# Help - massive die off after water change!



## crhammond (Oct 20, 2010)

I have a 6 year old 55 gallon Mbuna tank.
I had 2 Eheim 2313 canisters and a Bio-wheel on it for 5 years.

I got really busy and distracted for a year and did very few water changes - mostly just top-ups.

I finally got around to maintaing the tank again and found (no surprise) Nitrate levels to the moon. The tank had been stable although there were 6 deaths over the year when my wtaer cjhanges were not up to speed (fish were removed if/when I noticed.) I know - bad me. But also the fish were now 5 to 7 years old...

So I got some time back in my life and decided to clean it up and get ready to put in a larger tank.

At this point pH was 8.2, Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0, Nitrates somewhere north of 160ppm...
I ordered a custom 100 gallon tank to fit my space and started to gett he current tank back in shape.

In anticipation of the new tank I got a new Eheim Pro 3e 2078 and an Apex Lite controller.

I moved the media from the old Eheim filters into the new one. I didn't rinse the media I just moved it. That filled 1.5 media trays in the new filter, I added another tray of new media and new foam.

I did a big vaccume (too bog probably) 40% water change and hooked up the new filter.
Everything ran great and after 3 days there was no ammonia or nitrite but Nitrates were off the charts still. Fish all happy.

Over the next 3 weeks I did a 25% water change every 3 or 4 days. It was not having a visible impact on my Nitrates. But my pH was getting somewhat unstable... My tap water is 7.8 but I keept he tank at 8.2. It has crushed coral in it (Carib Sea) and I buffer with Kents cichlid buffer and true-ph 8.2.

I added a UV steralizer and the tank was looking awesome.

I got the tank stable for a week at 8.2, no signs of any problems.

My Nitrates were still a problem though and a couple fo new fish I added only lasted a few days.
I re-tested all readings with my kit and took a sample to the fish store to verify. My water was good except my Nitrates being off the charts.

So yesterday I did a 50% water change to try and get the Nitrates to start dropping. pH and temp was matched and I used Prime. I added the new water to the tank and within about 10 mins the whole tank turned milk white. PANIC MODE.

I added some more Prime (4 caps) and hooked up a Magnum 350 with a micron cartridge. After 1 hr the fish were gasping. Afetr 5 hrs the tank cleared... fish were starting to suffer badly gasping at the surface. The pH was crashing. I added buffer but it did nothing at all to the pH. pH dropped to 7.8 from 8.12 overnight...

I have no idea what went wrong but 1/2 my fish are now gone and the others are going soon 

6 Multipuntatus catfish, 1 Demasoni, 1 Yellow dead... the 5 other yellows, 1 demasoin and one remaining catfish are soon to be goners.

I don't know what to do and I don't know what happened. I re-tested now and my Ammonia is 0, Nitrites 0, Nitrates down to about 100ppm, temp 76.5, pH 7.8. The remaining fish are gasping still at the surface. Why would my pH crash? I buffered the incoming water to 8.2... I added buffer this morning and the pH did not budge.

Can anyone clue me in? I'm sure these fish are all going to die and I'm now totally terrified of what will happen with the new tank. My stable tank went to heck with one water change!

I am thinking of removing the remaing fish toa small spare 5 gallon to try and save them... and do a 100% water change.

Help, please!


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## CrownJewel (Oct 18, 2010)

That is a tragety! I am so sorry to hear about your loss.

I have never heard a story like this before. I can't explain why the water turned white but I have some suggestions.

Did you de-chlorinate the water. You probably did. I am just trying to cover everything. Perhaps the sudden large water change was such a change in water type, all at one time that it stressed your fished out really bad. When you are changeing from e.g. bottled water to tap water, you have to mix the waters so they are slowly intruduced to the new water type. I imageine if they had been in the same, unchangeing water for so many years they probably couldn't handle the very large rapid change. Although that wouldn't cause the water to turn white.

Did you put crushed coral in the water you were adding to your tank? If you did, did you follow an instructed doseage? And were you doseing the new water for just the new water or for the entire tank? If you were doseing for the entire tank you might have increased the power of the coral by adding it to a small amount of water and putting it into a large amount of water. Would you please post again saying more specificly how you managed the coral? Thanks.

Did you anything additional to the water you added? You might be able to smell a cemical in your white water (if you still have it) that might give you an idea of what could have caused this disaster. I hope this helps! And I hope the rest of your fish get better.

BTW I just thought of this but could your test strips be out of date? Just a thought.


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## crhammond (Oct 20, 2010)

I managed to save the rest of the fish. I set up a 5 gallon with some water matched to normal tank parameters (76.5, pH 8.2.) I put them in and within 5 mins they wer perky and happy!

Yes I did treat with Prime first - I always double the dose to be sure.

