advice needed

What is your alk?

Do you see anything on the clownfish?

How is its breathing?

How is it acting today?


Ive had clowns lay in my nem before and thought they were dead because they werent moving but were fine

 

We have 2 clowns that actually lay down in a coral. Kinda neat. Every once in awhile they have a real bad twitch then they go back to swimming again.

 

Dont worry about your alk. With no hard corals it will not move much at all and has no affect on fish.

Ph is a tad bit low, and with a newer tank I suspect your oxygen levels may be low.

So a few things could be causing your problem. The tank is not cycled well enough yet, so you are having some swings in nitrates, and ammonia, possibly caused by over feeding or insufficient filtration. Not sure what you have for filtration, but biocubes are usually lacking in that department.

Or they could have a parasite problem which attatches themselves to the gills of the fish first causing breathing problems.

How are you checking your salinity? Did you let your new SW age a bit before doing a water change? Newly mixed SW can burn the gills of fish, especially in a small system like that.

Just a few thoughts

 

Aquarium fish may suffer from serious problems as a result of high alkalinity in the tank. If it remains high over a prolonged period, it can dissolve the protective mucus layer that normally covers fish, leaving them vulnerable to bacterial attack and infection. Water that is too alkaline causes non-toxic ammonia to become toxic. Fish may have trouble breathing. It can also affect the fish’s fins and tails, damaging their growth and making them look ragged. Ultimately, fish in a highly alkaline environment may fail to thrive and can eventually die.

 

Also your ph Is fine the ideal range is 7.8-8

 

Do you have a credible source for that, or are you just typing out of your mouth? What are the actual numbers that start affecting fish like you are saying?

Second, he said he did a water change and everything tests normal. He would have to be dosing a ton of alk to affect the fish, and I can guarantee you the inverts would be showing major problems before the fish would.

 

He doesn't dose anything. He is using an API test kit. I am going to his place with some Hannah checkers to test his water over lunch. I went to his place last night to look, and there is no visible signs of anything wrong. I explained that my black and white clowns do the same thing from time to time. I told him to post on here about it to see if you guys could come up with something other then what I was saying. Alkalinity is not the issue here unless it's too high from reef crystals. But I will test it to be sure. What are some things to be on the look out xroads if it is a parasite issue? Like he said there are no visible signs at this time of anything. My observation of the clown did not indicate heavy breathing to me. But again I will double check this today at lunch.

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Any chance it's breeding behavior? He does have another larger clown in the tank too.

 

Keep an eye out for any type of skin problems

I am pretty sure it is an oxygen issue. The signs point to it, low activity levels, breathing hard. Especially a biocube with a tight lid, low filtration.

Possibly add an airstone to see if it changes, but since it is a fairly new tank, that is where I would put my $100.

If it is a sign of submission to another fish, they usually lay on their side and twitch real fast.

 

The only I thing I would add here is that he has a power head ment for 75gal. Pointed up to break the water surface. He has the BC protein skimmer. He has live rock in the back instead of the BC filter pad. He also has carbon running. Between the power head and protein skimmer, you still think it's an O2 issue?

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If it is indeed the O2 can he add the airstone to the back somewhere instead of the display area?

 

Its hard to say, but that is my educated guess.

Those lids are usually tight enough that it doesnt allow for oxygen/co2 exchange. So while they surface is moving, there isnt any oxygenation going on.

I would think an airstone in the back would be fine, as long as the air pump is drawing air out of the tank, so fresh air is going in.

One way to know for sure is to find someone with an ORP meter, but those are few and far between.

 

Thanks Xroads we will give that a shot

 

Your Nitrates seem a bit high for it being a new tank a couple months old. As stated above most likely your tank has not completely cycled. Did you QT your fish before you introduce them to your new tank? Where did your fish come from? Were they 100% healthy and does your LFS QT their fish? Has to be more reason for fish to start breathing funny all of a sudden if your LFS practices good husbandry and QT process your fish should be fine.

 

Ok we all know you don't like Donny. But why do you have to make everything so confrontational with him? Your really causing a lot of unnecessary frictions. Other people have opinions and are just offering them in a attempt to help. Some of us do have as much experience as you do Craig. You don't know everything.

 

It wasnt that, I just pointed out nicely that it wasnt an alk issue in my first response, and he had to spout out a long paragraph arguing about it, so I asked his source?

Do you know what is worse then no information? Wrong information.

And I know I dont know near everything, but I sure in the hell know it wasnt an alkalinity issue.

 

Wheres your proof that its not that?

Also speaking of bad info why on earth with it having a bc Skimmer that has an airstone and a WaveMaker in the tank would it be low orp? That makes no sense. Hes def not overstocked.

I copy and pasted that response that you called an argument from a website about fish keeping.

I dont want to argue or cause drama but everytime I post something you have to say something against me. Kinda tired of it man

 

Your wording was confrontational. Just don't think it should be about who is right. It should be about coming together to figure out the issue. It would cause zero harm to test and know the alk, so why make a issue out of it in the first place?

 

OP never mention ALK levels, in most cases (over a long period of time) if Alk is higher than normal it can cause some issues with fish. The OP tank has been up a couple months still new I don't see Alk being an issue but sometimes in new tanks it can be, besides the obvious Ammonia, Nitrate and Nitrite levels being high. If the OP can post about their Alk levels that can minus out any Alk issues that may have been mention.