# My platy getting weaker day by day!



## rca.myworld (19 Nov 2020)

Hi,
I am having a problem with my platy fish. The fish is been with me since June when I started the fish aquarium. She has been good until now but I have noticed she started to loose weight. I also see her not eating much really. She doesn't eat that much like she used to.

In terms of water parameters
Ammonia - 0 ppm
Nitrite - 0 ppm
Nitrate - 80 ppm
GH - 60 ppm
KH - 80 ppm
water temp: 23-24
PH: 7.0

This is the 80 litre Superfish Home 80 with lots of plants.  I have used esha2000, 2 doses about a month ago but no change. My platy is not eating much nowadays. What I have seen is that it doesn't want to eat anything but do come whenever I am feeding other platys. Her fellows specially her friend is really worried as I can see them coming to her and try to nudge her a bit. One thing to add is that other platys are all OK and they are her fellows and thriving. 
Is there an another treatment I can give her? She is the mother of other fry in my smaller 28 litre tank so I'm really worried.

I don't have third tank so the only other thing I can do is to move her to frys tank. The frys are now quite big so no need to worry.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
RK


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## rca.myworld (8 Dec 2020)

rca.myworld said:


> Hi,
> I am having a problem with my platy fish. The fish is been with me since June when I started the fish aquarium. She has been good until now but I have noticed she started to loose weight. I also see her not eating much really. She doesn't eat that much like she used to.
> 
> In terms of water parameters
> ...


Apologies but I haven't been around the forum recently. 
Some update. I have moved the platy with it's frys which are now quite big and she is ok in there. 
I have done 2 doses of King British disease clear. She hasn't gain much weight but she is going around. 
What I have noticed is that she try to eat flakes or micro pellets but she just gets them out of her mouth again even micro pellets which are for frys she can't properly eat. 
I think it must be some sort of mouth disease. What else I can give her. She has lost quite a considerable weight and I am afraid if this doesn't sort out she might die. 
Please help. Can I give her something else? 

Thanks


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## Hufsa (8 Dec 2020)

It sounds like she might have intestinal parasites. Im not familiar with the medication you mention, what are the active ingredients?
It might be a good move to treat with a medicine targeted specifically towards internal parasites. You would need to treat the entire tank and not just the one fish, as it is quite contagious, and while she is having the most symptoms, odds are all of them will have them to some degree


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## Hufsa (8 Dec 2020)

Also if she has any more symptoms that would be very useful to know. Does she itch herself on decor, does she hang around the surface, or on the bottom, etc?


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## rca.myworld (8 Dec 2020)

Hufsa said:


> It sounds like she might have intestinal parasites. Im not familiar with the medication you mention, what are the active ingredients?
> It might be a good move to treat with a medicine targeted specifically towards internal parasites. You would need to treat the entire tank and not just the one fish, as it is quite contagious, and while she is having the most symptoms, odds are all of them will have them to some degree


Thanks for this. The active ingredients I found are Silver proteinate 0.151% w/w.
Yeah, I will do both tanks but what medicine you recommend for internal parasites? Are there any which are safer for plants and shrimps? I moved her from my 80-litre superfish and that have both shrimps, neon tetras and a couple of other platys plus guppies. 


Hufsa said:


> Also if she has any more symptoms that would be very useful to know. Does she itch herself on decor, does she hang around the surface, or on the bottom, etc?


She doesn't itch on any decor or anything. I see her sometime hang around the surface and sometimes she is in the bottom so I would say 50/50.

Thanks


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## Hufsa (8 Dec 2020)

Im not from the UK so im not sure what the local brands are, but if I were you I would try to find something with the active ingredient Levamisole hydrochloride (sometimes just written levamisole or levamisole HCL)
It is safe for your filter, plants and shrimp and is very effective.


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## rca.myworld (8 Dec 2020)

Hufsa said:


> Im not from the UK so im not sure what the local brands are, but if I were you I would try to find something with the active ingredient Levamisole hydrochloride (sometimes just written levamisole or levamisole HCL)
> It is safe for your filter, plants and shrimp and is very effective.


Thank you. 
I have searched for Levamisole hydrochloride and found eSHA-NDX treatment on google.  I will ring LFS tomorrow and if they have it, I will buy asap. If not then I will order online. Available from Amazon/eBay. 
Has anyone else got any ideas or opinion? 
Cheers


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## dw1305 (8 Dec 2020)

Hi all,


rca.myworld said:


> Has anyone else got any ideas or opinion?