I decided my best bet is to re-start the tank with a 100% fresh water change. It will likely have a re-cycle and I will use Stability and Prime to get the fish through it (hopefully.)

I drained the entire tank, removed all the rocks, vaccumed every bit of the substrate and re-filled. I used a double dose of Prime and 6 tsp of Stability.

The crushed corals are in the substrate (Carib-Sea Cichlid blend form 5 years back.) I always treat the new water with Kents Cichlid buffer and Cichlid Chemistry. Lately I have been adding some buffer directly to the tank as the pH has been unstable.

I re-filled, filtered with the Magnum, Eheim and UV sterilizer for 1 hr before adding the Stability (UV will be off for 48 hrs to let the Stability work.)

I think I know a few things that went wrong...
#1 Too many changes too fast... so the fish were under stress to begin with

#2 I found that my Kent Cichlid chemistry has "gone bad"
It has become wet (its supposed to be a powder.) When I was mixing the Buffer and Cichlid chemisty in a glass of warm treated water it turned into a white gooey gross soup with clumps of stuff in it. I didn't add it to the glass yesterday ... so I missed it when I was making a batch of new water in my mixing tub. I am sure this is the main cause.

#3 The pH of my tap water has changed in the past 2 weeks! It is 7.6 today... so I needed an extra 25% more buffer.

#4 I should not have let the Nitrates get so dangerously high... they must have been over 200ppm for it to take so many water changes and even after a 100% change is still 10ppm.

I put the fish back in and so far so good... I'll be monitoring closely the next couple fo days.

On the positive side I have had a very stable 5 year run. I'm really sad about my Synodontis multipunctatus - they were the original 4 plus 2 born in the tank... One of the tank born ones survived.

I really hope I can re-establish the cycle safely and get these guys transferred to the new tank in a few weeks. That is going to be a high stress day for sure. Then I will slowly re-stock starting with more Synodontis multipunctatus (going to cost me!), maybe 12 Demasoni (these buggers aren't cheap either but I love the contrast with the Yellows!) and 5 more Yellows (cheap)... Yellows first, then Demasoni then Cats...


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## CrownJewel (Oct 18, 2010)

I am so glad your fish are well!

So I guess it was a formula-gone-wrong. Well, I guess we all learn from our mistakes. Just make sure you stay on top of your water changes for your cycle. My first cycle was probably harder on me than it was my fish, but if you keep up with frequent water changes it goes pretty smoothly.

Probably the biggest problem you are going to have with your cycle is the amount of fish you are going to add all at once, without giving your bio-load too much at once. It will probably take longer for your tank to cycle this time but you'll make it!

And when you say "yellows" are you refering to Electric Yellow? My cichlid Max is half Demasoni half yellow electric. Anyway...Hope this helps!

BTW my brother's goldfish's nitrates were literaly at 300ppm!


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## crhammond (Oct 20, 2010)

Few hours now... fish seem okay but breathing hard - maybe really stressed.

KH = 160 mg/L
Ph = 7.82 and very unstable again. It was stable for a couple fo hours at 8 ish and then crashed down again. Adding buffer did nothing... I double checked the ph probe with a test kit and they read more or less the same. I think I will get some solution and re-calibrate the probe to be sure.

No signs of ammonia or nitrites.

Still nervous... I can't understand why my pH won;t sit stable at 8.2 like it always has all these years. It seems like something is making acid in my tank???


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## crhammond (Oct 20, 2010)

Yes, electric Yellow's. The fish I have left are:

1 Synodontis Multipunctatus (5 lost, 4 were large spectacular adults  )
2 Labidochromis sp. "Mbamba" (0 lost)
5 Labidochromis caeruleus (1 lost, really nice adult  )
1 Pseudotropheus sp. Demasoni (1 lost - small 1"er that was already stuggling)

Not many left  The filter will have no problem on this low bioload! Once things get stable (pH) and the tank does it's mini cycle I am going to stock it with small (1-1.25") of the following to get ready to transfer to the new 100 gallon tank in a few weeks. They will be fine int he 55 gallon at this small size for a few weeks.

5 more Synodontis Multipunctatus
4 more Labidochromis sp. "Mbamba"
3 more Labidochromis caeruleus
11 more Pseudotropheus sp. Demasoni

Should be okay for my filter and 100 gallon setup.


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## triscuit (May 6, 2005)

Wow- what a nightmare. 

I have no idea of the number of factors that have contributed to this, but as you already know it's more than one. My best guess for your pH issue is DOC: something IS making acid in your tank.

DOC, dissolved organic carbon, was building up in your tank every day from fish poo, food, algae, and all the stuff that grows and dies or is eaten in the tank. The problem could have stemmed from you finally stirring everything up and at the same time adding so much new water. Old poo that hadn't yet dissolved completely finally had some clean water to muck up... and so it dissolved, providing plenty of acid that your buffering capacity wasn't able to compensate for. This also accounts for the seemingly endless supply of nitrates... every time you added fresh water, more poop could dissolve.

