Help! Installed new 160 gallon tank and already have 3 dead fish :(

rishic78 · Jan 17, 2023

Hey all, I was hoping to get some help.

I am a beginner that installed a Red Sea Reefer 750 (160 gallon tank). I cycled the tank for 2 weeks (using Dr. Tim's) and had zero ammonia, zero nitrites, and around 17 for nitrates. I then did a 25% water change. I then added in 4 clownfish and 7 banggai cardinal fish from my LFS on a recommendation to start getting nutrient load in that size of a tank.

Unfortunately, after about 2 days, one of the Banggai cardinal fish died. It would just swim low in the water and not eat. I initially assumed I had just gotten a "bad" fish. Then 5 days later, another Banggai cardinal fish started to exhibit the same behavior. It would start swimming low in the corner and not eat. And then it also died. I was hoping that was the end, but then 3 days later I started to see one of the clownfish start to act strange. It also was swimming low and then died today.

I took a video of what it looked like before it died: https://photos.app.goo.gl/adYScTbZZCwE7Q9p6

I am really worried I have some sort of disease and that it will take out ALL of my fish. I keep checking my water and it looks fine -- 8.1 PH, 0 Ammonia, 0 Nitrites, 17.0 Nitrates, 0.06 Phosphates. The only thing I can see is low is Alkalinity (it was at 6.7).

Any idea what to do? The other fish all seem healthy, but so did the clownfish just a few days ago.

Any help would be appreciated!

brandon429 · Jan 17, 2023

You need to pull remaining fish, fallow the tank, and not skip disease preps on round two

no params you can measure did this

see the stickies in the disease forum for the fix

notice for the entire disease forum: nobody is adjusting parameters, or fixated on measuring them, they’re disease prepping. It’s a physical set of acts you do to a tank to prevent this kind of disease loss.

params we guess at/feel that we are measuring accurately on API don’t apply here.
Your cycle isn’t an issue at all either

once you see how hard it is to prep for disease, the wait time involved, you’ll see why people skip it and in the help threads you’ll also see the price for skipping qt and fallow preps

Fish Disease Treatment and Diagnosis

A forum for discussing treatment and diagnosing saltwater reef fish.

www.reef2reef.com

Ronaldo Lee · Jan 17, 2023

Those Banggai Cardinalfish sure are pretty... I just had 5 last month suffer a similar fate. They were all eating when I came back from the LFS, one after another around 1 died each day. One survived in the end and now he's paired up with a pajama cardinal fish

. Did you acclimatise the fish properly (especially temperature wise)? Maybe try again with some chromis or PJ cardinals for now as they might save some money till you get the tank up and running.

brandon429 · Jan 17, 2023

that will further infect the tank, leading to more losses, because its opposite of the stickies in the disease forum.

Jekyl · Jan 17, 2023

Going from 0 to 11 fish could also be the cause. I would have started with 2. Also it's very rare that you can keep more than 2 clowns in a tank together long term.

rishic78 · Jan 17, 2023

brandon429 said:
You need to pull remaining fish, fallow the tank, and not skip disease preps on round two

no params you can measure did this

see the stickies in the disease forum for the fix

notice for the entire disease forum: nobody is adjusting parameters, or fixated on measuring them, they’re disease prepping. It’s a physical set of acts you do to a tank to prevent this kind of disease loss.

params we guess at/feel that we are measuring accurately on API don’t apply here.
Your cycle isn’t an issue at all either

once you see how hard it is to prep for disease, the wait time involved, you’ll see why people skip it and in the help threads you’ll also see the price for skipping qt and fallow preps

Fish Disease Treatment and Diagnosis

A forum for discussing treatment and diagnosing saltwater reef fish.

www.reef2reef.com

Any thoughts on how to identify the disease? I'm trying to see which remedy would be the best path. The main thing I noticed was heavy breathing...so is it likey Brook?

brandon429 · Jan 17, 2023

no I'm not sure how to ID so sorry

I only scrape up my data from posts in the disease forum to relay onward/skipping disease preps fails in the first several months about 80% of the time

I got that by scanning 20 straight pages of help threads there, and clicking on every entrant's name badge to see their first post on their tank. from that, we get age of tank usually, and I referenced that to how many months they ran before getting a disease wipeout, I settled on under eight months avg for a disease wipeout from skipping preps, in the best case scenarios.

