I have had a rope fish for 5 years now, and it has done fine..Never escaped, active at night..the usual. I have it in a 15 gallon tank (I know, small) with two gold fish and a star fish. I had 2 other gold fish in another tank, and one of them contracted dropsy. The other started behaving erratically. I took the erratic fish out of the other tank thinking the fish with dropsy may have somehow been affecting it, and put in in with my rope fish, gold, and angel fish. The gold acted dead after the transition and died the next day. When it did so, it swam into the cave my rope fish usually hangs out in. Now today my rope fish seems to be dying. There are absolutely no discolorations or external abnormalities that I can see. The rope fish floats on the top of the water mostly upside down (which it almost never does) and lies still like it's dead for long periods of time (2-3 minutes) then it might shudder, but still doesn't swim like it usually does. The levels in the water are superb, and this has left me scratching my head and concerned my rope fish will die. Any ideas?
ROPE FISH 911!!
- Thread starter johnrollah
- Start date
You are lying about your water parameters. Correct that issue and your rope fish will stop floating at the top of your tank. Typical symptom of nitrate overload. If you had even one goldfish alone in a 15 gallon tank, you'd be doing 30% water changes twice a day to barely scrape by. There is no possibility of your water quality being acceptable.
How soon did the starfish die after you added it? You'll want to remove the corpse ASAP as it will be a source of ammonia for days to come.
How soon did the starfish die after you added it? You'll want to remove the corpse ASAP as it will be a source of ammonia for days to come.
Like I said in my original post, I KNOW a 15 gallon tank is not sufficient. It's temporary, and I should be getting a 50 gal within the next week. The rope fish is almost a foot long, but spends most of its time coiled up hiding in the cave anyway. Knifegill, the nitrate and ammonia levels are fine at the moment..I did a dip test before posting AND have pH and Ammonia monitors in the tank, and all the levels ARE fine. I have a bubbler in the tank is well, which I think should eliminate the possibility of low oxygen, but I guess I don't know too much about that. Zfishies, how can I tell/remedy if my O2 levels are low?
PH and ammonia monitors in the tank? In the 15 gallon tank? I don't even have that in my 450! Most likely like the starfish/angelfish mix up earlier your probably confused.
It would be hard not to have an ammonia issue in such a small tank with that stocking. Your test equipment is faulty, just get a larger tank and the rope fish will be fine. Right now stop feeding and lots of small water changes. Good luck
It would be hard not to have an ammonia issue in such a small tank with that stocking. Your test equipment is faulty, just get a larger tank and the rope fish will be fine. Right now stop feeding and lots of small water changes. Good luck
There are test kits for O2 or can take a water sample to the lfs and test it. Honestly imo I've had over stocked tanks and had fine water params. I was not over feeding tho and did wc 2 a week. To get O2 high you can place your outtake tube from the filter high up cousing a waterfall and allowing O2 In the water or if you have flow fans\pumps you can make then create ripples on the water surface also allowing O2 into the water. There are many other ways just ask me for more those are the best ways tho. There's a couple more other good ways also to.
