Fish Tank issue...?

Question

We've had a fish tank for over a year and all the fish were doing great. We had a total of 6 different fish in the tank for the last year and about 3-4 days ago we added an algae eater to the tank and he stuck to the glass and did his thing. Well now it's been 4 days with the new algae eater and came home from work to my kids crying that all the fish were dead except 2 but those 2 shuld be on the way out cuz they are swimming around faster and crazier than they usually do and the ones that died were acting like that a few days before they died. Is that normal for fish to act like that before they die? Would an algae eater be the cause of the dealth of the 5 fish? Any ideas?

Answer 1

Is it the "Chinese Algae Eater"? These are the most aggressive ones and they are small and cute eating algae when young but when it grows and mature they will barly eat algae and instead they will become so territorial that they will hang on to any close by fish, remove their slime coat and kill them.

Dont mistake this from the siamese algae eater(make sure its the real one) which are peaceful and are called flying foxes.

And also i was doing some research and found out that there have been some carnivore pleco which i cant find in particular that hunts at night and kills fish but are hard to find. I have 4 large ones but they are not carnivoure nor aggressive and they are with 2 small cory catfish. And is quite easy to maintain the bioload from this fish when you get the proper filter and tank size. So its definitly the Chinese Algae Eater.

Algae eater list:
Heres the good ones:
Pleco(Plecostomus)
Oto(Otocinclus Catfish)
Siamese Algae Eater(Flying Foxes)
Whiptail Catfish
Royal Farlowella Catfish
Loricaria Catfish

Caution ones:
Gold Algae Eater

Worst one:
Chinese Algae Eater(The one that you might have)

Hope this info helps
WT

Answer 2

What type of algae eater was this? If it was a Chinese algae eater, it may very well be the cause of the other fishes' deaths. Chinese algae eaters only eat algae as juveniles. As they mature, they become aggressive, mean fish, and they develop a taste for the slime coat of other fish in the tank. This leaves the fish without a protective coat, so they're more vunerable to infections and parasites, if the stress doesn't kill them outright.

If this was a plecostomous (pleco), it may be an indirect cause of death, depending on it's size and the size of the tank. Plecos produce a lot of waste, including ammonia which is toxic to fish. It's possible that if your tank was close to being fully stocked already, the addition of the new fish produced more ammonia than the bacteria in the tank could process into less harmful compounds, and the fish died from ammonia poisoning. A 50% water change ASAP may be able to help the remaining fish if the concentration isn't too high. Do the change, then take a sample of tank water to your pet store and have them run a water test on it. If there's ammonia abive 0.5ppm after the water was changed, this may have been the cause.

Answer 3

If your talking about a Chinese algae eater then you have a territorial fish that becomes more aggressive with age. It can get to be about 10" long and it is most likely the cause of the other fish deaths in your tank. Return it to the store and get 2 Otocinclus. Chinese algae eaters are great for algae control but are not community fish.

Answer 4

This is so wierd this happened to me yesterday we got an Alage eater a week and a half ago and yesterday 5 out of my 7 fish were dead, and about 2 days prior they were acting crazy swimming really fast and shaking the other 2 died later the same night, acting all crazy before they died, very strange, we brought a sample of water down to the pet store and they said it was fine, so I guess we'll start over again. I say the hell with it lets get a dog. I'm so not a fish person.

Answer 5

It seems a strange coincidence if its not somehow involved.first off ,what kind of algae eater did you get.
one issue with the commonly called chinese algae eater is that they are known to try and suck the slime off some fish when they get older. this may be the case here but you usually notice this behaviour or at least notice the damage to the sides of your fish. if this is the case they can't be untrained so they have to go.
a second possibility is that as this is a new fish he may have brought a disease with him (as a carrier) that has affected your "clean" tank rather harshly look for fuzz or discoloration to indicate a specific disease you may be able to treat
thirdly it may be totally unrelated but fish dying like this might be a water condition so get some tests done (PH,Nitrates and ammonia) just to rule out this possibility and do some water changes

Answer 6

Most tanks are sealed with a special silicon, and we have a tank we repaired with marine silicon, so I don't think that is your problem. It sounds like your ammonia levels are high, you need to keep them at 0 just like your nitrites. I would try doing a 50% water change asap, and use the water conditioner and stress zyme like always. What I also find works is using a bit of aquarium salt in our tanks, by using the recommended amount, it also helps with stress and keeps the bad bacteria levels down. You may also have some of the disease left in your tank that killed your other fish, you can try sterilizing the tank and eveything in it with boiling water (without the fish in of course). If you keep goldfish, they always require more water changes. But I would try out tetras, as they tend to be easier and more hardy. And by turning your heater up to 80, it helps to any diseases to run their courses faster. I don't know what else to tell you, my mom had the same problem when I was young, but now that I am into fish keeping we rarely ever have a problem. PS: Don't use the testing strips, they are not as accurate in readings as the liquid water test kits are. Edit: sounds to me like your tank may be too small for your goldfish. You have about a 10 gallon tank and need to have at least a 20 gallon for one goldfish alone. This may be why you are having problems with goldfish. Try getting a larger tank for the goldfish, and switch to just tetras in the smaller tank. You can fit a couple of good sized schools in a 10 gallon. You cannot put goldfish with tropical though because the neons require a temp of about 77-80F, and goldfish room temp. With goldfish you have to be doing at least a 25% water change once a week. They produce ALOT of ammonia. You can siphon the gravel every 2 weeks. Feed them about as much as they will eat in 2 or 3 minutes twice a day. If they don't finish all the food, take any leftovers out and cut back a bit on the amount you give them.

Answer 7

Loose the algae eater! I had the same problem years ago. It killed all my fish. Then I watched it grow and grow in the tank by himself. Anytime I tried to put other fish in the tank, he Sucked them up, then spit them out. The fish he kinda ate swam around all crippled, then died. The algae eater grew to almost 12 inches before I decided to introduce him to the toilet bowl.