<"Harka verm"> contains Levamisole HCl. They sell it for cage birds and pigeons, so it maybe easier to find locally for you.

cheers Darrel


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## rca.myworld (15 Dec 2020)

Hi All,
I have now got Esha ndx which contains Levamisole HCl.  I did the first dose on Sunday. Here are the pictures of the said platy. She is looking really weaker.
Can I do the 2nd dose today after taking of 50% water change and without using dechlorination? That's what the instructions said on the product. 
Although the pictures are not clear but can you guys realise what it is seeing the pictures? 
I haven't seen her eating yet though. 
Thanks.


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## Hufsa (15 Dec 2020)

Its not easy to say, best course is to follow the instructions in the packet, and when the medicine allows, give her lots of clean water with water changes. She might be a bit worse for wear and need some time to recover.


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## rca.myworld (16 Dec 2020)

Hufsa said:


> Its not easy to say, best course is to follow the instructions in the packet, and when the medicine allows, give her lots of clean water with water changes. She might be a bit worse for wear and need some time to recover.


Many thanks.


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## rca.myworld (19 Jan 2021)

Hi all,

I urgently need some help with my favourite platy fish. She is not well at all. The last one I talked about before in the forum have since died. 
This one had given lots of Frys but seem unwell. First she had a problem with her mouth which seem like mouth rot so I gave her antil fungal from interpret. Now the mouth rot is gone but she is very lethargic and swimming on her head so another platy was after her. I have noticed this in the morning and she seems a goner but I managed to take her out and give her an aquarium salt bath for 30-45 minutes with disease clear from king fish and plenty of oxygen. 
She seems ok but when I took her again to the tank the biggest platy is after her again and again. They have been together since June so don't know what happened.
I have now put her in the breathing box but she is clearly not well.
I have checked water parameters and they seems all ok.  Ammoni :0 ppm. pH is on a slightly higher at 8 but this has been the case for past 6-7 months. I am planning to bring either peat moss or some almond leaves to naturally lower pH but what else I can do here. 
I don't want to loose her as she is my and my children's favourite. Please let me know anything which can help. 
Is there such a thing as fish vet for fish this size?
Thank you very much.


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## Hufsa (19 Jan 2021)

It doesnt look very good for her im afraid if shes upside down  
Sometimes the kindest thing is to stop their suffering if they are very poorly.. Its a hard choice to make and something you have to decide yourself.
Your ammonia reading is 0, was this with a liquid test or with a strip test? As far as I have been told the liquid tests are more accurate than the strips.
I would like to know your nitrite as well, have you tested that?
Dont chase your ph, stability is more important than getting an exact number.
Since more than one of your fish has fallen ill, I would look to your tank to see if there is something that is causing this. How often do you change water, and how much? What sort of substrate do you have, can you give us some general details of your tank and inhabitants. Do you "clean" the filter, how often and in what way. 
Healthy strong fish dont fall ill for no reason. Sometimes you randomly lose a fish but when there are several I would consider if it could be a systemic issue.


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## rca.myworld (19 Jan 2021)

Hufsa said:


> It doesnt look very good for her im afraid if shes upside down
> Sometimes the kindest thing is to stop their suffering if they are very poorly.. Its a hard choice to make and something you have to decide yourself.
> Your ammonia reading is 0, was this with a liquid test or with a strip test? As far as I have been told the liquid tests are more accurate than the strips.
> I would like to know your nitrite as well, have you tested that?
> ...


Hi Hufsa,
Thank you for responding back.
I test with liquid test. Mine is from NT labs and they are good.
Nitrite was 0.25.
I have put her back into smaller tank with rest of the original bunch. They are all in the big tank and I only moved them 3 days ago but she seems a bit bad after giving birth. She contacted mouth rot at least about a month ago. After counting the frys the bigger tank seem crowded although it's 80 litres.
I normally clean the tank every 1 week, sometimes it can be 2 weeks but mostly one week. I do clean the filters in aquarium water. Do put in the beneficial bacteria everytime I clean the tanks. Also for last Oct I have been using Seachem prime for dechlorination.
Smaller tank:
This tank is my first setup so all it has are sand, gravel mix, a wood piece with a heather and internal filter. I had put a sponge on the filter intake which I normally discard after every 3 months or so. The tank is 28 litres. I have only got 3 orange platies including the one shown in picture. One male rainbow platy, one slightly bigger tuxedo female platy. One zebra danio male. One guppy male.
The bigger tank:
This was my 2nd tank. It has got lava rocks on the  the bottom and tropica substrate on top. It has some seiryu rocks and one piece of wood with plenty of plants. I again do the similar clear maintenance here although compare to smaller one the water remain clean in this one for longer but I still do maintenance for both at the same time. I don't run any carbon in my filters.

