Amano New Year Build!

Thank you. I took a couple of valium earlier today and finally passed out and didn't have to watch the last three die, but I removed the bodies a few minutes ago and the barbs are no more. While doing this I noticed a glowlight hanging at the surface, and a weak and confused neon stuck in the plants. It remains to be seen whether they are next.

I'm a bit too numb to feel much of anything right now, but I can get a bit of analytical distance and ... well there's fuckall to analyse, because for starters I don't even know what happened today. Today was a nightmare of watching over the fish and seeing them die one by one and removing them from the tank. I can't even summon up any more tears.

Is it columnaris? Something else? And if it is columnaris where do I go from here? Do I put the remainder of the fish in quarantine and nuke this whole tank? What do I do about the plants and the scape? Do I treat this tank with antibiotics risking a cycle crash and would my vet even give me what I need? Where do I get tetracycline or quinoline or whatever else I might need? I don't even know if it's the cause!

My dad was ready to go bust kneecaps but I can't blame the LFS - they didn't breed columnaris in some evil laboratory down in the basement. Nevertheless, I can't risk introducing ANY fish now, and I can't risk giving away the remaining fish to go and cause devastation elsewhere. There are too many fish to put them into the 33L toilet, how do I treat this while keeping the water clean and not crashing the cycle. And how do I guarantee that it will be eradicated, whatever it is?

The only person who is to blame is myself - I was terrified of adding new fish for precisely what happened today, and I should have listened to my gut and set up quarantine, but that sounded like a faff and here we are. At the very least I should have waited until the new tank settled better and should not have gotten so many fish at once because that undoubtedly led to stress and may have been a tipping point. Also, no good deed goes unpunished and I should never have taken the marginal glowlights out of pity. The lesson is if there are any iffy individual fish in an LFS tank, stay away and let them deal with it.

Right now I can't even bear to go near the aquarium and looking at it fills me with a measure of disgust - and horror of dealing with the prospect of having a repeat of today. The tetras mostly seem perfectly fine - but so were the barbs yesterday evening. What once brought joy is now only fit for professional detachment and I don't know if it's even worth it.

I'd appreciate some wisdom from anyone who has had to deal with this kind of situation before.

I've had to deal with the passing of many pets throughout the years, and there is a quote from Irving Townsend that has always brought me comfort: "We, who surround ourselves with lives even more fleeting than our own, live in a fragile circle - easily and often breached."

It rings hollow right now especially if you're the one doing the breaching.

 

Does anybody have any advice whatsoever?

 

That's all the tetras gone. Some bodies are unaccounted for and I'd need to go through the tank with a comb to find them.

There are four Danios left, and they're not looking well. Whatever this is, it is DEADLY. Let this be a lesson to all and sundry - plan your additions carefully and QUARANTINE.

 

There is a certain petshop i used to get fish from, and i had the same thing happen to me. i had about 100 green neons when they were pretty rare a good few years ago, and couldn't resist adding a couple more from this petshop when i saw more, and the new ones died, and took all my other green neons with them.. lesson learned, quarantine 1st.

sorry you are going through this

 

Thank you. As usual my father is an amazing pep talker as well and he helped me abandon the feelings of guilt and self-blame - and helplessness - which compose the bulk of the bad emotions.

After doing some research, I have dosed the water with 500ml of 0.5mg/L chlorhexidine gluconate solution after the last of the tetras were gone. The effective ppm isn't nearly enough to harm the remaining Danios (theoretically) but at this point I have little left to lose by trying it and the Danios are hanging in there - for now. If they survive this it will be a miracle and something to celebrate, so I have that to look forward to at least. But I'm tempering my expectations.

 

You know what's utterly ridiculous? With only a few tiny fish left in the tank, and with the ADA light on full blast, I am getting an absurd amount of pearling and water column trails as the water gets saturated with oxygen...

 

silver linings

 

Yes. It reminds me that there is life in there and that it isn't a glass coffin.

 

Well this is very interesting, and another potential tool for the boxotrix.

Chlorhexidine is a general-purpose biocide and an agaecide - and this is what it does to what is either BBA or GHA covered in diatoms - at a concentration of less than 0.003ppm (if my calculations are correct). Get rekt bitches. It remains to be seen if the plants are affected but I'll do a water change tomorrow. The tiniest of the danios passed, there are three left and they are feebly swimming around at the surface but are keeping their orientation and are very alert and dash for cover when I move my hand closer. Hold thumbs for me, guys!

 

And that was all she wrote - all the fish are gone. At least the ordeal is over.

 

MASSIVE bacterial bloom today. I never did account for all of the dead fish even after repeatedly blasting the substrate and all the nooks and crannies with a flow pump. Possibly also a superinfection as the chlorhexidine got deactivated overnight (it very rapidly binds to organic materal). The water temperature is also 26'C as I'm slowly increasing it to give any potential nasties their just desserts. If costia is in there, boy oh boy is it in for a torrid time. The plants will have to hang in there.



No pearling from the plants either and the cause is obvious - it's pretty scary actually and suggests that baccy blooms are not to be taken lightly if you have livestock.

 

the bacterial bloom is feeding on something, are you sure all your params, ammonia etc. are all good?

 

The last time I tested it was yesterday, 0/0/10. Let me do a quickie, I also want to know.

 

Just do water change every day. get rid of excess nutrients in the water.

 

Light is a bit gnarly but the results are clear enough. Not unexpected at all - it's either dead fish that I can't find, Jimmy Hoffa, or I crashed the cycle with the Chlorhexidine - or all of the above. The pH might be lower than 7.4 but icba to do a wide range test now. It's academic at this point - it needs to sort itself out and any missing fishy friends are now committed to the deep, and to the good health of my plants.

 

With the utmost respect, my response is... nah.

 

feed the plants

 

My pretties must fly, especially the dead ones.

 

My Riccardia have been patiently biding their time for nearly two months - they weren't kidding when they said it's a slow grower!



I would judge that they have doubled, maaaaaybe tripled in volume during that time. It could just be due to the fact that they're growing in hermetic little pots with nothing but agar to sustain them.



When this lot clears and I can risk sticking my hands in the water again without the skin peeling off, I think I might have a go at rehoming one of these in the water column, on the big rock. Chances are it'll melt, chances are it won't. We'll see!

 

I didn't crash the cycle after all. Readings are 0/0/0 this morning. On a hunch I added the last few drops of CHG solution from the empty bottle to the test tube and it immediately turned green - so the chlorhexidine product contains ammonia despite it being labeled as "in a pure aqueous solution". I'll contact the manufacturer on Monday to confirm. I dosed my remaining danios with ammonia when it's the last thing they needed