Arod0416 Posted February 10, 2020 Share Posted February 10, 2020 Hello everyone, i have two clownfish - one female and one male. The male is perfectly fine but the female is breathing hard and the gills look swollen. Inside looks red, now the lights are off and she is trying to swim up ( up to the middle of the tank) and swims back down and falls on the sand on her side. my water parameters are: ph: 8.2 salinity: 1.025 API ammonia: 0.25 salifert ammonia: <0.15 nitrite: 0 ppm nitrate: 20 ppm my tank is currently cycling, it is in the diatom stage. I feed my fishes every other day. I have several live rocks and dry rocks from my previous tank. I cleaned them with hydrogen peroxide and rinsed them. When I first began my tank, I added ocean water from petco and live caribsea sand. My tank been running with the ocean water and sand for about 2 months and 2 weeks with livestock. do you think my clownfish has brook or ammonia poisoning? Quote Link to comment
Clown79 Posted February 10, 2020 Share Posted February 10, 2020 Most likely ammonia. It burns their gills. Cycling with fish isn't advised for that reason, its cruel to the fish and harmful to their health. 3 1 Quote Link to comment
Arod0416 Posted February 10, 2020 Author Share Posted February 10, 2020 Thank you for reaching back out. she ended up dead this morning. It is difficult to cycle a tank. I read different forums and articles on cycling with clownfish or damsels or even ghost feeding. So, at this point, I have to hope for the best for my male clownfish and chromis left. Right now my tank went from diatom to forming red algae. So far, the cycling process been going good... well based on what to expect next Quote Link to comment
Smurf Posted February 10, 2020 Share Posted February 10, 2020 How big of a tank is it? Do a water change (which will prolong your cycle) I would take the other clown out and just leave the chromis to cycle if you really wanna keep a fish in there. 3 fish in an uncycled tank sounds like a bad way to go out. 2 Quote Link to comment
A.m.P Posted February 10, 2020 Share Posted February 10, 2020 Cycling isn't really difficult, it just takes time. Ghost feeding or dosing ammonia and waiting is the only way to do it without killing or causing permanent damage to animals. Hoping for the best at this stage isn't a great course of action, take the animal's out and cycle the tank properly. If the lfs gave you the advice to cycle with three fish, then I recommend you don't go back. 2 Quote Link to comment
Ratvan Posted February 10, 2020 Share Posted February 10, 2020 Did your LFS give/sell you anything to lock down the ammonia while you were fish in cycling? Quote Link to comment
Clown79 Posted February 10, 2020 Share Posted February 10, 2020 You can use seachem prime to detoxify the ammonia, this will not stop the ammonia processing but will detoxify it to allow for the fish to be there safely. Unfortunately, if using the api tester, results will not be accurate with Prime use so a seachem ammonia badge can be used instead. 1 Quote Link to comment
Arod0416 Posted February 10, 2020 Author Share Posted February 10, 2020 Hello everyone, yes my LFS did give me 3 fishes to cycle. But, after doing my research and confirmation here, I will not be going back. I have been adding prime when I did my water changes. I am getting a rodi equipment. It should be coming in tomorrow. My fishes I have left now is swimming and eating and breathing normally. Today is day 13 with them. So I am hoping for the best. Just going to keep maintaining it at this point. I have salifert testing as well. Well for ammonia, mg, alk, and phosphate. And api kit for nitrite nitrate ammonia and ph. my LFS cannot hold my fishes for me and they are more than an hour drive for me. Quote Link to comment
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