The only thing I can think of is that I don't have a proper setup for taking out water or putting it back in. I normally clear out in the bucket and then put in tap water but until I don't finish topping up I don't put prime or bacteria.
The tanks are in the furtherest corner room of the flat, while kitchen is at the back like most UK terrace flats.
Hope this is sufficient.

Regards
Rk


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## Hufsa (19 Jan 2021)

Okay, that is probably the reason there. Nitrite should be 0 at all times.
I know from my own tank that when I change things too much, or feed too much food, the water quality will become poor (nitrite or ammonia), and the fish can become sick as a result.

Now that we have a lead on the cause of the sick fish, I have a few more questions, if you dont mind.
When you say you clean the tank, exactly what do you do then? Do you only take out water and put in new water, or do you do anything else?
I also take it there might be a lot of fish in your tank now since you have all the fry. Its really easy to overfeed fish, Ive struggled with that personally and what helped me was the knowledge that a fish needs only about the size of his eye in food every day. So you can look at all your fish, add up all the eyeballs and then you can know about how much food they need. More food than this will not be good for them, and it will be very hard on your filter. If you feed too much the filter becomes overwhelmed with bad water quality as a result.

That sounds like a lot of fish for a small tank, 28 liters is a nano tank and can only support a few small fish.
Would it be possible for some of the fish to find new homes, maybe by private sale or asking if your local fish store will take them?

Its good that you are using dechlorinator for your water changes.
You should add the Prime to the new water and stir it around before you add the new water to the tank.
Its perfectly ok to use a bucket for water changes, just make sure no cleaning agents like soap or chemicals have been in the bucket. You should have a bucket that is only for the aquariums.

You dont have to throw away the sponge on the intake of your filter. Squeeze it gently in aquarium water until the worst of the gunk is out, and put it back. This is a good extra source of filter capacity for your internal filter.


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## rca.myworld (20 Jan 2021)

Hufsa said:


> Okay, that is probably the reason there. Nitrite should be 0 at all times.
> I know from my own tank that when I change things too much, or feed too much food, the water quality will become poor (nitrite or ammonia), and the fish can become sick as a result.
> 
> Now that we have a lead on the cause of the sick fish, I have a few more questions, if you dont mind.
> ...


Hi Hufsa,
Thanks for this. Well I was already on it. Forgot to mention that I did a 70% water change yesterday after finding my favourite fish having trouble. 
I don't generally test tank each week or after every water change that might be another reason. I think your concern about feeding too much food is true because I used to feed them twice. 
When I clean my tank, I clean the gravel, take out rubbish i.e. leaves that are rotten, if there is any poo etc. clean the glass and filter completely.  I don't clean the biological filter except in the aquarium water but just a gentle squeeze nothing more 3-4 times.  
I am surprised, that's a total of 7 fish in 28 litres. Is it a lot? None of them are bigger than 3-4 inch.
The 80 litres now got 6 medium rainbow platys courtesy of my platy which died (mentioned in my previous post), 3 shrimps, 2 cardinal tetras and atleast about 8-9 smaller frys from my favourtie which the picture is shown. I already gave previously quite a bit of fry before plus bought a used 140 litre aquaone but didn't manage to clean it yet. 
After discovering some videos on youtube and some reading, all my filters have extra media in there. 
I think my dechlorinator is part of the issue here.  When I clean the big tank, it took me almost 2-2.5 hours altogether. Also I got a bit garden plastic tank but I haven't put water in there, being lazy I just bring the water after mixing cold and hot and then just pour it in from a jug until the aquarium is full. Then I add dechlorinator and bacteria. A better method which some of you have previoulsy prescribed is to fill the garden tank with buckets of water and then add dechlorinator there and maybe add a heater in there so the temparture is precise. 
Yes my water bucket is exclusive for aquarium. It's specially bought for aquarium.
The sponge on the intake after 3-4 months is very bad. I generally find it harder to clean unless i use a brush and it seem to affect the performance of the filter hence throwing away the old every 3-4 months was my routine. 
What else you guys think I should do? I thought the water changes is where I am struggling. With 140 I am not sure how am I gonna do this because that will take quite an effort to empty and fill. If I invest in water pipe system how would I mix the prime at the source or is it ok to fill in the water and then mix it.

Thanks
RK


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## rca.myworld (20 Jan 2021)

One other update. The platy is going OK for the time being. However I have noticed that she keeping her head up and tail down literally.  
Any of you noticed anything like that before? I have seen fish keeping their head down and tail up when they are not feeling well but not this way. 
Any ideas?

Thanks


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