Jekyl that is a fine detail catch I didnt see that. it won't affect the biofilter but that sure might impact disease vectoring and behavioral issues / bullying potentially, as I read it in the disease forum

Cell · Jan 17, 2023

11 unquarantined fish added all at the same time is a recipe for disaster.

No other symptoms other than heavy breathing?

Any inverts?

Can we see a full tank picture?

Cell · Jan 17, 2023

@brandon429 Does no nitrites after just 2 weeks makes sense? Dr Tim's takes like 10 days per directions, but I thought nitrite is still usually high at this point.

bushdoc · Jan 17, 2023

Not a fish medic, hopefully one of them will answer. Fish is breathing very heavily, indicating that gills are involved in disease process. No external signs of parasites, but it can be brooklynella , I am afraid.

brandon429 · Jan 17, 2023

I don't factor anyone's non digital test kit guesses, tanks that have been cycled years often guess_/ report zero nitrate, we don't ever factor nitrite at all, and we have zero logged examples of failure to control ammonia given his cycling ramp up time

That's why I unfactor any cycling issues

Unless his tank has no rocks in it

I forgot to check that, awaiting pic verification

I've never seen a cycle challenged at all, ever.

I don't want to ever know anyone's nitrite guess, they're using api for it 99% of the time and it doesn't make api more accurate than ammonia testing

I specifically think we can't measure a cycle off people's nitrite guesses.

If he put in no bottle bac then yes 11 dumped fish could spike ammonia, I took for granted so far he used bottle bac... surely he did?

He said Dr Tims but didn't specify bac or just Dr Tims ammonia/ surely he used there bac/ hoping

Post a tank pic in white light, not blue, looking for benthic growth confirmations like brown spots or algae or mats on the sand/ pigments that verify cycle timing without test guesses

threebuoys · Jan 17, 2023

The very rapid breathing of the clownfish suggests the possibility of velvet or perhaps brooklynella.

The white body makes it difficult to see if any parasites, e.g. ich, are present. Likewise, can't see if any mucus or slime problems (velvet or brook) are present.

The problem with treatment is that different meds are required for velvet versus book.

Brook is typically a clownfish disease while velvet is seen on most species. Have you noticed rapid breathing on any of the other fish? Like 125 - 200 breaths a minute?

Velvet is treated with copper in a QT. Brook is treated with formalin also in a QT. TRhe two meds cannot be used simultaneously because they would be too strong.

See the link to QT protocol i my signature below.

brandon429 · Jan 17, 2023

highly solid symptoms ID, noted. nice.

Cell · Jan 17, 2023

brandon429 said:
I don't factor anyone's non digital test kit guesses, tanks that have been cycled years often guess_/ report zero nitrate, we don't ever factor nitrite at all, and we have zero logged examples of failure to control ammonia given his cycling ramp up time

That's why I unfactor any cycling issues

Unless his tank has no rocks in it I forgot to check that, awaiting pic verification

I've never seen a cycle challenged at all, ever.

I don't want to ever know anyone's nitrite guess, they're using api for it 99% of the time and it doesn't make api more accurate than ammonia testing

I specifically think we can't measure a cycle off people's nitrite guesses.

If he put in no bottle bac then yes 11 dumped fish could spike ammonia, I took for granted so far he used bottle bac... surely he did?

He said Dr Tims but didn't specify bac or just Dr Tims ammonia/ surely he used there bac/ hoping

Post a tank pic in white light, not blue, looking for benthic growth confirmations like brown spots or algae or mats on the sand/ pigments that verify cycle timing without test guesses

Use as an indicator for faulty testing. No measurable nitrites after 2 weeks is not normal therefore the measurement may be inaccurate. If the nitrite measurement is off, perhaps other measurements are also off.

