Tetras gone wild!

[L number Banana]

An unexpected happening:
So, I get some cardinal tetras to make my bare tank look lived in while I wait for the glass cats to arrive, the plants to get a bit larger and find some more branches.

I bought seven, one died overnight, so I brought back the corpse and got seven more plus one replacement. Two dead overnight, two more during the day..
They were showing no signs of anything wrong (other than being dead of course).
Panic
Water changes like mad, testing the water for everything and anything, phone the LFS, the owner reassures me that some people just have bad luck with cardinal tetras, even she has trouble with dwarf gourami but is totally successful with everything else including running the best LFS in town (my opinion). She suggests that sometimes they just get stressed out or something. The ones still at the store are fine. Obviously I don't have to buy Cardinals for my replacements, so no rush. Dead guys are in the fridge
I feel better, sort of. I DID just kill some lovely little fish
Try to figure what could be stressing them out if that's the case. Maybe they need more company...?
I scoop my seven older Glowlight tetras out of one of the other tanks and add them in with the cardinals for company.

Today the rest of the cardinals are doing great but the glowlights have gone wild! Three have decided they're Mommas and all the boys are chasing them into the plants, doing the flip-flip thing and they're scattering eggs everywhere!!!

Apparently they hatch in about 25 hours!
Eeek, what do I do?

[Jools]

Good about the spawning. What, exactly, is your routine for getting from fish in bag at home to fish in tank?

Jools

[L number Banana]

Thanks, Jools though I can't take credit for the spawning - ph change/temp change.

I don't think I killed them by transport issues but, just in case I'm missing something, here's my usual routine:
The LFS has higher ph so it's kinda slow.

LFS to home: usually on my lap in the winter for short trips or in the styrofoam container with a 'warm' hot water bottle at the opposite end of the fish bags. These guys were lap/dark cloth because the LFS is about 10 minute drive. No stryrofoam container so no stops on the way.

I leave them floating in the bag for a while because the temp in the tank is warmer. Open the bag after maybe 20 mins and start adding wee bits of my water to the bag. The change in ph would have been from 7.3 or 7.5 to 6.5. The first bag took about two hours of that water changing, the second batch longer since I thought that the ph change may have been too fast but I lost more from the second batch. They were more blue than the first batch. Scoop the fish out eventually and dump the LFS water.

Too long in the bag water maybe? Perhaps the lady at the LFS was just being polite about me killing her fish. I'm pretty sure there's no issue with how they were caught at the store, I've only ever lost a couple otos from there and nothing ever from my time before catfish.

Any ideas?

[Farid]

hi,
if i get any fish ...i personally think it's not the pH change neither is it the KH but i am quite sure the only thing fishes have to adjust to, is the conductivity as this is the only thing that can give a fish body stress during osmotic pressures...
this is my version....

looking at the behavour of marine fishes getting adjusted to new waters the stress is shown immediatly!!starting with white dots up to uncontrolled drifting around same in freshwater with neon tetras...

also fishes from harder (KH) water need to be adjusted a bit longer if the new water is soft (less KH)
the other way round the same fishes can be less sensitive...

rgds
farid

[andywoolloo]

that seems like a very long time in the bag to me, altho you are opening it.

I like to get them out of that bag asap. I use a fish bucket and put them in there with their bag water and slowly drip the water form the tank into the bucket. I cover this bucket with a screen and watch them and when I am done acclimating I scoop them up and add to tank. Usually in bucket for like 20 mins I think. Unk if I do it right or not tho.

**edited for typos**

[L number Banana]

Farid wrote:

looking at the behavour of marine fishes getting adjusted to new waters the stress is shown immediatly!!starting with white dots up to uncontrolled drifting around same in freshwater with neon tetras...

I chose the Cardinal tetra instead of the neon tetra because I read that the water temperature of 25c is better for them. The ones that died didn't have any spots or the like. The first one was the most blue of the 7 and it was on the substrate in the morning, Still no spots or anything that I could see. In the second batch, there were several that were more blue than the others and these may have been the ones that died that night. The two that died during the day looked fine in the morning but when I looked in the tank around noon, they were on the bottom.

i personally think it's not the pH change neither is it the KH but i am quite sure the only thing fishes have to adjust to, is the conductivity as this is the only thing that can give a fish body stress during osmotic pressures...
this is my version....

