Total tank losses are never welcome, but they still happen

[bekateen]

Ugh, after doing routine water changes on my three greenhouse tanks yesterday, I arrived today to discover one tank entirely wiped out. Since the other two tanks are not affected, I can rule out power failures and the greenhouse overheating (plug-in heaters are unplugged), so I have to imagine that it's something singular that I might have done to this one tank, such as did I forget to add dechlorinator to this tank? Our city uses chloramines, which are supposedly toxic to fish.

It's a total loss of all the fish that were in the tank. These fish were all collected by me or by my Peruvian colleagues along the Rio Nanay:

• 7 adult
  Ancistrus cf_leucostictus
  (these had spawned once, but the fry didn't survive - I was hoping for a second spawn)
• 10 adult
  Dianema longibarbis
  (I had males and females in the group and was hoping for a spawn)
• 3 subadult
  Batrochoglanis raninus

Dang these types of days hurt.

Regards,
Eric

[Shane]

So sorry Eric. I have done the same thing.

Now I add Prime immediately after draining a tank (before moving on to the next one) and use a dry erase marker to write a big "P" on the front glass. This way, when I start filling I can see that the tank was dosed. As I am often draining and filling at the same time this system has stopped me from forgetting to dose a tank. If I forget to write on the tank (it happens) the tank gets dosed before it is filled. Better to add Prime twice than forget it.

After water changes I clean the outside glass and wipe off the "P." I then use the marker to write the date and percent of water changed on the glass.
-Shane

[Viktor Jarikov]

Sorry to hear Eric and thank you for reporting. It's a jolt to those of us who read it and realize they've gotten a bit too complacent with their memory and attention strength or those who did notice a decline but haven't mitigated their weakened memory grip. Now that I am personally past half a century, the short-term memory has been noticeably declining. We are on well water and in recent years I started regularly leaving Missus, our household, and our fish with any running water when I forget I am washing our RO membranes (must be done daily for 15 min; I leave it running for hours when I forget until the water storage tank is emptied).

[bekateen]

Thanks guys. I know it happens to everyone at least once, but it still hurts. And Viktor, you are correct about memory. Even when I'm "paying attention," I sometimes second guess whether something happened (like did I add dechlor).

Shane, absolutely, it's better to double dose than not dose a tank. I've intentionally redosed a number of tanks over the years, out of fear that I might not have dosed them the first time. I've never tried any marking system like that which you use, but it's a good idea. I try to drain 2-3 tanks at a time, dose them all at once, then fill all at once. But using some kind of intentional reminder is definitely worth me considering, after this.

Cheers, Eric

[characinkid]

Sorry to see this Eric, and strongly agreed on the memory, im in the same age range as you! Its tough to loose a whole tank of fish, but im sure you will find a use for that empty tank now.
Ive never used Prime, my goto has always been to leave the fresh water in a large bucket with an airstone for at least 24hrs to warm up a little and let the chlorine dissipate. Not sure if ive always just been lucky but this has been my goto for 30yrs!

[bekateen]

Sorry to see this Eric, and strongly agreed on the memory, im in the same age range as you! Its tough to loose a whole tank of fish, but im sure you will find a use for that empty tank now.
Ive never used Prime, my goto has always been to leave the fresh water in a large bucket with an airstone for at least 24hrs to warm up a little and let the chlorine dissipate. Not sure if ive always just been lucky but this has been my goto for 30yrs!

Thanks. Yeah, aging sucks a little bit. You start losing your vision at 45, and this summer I turn 61. Memory issues are scary (is it just normal forgetfulness or something more serious?).

Air dissipation of chlorine works fine, but it doesn't work for chloramines. I mentioned Prime, but I actually use Aquavitro alpha, which is also made by Seachem; I've spoken to Seachem tech people and they confirmed it's exactly the same as Prime but its 50% more concentrated, so 1ml treats 15 gallons instead of 10. And for some reason, this product sells at a cheaper price around me, so it's more economical too.