exnisstech · Jan 17, 2023

Granted this may be a disease issue but I'm curious does this Dr Tim's majic in a bottle really work? Only reason I ask is because I have always cycled with plain unscented ammonia and testing. Been doing it like that for over 20 years but only 5 or 6 salt water tanks, others were fresh. I have never had any kind of unusual die off like the OP. But I have also never added 11 fish to a 2 week old tank. Reason I ask because I keep seeing post about people having trouble with their new tanks and most of them are using some kind of bottled chemical, bacteria or even several kinds. I don't remember reading much about cycle problems when people do it old school like I do with ammonia or a piece of shrimp etc. Is it because that method just works or does no one use the old school methods any longer

Cell · Jan 17, 2023

exnisstech said:
Does this Dr Tim's majic in a bottle really work? Only reason I ask is because I have always cycled with plain unscented ammonia and testing. Been doing it like that for over 20 years but only 4 or 5 salt water tanks, others were fresh. I have never had any kind of unusual die off like the OP. But I have also never added 11 fish to a 2 week old tank. Reason I ask because I keep seeing post about people having trouble with their new tanks and most of them are using some kind of bottled stuff or even several kinds. I don't remember reading much about cycle problems when people do it old school like I do with ammonia or a piece of shrimp etc. Is it because that method just works or does no one use the old school methods any longer

Several brands of bottled bac have been heavily vetted by the community and proven to be effective.

threebuoys · Jan 17, 2023

exnisstech said:
Granted this may be a disease issue but I'm curious does this Dr Tim's majic in a bottle really work? Only reason I ask is because I have always cycled with plain unscented ammonia and testing. Been doing it like that for over 20 years but only 5 or 6 salt water tanks, others were fresh. I have never had any kind of unusual die off like the OP. But I have also never added 11 fish to a 2 week old tank. Reason I ask because I keep seeing post about people having trouble with their new tanks and most of them are using some kind of bottled chemical, bacteria or even several kinds. I don't remember reading much about cycle problems when people do it old school like I do with ammonia or a piece of shrimp etc. Is it because that method just works or does no one use the old school methods any longer

Lots of threads on this topic, here is a fairly comprehensive one

Bacteria in a bottle, Myth or Fact

Call me old school, back in the day we placed a deli shrimp in a tank to kick start the cycle. When tank reached 1.5-2 ppm ammonia we pulled it out and waited sometimes weeks to months for bacteria to colonize and drop ammonia and nitrites down to 0 to make tank safe for livestock. With recent...

www.reef2reef.com

bushdoc · Jan 17, 2023

exnisstech said:
Granted this may be a disease issue but I'm curious does this Dr Tim's majic in a bottle really work? Only reason I ask is because I have always cycled with plain unscented ammonia and testing. Been doing it like that for over 20 years but only 5 or 6 salt water tanks, others were fresh. I have never had any kind of unusual die off like the OP. But I have also never added 11 fish to a 2 week old tank. Reason I ask because I keep seeing post about people having trouble with their new tanks and most of them are using some kind of bottled chemical, bacteria or even several kinds. I don't remember reading much about cycle problems when people do it old school like I do with ammonia or a piece of shrimp etc. Is it because that method just works or does no one use the old school methods any longer

You have a very valid point, especially with introducing 11 fish at once into newly established tank. Some fish are immune to some disease, like Marine velvet, but when stressed, their immunity drops and disease start manifesting itself.

rishic78 · Jan 17, 2023

Cell said:
11 unquarantined fish added all at the same time is a recipe for disaster.

No other symptoms other than heavy breathing?

Any inverts?

Can we see a full tank picture?

Yeah, it was all from the same LFS. The fish came from 3 different tanks there (all 7 cardinal fish were from one tank, each clownfish pair from their own tanks).

I do have inverts -- 5 turbo snails, 5 red leg hermit grabs, and 2 cleaner shrimp.

The thing I noticed with all 3 fish is that they would sit in a corner and stay low to the bottom of the sandbed and not really eat. And then 2 days later they would be gone from the tank. The snails got to the two cardinal fish before I could pull them out. I saw the shrimp going after the clownfish and pulled that one out myself. I have not seen any slime on them or dots.

Here is a video showing the full tank:

New video by Rishi Chandra

photos.app.goo.gl

I will pulling out the fish to quarantine them but trying to figure out how to diagnose the right medication for them. Or is there a default I should use if I don't know what kind of disease it is?