losing fish?

Question

Our family just purchased a 38 gallon fish tank 14day ago.
We purchased the tank at a local pet store in a small town we live in. We had a tank established already but it was small (2 gallon). The pet store owner told us we could jump starts the new tank with the old one. Addition to that information he also told us we could put up to 25 fish in our new tank as soon a possible and sold us 25 fish in the 3days. Our big mistake we should have did our research before buying the fish (too many fish too fast). We lost 10 fish every few days since then.
The pet store owner replaced the First 3 fish no problem but the fourth and fifth fish, I took in a water sample for some help. He at that point refused to replace anymore fish told me I had new tank syndrome.
I Asked what I could do to help the fish survive he sold me a bacteria additive (very expensive) to add to the tank and that point told me he would not replace anymore fish. Put in the additive on the 4th day and I have no seen any change in the tank and I am still losing fish.
I need help please!!! Still losing 1 to 3 fish daily, my children and I are getting very upset not knowing what to really do. We never had a big tank before and just a Beta Fish.
3 molly, 2 bala sharks, 1 tiger barb, 2 danio, 1 red tail shark, 1 gourami, 1 cat fish, and 1 acanthicus Adonis
The Water Temp. range is 78-76 degrees,
Nitrate level is 20 ppm,
Nitrite level is 30 ppms
Hardness is 150 ppm
No chlorine
Total alkalinity is 180
pH is 7.8

addtional infromtion:
The shop owner refused to help us with this problem after the fish started die( so this is no option). I went online: did some research and called other fish stores all informtion so far they have recommened to changge filters and to do from a 10% to a 50%water changes every 2 days. Did not no which was right so I have been doing 10% water changes every two days and rinsing out the filter. This is the reason I writing you.
I have used salt as recommend.
The water seems cloudy but white.
The fish we had in the 2 gallon tank have survired and are swimming strong.
It seems the fish we purchased the the pet store are the only ones dieing.
Could the fish be ill from the pet store?

Answer 1

first off with your new tank .. quit changing the water.. it kills the good bacteria that your tank needs. it sounds line you have way to many fish to start off.. and it can take a month for the tank to settle and stabilize. more than likely you might lose the rest of the fish.

best suggestion i can make is warn the children that this is a start and be prepared.. secondly go to a place like petco or petsmart that offer a 14 day life warranty.. i get all my fish there and if they die they replace them.. they also do free water tests at petco..

whatever you do dont change your filter or water for the next 2 weeks at least.. the water might get a cloudy white.. that is bacteria bloom it is a great thing.. it will settle.. make sure you are using a chlorine remover on the water you currently have.. if you didnt use it when you filled and changed.. add some.


past that you have to wait and see

Answer 2

Wow! Are the fish you listed above (We never had a big tank before and just a Beta Fish.
3 molly, 2 bala sharks, 1 tiger barb, 2 danio, 1 red tail shark, 1 gourami, 1 cat fish, and 1 acanthicus Adonis) where in your 2 gallon tank? Do you know how small that is?
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The first big mistake you made was to listen to the pet store salesman and not reseach what you are doing. Even if you tank is established (meaning that there are enough bacteria to sustain the ammonia level to 0 and nitrite too.) you shouldn't add 25 fish at a time.

Answer 3

First, buy a bottle of Prime from Seachem. Its in a red bottle and most pet stores including Petsmart and Petco carry it.

It will detoxify the nitrates, nitrites, amonia and chlorine/chloramine. It will also let the biofilter mature without killing your fish.

This is way too many fish though as you've already been told. The bala sharks will get very big and the mollies will reproduce very fast as well.

I'd at least take back the bala sharks at this point and do some more research on what kind of fish and tank that you want.

You don't need the bacteria starter if you use the prime. Let nature provide it for free.




Only get a couple fish at a time and keep up the use of the Prime according to the directions,

Answer 4

ok, the fish store guy is out of his mind. He NEVER should have sold you ANY fish that soon.

