess your fry starved to death, a common occurance in a clean tank.

--garyroland.

When they were tiny, I fed them infusoria and powdered fry food. I tried to hatch baby brine shrimp but didn't have any luck. When they got a bit bigger I gave them flakes, pellets and Hikari sinking wafers. I could see that they were eating, and most of them grew fast. The ones with clamped tails didn't grow as big as their non-clamped siblings. The little tank wasn't exactly clean (I've been really busy with exams and work). I did a 20% water change about once a week (give or take a few days) but it still left the tank pretty messy.

There are a couple that look sick at the moment. Not moving much, clamping tails, a bit pale. What should I do for them?

[span class="edited"][Edited by 2004-07-05 23:59][/span]

What kind of substrate were they initially in? How big were they when they died. One of the most common causes of death in cory fry is due to fungus. When this occurs their tail starts to clamp and they turn pale/whitish starting from the tips of their tails ans working towards the head. I would suspect this in the smaller tank, but when in the bigger tank as gary said I would suspect starvation.

They were on sand in the little tank, gravel in the big tank. They're about 2-3cm long (just a guess, I'm at work and they're at home). I treated them with fungus cure a few weeks ago, but it didn't seem to do anything. They have only been in the new tank overnight, could they really starve that fast? Should I separate them again so they don't have any competition for food until they're a bit bigger?

I've got to get this straight...

How many hatched out, how many died, how many look bad??

A ballpark figure is fine since I know it's hard to count new fry.

--garyroland.

There were about 40 eggs to start with. They hatched on the 11th of May, and there were about 30 fry. I kept them in a tupperware container floating in my main tank for about two weeks. I fed them powdered fry food and infusoria. I think that only one died in that time.

When it was getting a bit crowded in the container, I moved them into the little tank with some guppy and platy fry. The tank was still cycling, but I bought some NIC and that sped things up heaps.

Since then they've slowly died off. Every couple days there'd be another one, or maybe a few. Sometimes there would be a lot, then nothing happen for a week.

I moved them over into my new tank a few days ago, and the next day I saw one dead. That afternoon I found 3 more.

Now there are only six left. Three look big and healthy. One is smaller but doesn't look too bad. There are two I'm worried about. They're really small and look kind of pale. Their tails are a bit clamped. They don't swim around much.