Sudden fish loss, swimming vertically against glass

[cfergu22]

Tank 100 gallon with sump, 8 months old. No new additions in the past 3 months.

Nitrates .9
Phosphates .01
Ammonia 0

About 4 days again my royal gramma who almost never comes out of its hiding spot started swimming vertically against the back glass. Almost like it’s laying on the glass. Sometimes it lays on the sand. It’s still eating.

Then last night my blue chromis did the same thing.

Then this morning my blue chromis and Flame angel were dead. No signs of disease on their skin.

All other fish seam healthy. Shrimp and other inverts seem fine.

Anything else I should be checking?

I’m going to do a 20% water change tomorrow. I also changed out the carbon I have in a sock in the sump.

The only major change I’ve seen is I am battling a hair algae problem in some spots.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Tank 100 gallon with sump, 8 months old. No new additions in the past 3 months.

Nitrates .9
Phosphates .01
Ammonia 0

About 4 days again my royal gramma who almost never comes out of its hiding spot started swimming vertically against the back glass. Almost like it’s laying on the glass. Sometimes it lays on the sand. It’s still eating.

Then last night my blue chromis did the same thing.

Then this morning my blue chromis and Flame angel were dead. No signs of disease on their skin.

All other fish seam healthy. Shrimp and other inverts seem fine.

Anything else I should be checking?

I’m going to do a 20% water change tomorrow. I also changed out the carbon I have in a sock in the sump.

The only major change I’ve seen is I am battling a hair algae problem in some spots.

How are you testing water?
Are you adding any tap water to the tank?
You have presence of cyano bacteria in the tank suggesting high nitrates and phosphates despite your numbers which may be from false readings. Remaining fish,. . . . eating and breathing normal?

 

[cfergu22]

Only RO DI

Testing with Hanna for Phospate and Nitrate.
Red Sea for ammonia (only checked because of deaths).

I do have some red cyano. Been battling that for a while with the hair algea. But honestly besides a few spots the tank looks as good as it has in a long time. I’m going to try to suck out a lot of the hair algae and cyano tomorrow.

Tank is by a window so I’m pretty much guessing I’ll always deal with some nuisance algae. But this is my first time with multiple fish dying since I started. The fish have been pretty stable. Either qt’d them myself or bought from an online qt’er. But like I said, haven’t been any new editions for a while.

 

[cfergu22]

Yes, other fish breathing, eating and acting by normal. The flame angel had been a little shy for the past few days.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Yes, other fish breathing, eating and acting by normal. The flame angel had been a little shy for the past few days.

So - there isn't any fish or shrimp that took over the gramma's cave?

 

[cfergu22]

That’s a good question. I have a Bartlett Anthia that was taking over the royal grammas cave. Moved him out to a smaller hole. That was about 3 weeks ago. If it was just the royal gramma I would understand. It’s never been social, just always darted out to eat then hid. Even when I only had a fire fish and goby. So I would suspect bullying.

But the flame angel and Blue reef Chromis dying on the same day is more alarming. And the Royal Gramma is still alive, just resting against the glass moving around.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

That’s a good question. I have a Bartlett Anthia that was taking over the royal grammas cave. Moved him out to a smaller hole. That was about 3 weeks ago. If it was just the royal gramma I would understand. It’s never been social, just always darted out to eat then hid. Even when I only had a fire fish and goby. So I would suspect bullying.

But the flame angel and Blue reef Chromis dying on the same day is more alarming. And the Royal Gramma is still alive, just resting against the glass moving around.

Sorry, I missed that text - two fish dying overnight is a serious issue as that was most likely related.

Can you post a video of the remaining fish under white lights?

 

[cfergu22]

Here’s a video sorry it’s longer than it needs to be, they were hard to get. Once I changed the lights they would barely come out even when I fed them.

 

[cfergu22]

Here’s a quick video of the royal gramma

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Here’s a quick video of the royal gramma

I don’t see anything wrong with the fish in the first video - they look good. The gramma is plastered against the tank side just like they do when they’ve got nowhere better to hide. Trouble is, I can’t account for the two fish dying - sorry!

 

[vetteguy53081]

Here’s a video sorry it’s longer than it needs to be, they were hard to get. Once I changed the lights they would barely come out even when I fed them.

Long videos are welcomed. The video is very blurry. Do the clowns, at least one show color loss? If so,,,,, eating and breathing normal?

 

[cfergu22]

So all the other fish seem to be eating and breathing normally. I don't think the clowns have any color loss, it think that's just the bad video. To my eyes in person they both look dark and colorful.

Oddly enough, today the royal gramma started acting normally again. It has a new spot on the other side of the tank down real low where a rock meets the sand. 7 days in a row it was laying on the sand and laying on the glass. So I guess it was just chased out of that hole by one of the other fish. It's pretty wild that none of the fish were pestering it while it was laying out in the wide open against the glass.

Still no idea what caused the other 2 fish to die in one night. But at this point I'll never know.