Cheers, Eric

[Shane]

On tanks with an exposed side I write there. Thought some might find this funny. About a year of water changes.

Who said, "One more bucket and the farce is complete."

-Shane

[Viktor Jarikov]

I don't know who said this or what it exactly means. I remember it was Matt the Grokefish's signature

[bekateen]

I remember it was Matt the Grokefish's signature

Excellent memory Viktor!

Who said, "One more bucket and the farce is complete."

-Shane

According to Google, it was you.

[Bas Pels]

Reading this I'm so happy our tapwater is never chlorinated.

This is a problem I never have had to face. Still, I've had bad waterchanges, but not this bad

[NeptuneNomad92]

It's always tough to see something like this happen. Sudden reminder of how delicate our aquariums can be.

[Taratron]

Some years ago I never worried about the temperature of the water from my sink, because why would I? Never had issues before! Either it was a hotter night than usual, but I filled my hillstream loach tank up about 5/6pm. I worked early morning shifts so was up about 2am for work. And I remember going to the bathroom where the tank is, sitting down and touching the tank, and how hot it was. Seconds later, the smell hit me. I don't know how hot the water was coming out, but by 2am the tank was 90*. All the loaches were cooked.

It was a breeding tank of about 10 adults and 20-30 fry. I think the snails and maybe a few shrimp survived.

These days I have large 30 gallon water change totes that water usually has to chill in for a day or so before use. But losing that tank, I still think about. It was horrible.

[bekateen]

Ugh I feel that story. Sorry.

Eric

[Viktor Jarikov]

Some years ago I never worried about the temperature of the water from my sink, because why would I? ...

Sorry to hear and thank you for sharing. So tap water you refilled your loach tank after a WC must have been more than 90F - normal for Phoenix, Arizona? What was the normal running temp of the tank? Sorry if I am missing something.

[bekateen]

In Stockton, California, during the hottest summer days, "cold" tapwater in my house exceeds 90F.

Definitely impacts my decisions of when to do water changes.

Cheers, Eric

[Taratron]

yeah the water from tap sometimes comes out at 90* or so. great to kill ich, bad for fish.

[TwoTankAmin]

Sorry to hear it Eric. But I am older and had a worse one a few months ago.

My WC L173 had been actively spawning and when I would look into the tank I could see an assorted size of offspring wherever I looked. I knew the time was passed to do tank breakdown and removal of offspring. But I had been busy with a lot of other stuff both fishy and regular life, so I let things slide. It was made even worse by my having to skip water changes for the first time in over 2 decades.

When I finally got a bit of time to try and catch up on tank work I was about to break down the zebra tank as all the fish save 3 and a few fry had been sold and needed to bepulled. At the last minute I changed my mind and decided I better do the 173 tank. It is an under tank and I pulled up the stool and had my buckets and supplies at hand. It was night so I turned on the tank light.

When I looked into the tank I was seeing dead fish everywhere and the small was not good. I know what had to have happened and it crashed the tank. The first thing I did was to throw in some dechlor with ammonia detoxifier included and then I began to pulls fish. I was scooping them up by the netfull. And then I began to remove all the decor to find even more dead fish.

Many of the few fish still alive and some of the dead ones had a bright red coloration on the rear 1/2 or their body. When I got out all of the dead fish I estimate it was 75 (or more) and the tank is a 33 long. All of the breeders were still alive but one had a bright red rear. So did a few young adults. When I got the water changed twice, I returned minimal decor to the tank and added a large piece of PolyFilter to both of the AquaClear filters on the tank. In addition to the 10 breeders there were an assortment of about 10-12 other survivors ranging in size from 1.5 incheds to just over 3 inches.