With Nitrite levels that high, your fish will ALL surely die. They cannot live like that. Here's what you do, take every single fish and bring them back to the fish store. Tell them you're returning them and you want a FULL refund for all the fish and the bacteria additive you bought. They will probably refuse, but you should stand your ground and speak to the manager. If they still won't bend I would threaten to call the media, the better business bureau and the ASPCA and tell them what's going on.

I cannot think of a worse way to start up a tank, and that store is either so stupid they shouldn't be running a shop or they are so corrupt and greedy they just want to make a sale. That is just plain outrageous what they have done to you (and those poor fish who are suffering). They have totally taken advantage of you and they should not be allowed to get away with that. I'm sure they're doing it to many more people.

Get those fish back to the store immediately. Don't wait because they probably won't survive more than a couple more hours. And make a BIG stink of it while you're there.

Answer 5

Well, I guess you learned the hard way not to trust what salespeople in pet stores tell you - after all, there's a reason they have the term "sales" in their titles.

Up to a point the info you were given was correct - if you moved your earlier fish, gravel, and old filter into the larger tank you would have been fine. After all, the old gravel and filter already had enough bacteria to support your fish by breaking down their wastes. Your mistake was to add the additional fish all at one time - this didn't give the bacteria enough time to reproduce to handle the additional wastes.

Your major problem right now seems to be the nitrite - this starts to stress fish at 0.5 ppm. Higher can be extremely toxic, as you're finding out. The only solution is a series of water changes to bring it down, but you don't want rapid changes to your fishes' environment either. I would suggest starting with a 50% water change ASAP. Just add the new water slowly - if you gave a spare milk jug or large soda bottle that's empty, you can sit it on a board or top of the filter and poke a pinhole at the bottom - this will add new water gradually. Just try to match the temperature, and use whatever product you normally do to remove chlorine/chloramine. You may need additional 50 % water changes until you can get the nitrite level within a safe range for your fish. Also, if you add some aquarium salt or other salt without iodine (can be kosher, canning, pickling, or rock salt, or table salt without iodine added) at 1 tablespoon per 5 gallons of tank water, this helps to protect your fish against the affects of nitrite.

Answer 6

Ugh. The pet store owner should not have sold you all those fish before you got the new tank established. :(

I'm afraid the only thing you really can do is to ride it out. Your tank needs to cycle and establish itself before you add fish to it. Replacing your losses will need to wait until the tank has cycled. In the meantime, you should do partial water changes (10-15%) once every two weeks or so for a couple of months to alleviate stress on the fish you already have in there while your tank establishes itself.

Answer 7

well it seems to me like the bacteria additive didnt work because i bought mine from petco the first time i bought my tank and it made it work the day i bought the fish so if you have a walmart near you go to it and there is like a green and white package of bacteria additive that really does work and its not very expensive it says it can be used in salt or fresh water i used mine in both and that really helps also the fish could just be stressed out. so you can get tank buddies stress reducer they are sold in little blue and red packets in the fish section in walmart and in petco and petsmart. also aquarium salt works very well too dont be fooled by the name it is for fresh water fish its not the same kind of salt as salt water fish use so put as much as it says of that in. when im setting up a tank i usually put a few algae tablets in like the kind you can buy for bottom feeders and that usually helps but since you already had your tank running for quite a few days i dont know if that would help or not. i hope you stop loosing fish.

Answer 8

Hi Unknown, Unscrupulous pet store advice is rife in the world of fish keeping & unhappily you have just found that out-many of them are only after your money. It IS possible to jump-start a larger tank from a smaller one but only really as long as the bigger one is only up to twice the size of the smaller one.

I suggest you contact your local consumers association/Citizens advice centre & report this fool, not only is he causing grief by needless cruelty he is upsetting you & your family & on top of all that is giving you advice that is totally wrong & designed merely to extract money from your bank account. I suggest you confront him with this first, if he realises you know what you're talking about & know he's been telling porkies he may relent & refund your money for these poor fish as well as the other equipment. As a consumer you have every right to expect proper, helpful & constructive advice from someone in the fish keeping trade.