Not sure of the conductivity but the fish store uses our local water and the tank they went into had about 1/3 rainwater added.

The Cardinals left in the tank are all doing well, eating and swimming fine - no casualties this morning.

andywoolloo wrote:

that seems like a very long time in the bag to me, altho you are opening it.

Maybe I could slip an airstone into the bag or bucket? Perhaps 7 and 8 in one bag just contains too much ammonia?
Very frustrating. I've always been lucky but it seems the more I know, the more problems I have Or maybe I just buy more fish to have things go wrong with

For anyone that wants to see what the little glowlights were doing, here's a couple of videos of their spawning. Canon powershot in shaky hands!
Don't laugh at my coconut, I'm testing shapes The one in the video looks like a cartoon-style hut - it has a java for a flag

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[krazyGeoff]

Hi L-Number
I always had the same issue with my cardinals, and it drove me nuts. Finally I settled on the following technique and never lost one since....

Open the bag and rest it in the tank, with the bag hanging over the side of the lid. Sit it there for 1/2 hour.
Then add 1/2 cup of water to bag. Wait 1/2 hour and add another 1/2 cup. Repeat this until the bag can't fit any more water and rest over the lid, or until you have added 5 cups.
Yup thats 4-5 hours of acclimatisation.
At $7.00 each or whatever I was paying it was way uncool for 10 to die overnight.

Worked for me.

ps. like your new avitar......

[wrasse]

Sounds like you have a very good LFS. And only 10 minutes away, so that's not an issue.

for the glowlights to be spawning your tank is oviously fine, and in any case your remaining cardinals are well.

Sometimes, when you look at a tank of cardinals - or similar - in a shop, you can see that some are suspect specimens. Too thin, stunted, bent fins, etc etc. Some assistants are good with a net, some are hopeless and just stress the fish. Maybe get some more, but get an assistant with a trained eye. The big change in PH could be the issue and might cause acidosis. I don't know how you get around that unless you set up a tank with the same conditions as the shop tank. That's the risk we all take when buying fish.

[MatsP]

LNB: Do you measure the pH/TDS(EC) of the water in the bag and the new tank? If they are similar, you don't need to keep the fish in the bag for very long at all. If the difference is big, then you need to go slowly.

--
Mats

[PlecoCrazy]

While setting the fish in your lap help's keep them warm you need to pay attention to the corners of the bag. sometimes those guys are swimming down into the corners and when you set the bag down on your lap, car seat, etc.; fish become trapped in the corners. While some may not perish right away the outcome is the death of the fish usually. I usually lay my bag's on their sides to avoid the corner problem. That may or may not be your problem but something to look for.

[L number Banana]

LNB: Do you measure the pH/TDS(EC) of the water in the bag and the new tank? If they are similar, you don't need to keep the fish in the bag for very long at all. If the difference is big, then you need to go slowly.

--
Mats

Still don't have my TDS meter yet but the pH is quite different. They have 7.4 or so and my tank is 6.5. That was what I worried about most so I tried to take my time (as described above) but maybe it wasn't long enough. Do you think I should pop an airstone in if I do it over many hours? Going to the LFS tonight for my credit - there was another dead one this morning

Plecocrazy wrote:
While setting the fish in your lap help's keep them warm you need to pay attention to the corners of the bag. sometimes those guys are swimming down into the corners and when you set the bag down on your lap, car seat, etc.; fish become trapped in the corners. While some may not perish right away the outcome is the death of the fish usually. I usually lay my bag's on their sides to avoid the corner problem. That may or may not be your problem but something to look for.

I lay the bag flat so it sits with my legs touching either side/bottom but it's always something to watch for anyway, especially with such small fish like the cardinals. I have to be really careful even when tipping the bag when it has a twig catfish in it, those pointy noses can get into mighty small folds!

Changed more water this morning but the readings are still good. Oh, this sucks, they're such sweet little fish and there's no way the glass cats are going in there until I can figure it out. The other tetras (glowlights) are still doing great.

