fish losses and seemingly 'gasping' for air

[leemonk]

Hey all,

Four days ago I took the plunge and changed the substrate and setup of my tank around. I am using James C's Akadama basis for my tank.

I changed to the following setup:

JBL substrate
Sprinkling of 'Miracle grow' balls
Akadama as a top finish

Two days before this change I also followed the FE CO2 thread and I now have that setup operating within my tank (minus the bubble counter - it didnt arrive).

I have been away for two days (one night) and got a call from my wife last night to say that the fish all seemed to be gasping at the top of the tank (though she knows nothing about fish) and that two were sitting on the bottom really not moving much.

I immediately thought it might be the CO2 and asked her to turn it off. This she did. However, I got a call this morning telling me that one Molly and a neon tetra had died and that three blue rainbows were looking rather poorly, however all the other fish seemed okay.

I returned home and removed the now dead three rainbows (my favourites 😡 ), and all the others seemed okay. I turned teh CO2 back on, but literally so that there were only a few miniscule bubbles coming out of the diffusers (similar to this: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Lot-of-2-CO2-...trkparms=65:12|66:2|39:6|72:1686|293:1|294:25). 1 hour later all the fish are at the top again!

I dont understand it, there are almost no bubbles coming out!

I know the detail is really poor in this post, but are there any other suggestions as to what it might be? Also.... should I just leave the CO2 off until I get a bubble counter?

Regards

Lee

 

[Themuleous]

What size tank is it?

Sam

 

[samc]

its probely lack of O2, put an airstone in and they should be ok. when the are you could tun your c02 back on but keep an eye on them.

 

[chump54]

i would say a quite large water change would be a good idea, it'll quickly reduce your co2 levels.

have you got a drop checker?

Chris

 

[leemonk]

hey,

Its late now, but ill answer what i can.

its a RIO 180, so 180 litres.

I have an airstone which has now been on constant for two days.

No, I dont have a drop checker.

I turned the CO2 off again earlier and now the fish are normal again.

Maybe I have some bad CO2? I guess I need a bubble counter asap, whihc Ill get tomorrow.

Lee

 

[samc]

get a drop checker! they are very important when comes to co2

 

[chump54]

I would think its unlikely you have bad co2, it's more likely you had too much. check out ceg's drop checker article very useful.

Chris

 

[leemonk]

I think you are all correct. It certainly seems like to much CO2. I came down this morning expecting to see a graveyard for fish and they were all absoloutley fine. I had turned off the CO2 last night, so this is obviously the cause.

My only concern is that there seems to be a saturation level with minimal input. The amount of bubbles coming out when I turn this thing on is minimal......

Oh well.... gonna go see my lfs to get the bubble counter and drop checker.

Thanks all.