The next day I removed 3 more corpses- the one breeder and 2 sub-adults which had the red rear ends were goners. However the red on any of the other fish had vanished. Since then I have been feeding and changing water and hoping I did not sterilize the breeders. But I am not hopeful. For a while nobody caved, now, a few months after the fact, I have two caves claimed.

I am wishing and hoping I did not do permanent damage to the breeders. I have just begun feeding them more protein (frozen foods) and Repashy Spawn & Grow along with the Ebo-Aqaristik.

I knew that tank needed to have fish collected and removed, but my old brain did not seem to grasp how badly. I killed those fish just as sure as if I had done it intentionally. This incident just reinforced my knowing that it is time for me to cut way back on keeping fish. It is not fair to the fish not to do so

[bekateen]

Sadly, apparently I wasn't out of the woods yet. I had two other major tank losses since this summer, these latter two incidents both triggered after I bought new fish.

• In late summer, I bought two
  L387
  to add to a group of all males which I already had. I QT'd the new fish for two weeks, treated them prophylactically with PraziPro and Seachem Paraguard. Then I added them to a tank housing 3 other 6-year-old L387 and six
  Baryancistrus beggini
  , some of those also in my possession for 5+ years. Within days they all broke out with a crusty coat on their skins and all but one L387 died in 2 days.
• Then in mid October, I bought 4
  Panaqolus albomaculatus
  to add to my group of three fish, some which I had since before the COVID-19 pandemic. Again I QT'd the fish, but this time I used API general cure and treated the new fish with two full rounds of the medicine. After QT I moved them into a tank housing the other mustard spots along with over 50 juvenile
  L397
  and 20 juvenile
  Rineloricaria lanceolata
  . Again something that looked like ich raged through the tank within two days. I did daily water changes and treated with Paraguard, but lost 6 of the 7 mustard spots and 100% of the L397 and Rineloricaria. That was crushing. I was helpless to stop it.

In both cases I bought the fish from reliable sources and the fish looked healthy and well fed after QT. I wish I knew what the disease was so I could treat it more effectively.

I can only hope that I'm done with major tank losses for a while. Sure not going to mix any fish in the near future.

Regards, Eric

[Viktor Jarikov]

That's tough, sorry to hear, Eric. Trivially speaking, I am sure you know microscopic study could have helped. Of course, I myself have not bothered so far with learning the microscope. Moreover, I am sure you know QT is suggested to be at least ~10x longer than 2 weeks. And yet, of course, I don't QT fish unless it is from the wild or semi-wild or strongly suspected of potential problems, and even then, I sometimes opt for a "kill all external pathogens but hopefully not the fish" treatment and place them in target tanks. So I don't have a leg to advise anything, except the obvious things I myself don't do. IDK if I am lucky or forgetful or what but I can't recall having such a problem you describe, not to mention two in a relatively short succession. My deepest sympathies.

[bekateen]

Thanks Viktor.

I am sure you know microscopic study could have helped. Of course, I myself have not bothered so far with learning the microscope. Moreover, I am sure you know QT is suggested to be at least ~10x longer than 2 weeks.

Indeed. I have access to plenty of microscopes at work. And in the past, although not these times, I've used microscopes to attempt to identify pathogens. Sadly, even with my Biology background, I have never had luck actually identifying what I saw as pathogenic organisms. I wish I was better trained in that ability.

Regarding QT time, my preferred method of QT is to set up a new QT tank for a group of fish of one species, then make that QT tank their permanent home and redecorate as appropriate. However, in both of these cases, the new fish were bought for the express purpose of adding them to existing tanks after QT, so the other method was not an option. And in real life practice, it's difficult for me to QT fish more than about 2 weeks in temporary tanks.

As I mentioned in another post, I did get two new groups of fish this last weekend (4 Microglanis and 4 Rineloricaria). Those were from the same store so they're QT'ing now together, but when they're done, each group will get a new tank and won't be mixed with other existing fish, so even if I lost these fish in QT, it won't impact my other fish.

Cheers, Eric