Argh, now I have to decide what to do, buy more tetras or try some other fish that likes the same conditions. They have all the regular guys like pencils, rasboras, danios and many more kinds of tetra.

Time to read up on all the others. Will my tetras be okay with just four buddies? Will they school with the other tetras once the bigger? They still seem kind of shy compared to the glowlights.

[L number Banana]

Gasp! I found another dead guy I had missed before. He's probably been there a couple days - should have counted better. He was all fuzzy
Three left and lots of water changes to make up for missing the dead guy who was probably contaminating my water.

Got my credit at the store tonight but couldn't decide what to buy. The little rummynose tetras were calling me but they got the glass cats in so I asked if I could let them hang at the store for a while before introducing them, no problem. They got the kuhli loaches in too. I'll use the credit for the glass cats so I can start with a better shoal.

I don't have enough plant cover to get the cats yet and I don't have an extra QT tank. They have been marked down to 3 for $20 though
Think I should unleash the hornwort to cover the surface while I wait for the larger leaved plants to provide cover?

Can ya tell I'm excited? Diamonds are a girls best friend? Hah, phooey.

[racoll]

Sometimes, when you look at a tank of cardinals - or similar - in a shop, you can see that some are suspect specimens. Too thin, stunted, bent fins, etc etc.

Indeed. This is because they are mass produced.

I wouldn't keep captive bred cardinals if you paid me. Look at them funny, and they die.

Wild caught specimens look completely different in the shop, and are in another league altogether - never had any problems with mine.

Also, they prefer warm water, like 28C+, which is why they are often kept with discus.

They also do not appreciate bright lighting.

[Jools]

Wild caught specimens look completely different in the shop, and are in another league altogether - never had any problems with mine.

Yes, and they are certainly in good nick as I've been looking after them for around a year (?) now. The only thing Rupert gave me that's been easier to keep was a lot of bogwood.

Jools

[L number Banana]

Got the glass cats and they're awesome!
Much prettier up close that at the LFS where I couldn't get right in their face (5'3'). And yes you can see the little heart pumping behind the silvery bit. Cool.
They take flake grudgingly and take freeze-dried Brineshrimp and FD Tubifex but seem to lose their minds with frozen Brineshrimp. Quite a site.
A few snails have managed to find their way into the new tank much to my horror but the glass cats have gotten the idea that following The Hand as it squishes snails is a good way to eat as well. They come to the surface for feeding but only after I swish a bit of the frozen shrimp into the water.
They're mostly mid-level swimmers at this point but rest in an open space near the bottom at night, all lined up like they're waiting for the opera.
They still check out their reflections in the side glass but no serious bumping or anything, just swimming up to it and checking it out with their whiskers.
So far they don't have a preference for the darker area with plant cover or the very bright areas where the plants haven't taken over yet. Sometimes a couple of them sit in the hornwort directly under the lights.
They also don't seem to have a preference as to which end of the tank they like - one is more consistently warmer because it's near the pellet stove and the heater almost never turns on. The far end of the tank has the heater come on a few times a day. The thermometer only shows a degree difference so not enough for the fish to care I guess.
Two of them like to chase the Cardinal tetras but the tetras are fast so they give up the chase quickly.

Since I had several cardinals not make it and 3 malayan halfbeaks go the same way, I only introduced 7 of the glass cats. I'll definitely be getting more since what ever the issue was, it's not my water. I was thinking of a school of 11 but now that I see them, I'd like much more than that. AND they have those smiley catfish faces!

The tank already needs rearranging since the branches I picked out have managed to roll over enough that it's blocked up the largest open swimming area. Need to devise a way to secure the branches to some slate or rock. I had them pinned in an arc that was just held there by tension. Bad idea. So far I only have the HOB Whisper 40 filter on this tank and the reading have been stable with the addition of my 8 twigs and the seven glass cats. Was expecting to have to bring over the other little whisper filter but so far so good and the silence of this tank is heavenly.

Okay, how do I photograph a see-through fish nicely??? Thank god I'm using digital because every photograph has been terrible!

Tip for catfish people trying to get 'girls' to like their fish: So far the guys and kids say, "Cool!" and my women friends all say ,"Eew, they're like skeletons!"