I wouldn't worry too much about pH shifts between 7.8-8.2. Right now your tank chemistry is changing so fast that it would be impossible to get a reading that would be accurate an hour from now. Put away the pH kit, and make sure your KH remains stable. BTW- crushed coral is useless- it does not dissolve fast enough above pH 7 to even bother (imho).

That's a lot of fish you've got in 5 gallons right now. It would be very hard to regulate the water quality. I suggest getting them back in the main tank now that you've got it cleaned out.

You may lose more fish now, no matter what you do- it doesn't mean that anything new is wrong. They've been badly stressed, both from long term neglect and from short term massive changes to their physical and chemical environments. Take it easy on them for the next couple weeks, watch for ammonia and nitrite spikes, and hopefully they'll pull through.

Best of luck!


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## crhammond (Oct 20, 2010)

Yep - that's part of it for sure - I built up a lot of toxicity and gunk by not taking care of the tank and released a lot of it all at once. I definately do have some funky Kents Cichlid Chemistry too... no idea how that happened. My guess is it got some water in it at some point and wa sput away like that.

Tonight I discovered what I think ultimately killed the fish last night. They sufocated due to lack of Oxygen. Rookie mistake... oops.

Late this aft I had all the fish back in the 55 gallon, readings all good, pH low but stable. Fish happy (as happy as could be expected.) I got the KH up a little more with some more buffer (it was much lower than 2 years ago... about the time I started to neglect things too much.)

2hrs later they were gasping for air again. Finally it clicked - they are not getting Oxygen! When I did the big 50% water change I added enough to cover the spray bar. Ummm - fish need Oxygen... new bacteria use tons of Oxygen and when you put in lots of dechlorinator/Prime it sucks a ton of Oxygen from the water too... so I started airating my tank like crazy and within 15 minutes the fish were happy again... AND the pH went up and stabilized at 8.05.

The chemistry in the tank is obviously going to take more time to stabilize and I am not out of the woods yet.

But am am sitting here in awe of how tough my Cichlids are as the Yelow Labs that were gasping for air 3hrs ago are doing the spawning dance! Clearly clean water and Oxygen is agreeing with them HA HA.



triscuit said:


> Wow- what a nightmare.
> 
> I have no idea of the number of factors that have contributed to this, but as you already know it's more than one. My best guess for your pH issue is DOC: something IS making acid in your tank.
> 
> ...


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## triscuit (May 6, 2005)

Doh! Of course! I didn't think that with your filtration being what it was, that water movement wouldn't have been sufficient. Thanks for sharing that so I'll remember it next time someone has a similar problem.

Here's to happier fishkeeping! :thumb:


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## BillD (May 17, 2005)

With the natural pH of your water, I would rethink playing water chemist. You and your fish would be better served if you used the tap water alone, and didn't bother with the buffers. It would be much easier to maintain a stable tank if you just use the water you have as is. This way you avoid changes in Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) which is more important than any shifts in pH. You will save some money too.


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## crhammond (Oct 20, 2010)

Bill,

I am thinking the same thing. In the past I had no prolem at all maintaining 8.2. I simply added 1 tsp of buffer to my new water and pH was solid. Since messing with the tank that is not the case.

Everyone survived the night but the pH is back down to the natural tap water level (7.65.) The fish are alive but clearly stressed out (very jumpy.) I am leaving it as is right now. As long as it doesn't drop lower I won't mess with it. At pH of 7.65 any ammonia spikes will also be much less toxic.

The most important thing now is to keep these fish happy and let the tank re-cycle. In 3 weeks this tank is being replaced by the new 100 gallon and I have to do this all over again. If everything is stable I should be able to move the existing water and filter and avoid a cycle in the new tank... and also start out with near 0 Nitrates.

Maybe once things settle down again in the new tank the buffer will work like it has in the past and a pH of 8.2 will be easy to establish with 1 or 2 tsp of buffer.


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## triscuit (May 6, 2005)

I just use baking soda as a buffer. That's mostly what the stuff you are using is made of. Because stability is one of the key factors in successful fishkeeping, buffering is a smart thing to do. Check the KH of your tap water before you decide not to buffer.

Also, find out the parameters of your source for new fish will be- minimizing their shock while working to stabilize your current fish may be useful.


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## crhammond (Oct 20, 2010)

All is well in the tank still.

The pH was 8 then dropped over 10 hrs to 6.5, then came back up to 8.2 over 6 hrs and has been stable at 8.2 for 18 hrs. Whatever was contributing acid is gone now.

The fish are happy and the water is good with no ammonia or nitrites.


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