# All Fish Died!!



## Beck17 (Nov 18, 2009)

I bought 6 fantails, carefully floated bag in tank, added tank water to bag gradually, etc. Then scooped them out with net and put into 72 gal tank (no store water got into tank). Yes it has filters.

Next time I looked (not more than 45 minutes) 4 dead, two dying. Ten minutes later, all gone. 

So fast! What could have happened?
Thanks

(I have had fish before, but years ago - never had this happen!)


----------



## Dragonbeards (Dec 14, 2008)

Possibly a disease from the store where you bought them? Was the tank cycled?


----------



## Ghost Knife (Mar 12, 2008)

Either disease or ammonia. If the tank was not cycled high amounts of ammonia would kill them that fast.


----------



## Shaggy (Apr 29, 2005)

Its sounds like the tank wasn't cycled correctly. Sorry to hear about the dead fish.


----------



## emc7 (Jul 23, 2005)

Did you use dechlor? Sounds like a water issue. Too fast even for columnaris. You could have forgotten the dechlor (or underdosed because your water company overdosed the chloramine), had toxic residue from a cleaning (or recent sealing), miscalculated a buffer dose (too much acid buffer can kill, guess how I know), or shocked them with a sudden change in pH, temp, or salinity (some store have nearly brackish water in their systems). What were the symptoms before they died?

6 fish in 72 gallon in less than an hour isn't ammonia from the bag or food. Was there old, dead stuff in the tank? Did you use a chlorine remover, but not a chloramine remover. If there is chloramine added to the water by the water company and you just use old-style dechlor, it quickly releases a fatal dose of ammonia.


----------



## TheOldSalt (Jan 28, 2005)

This was definitely not from some disease or from a cycling problem if it hit that fast.

My first guesses are:
- Temperature shock
- pH shock
- chlorine shock
- and what emc7 said, leftover ammonia from chlorAMINE

Any of these could have done this, and might have even been a combination of some of these.


----------



## ron v (Feb 24, 2005)

How long were the fish in the bag? Possibly ammonia poisoning. Did you float the bag opened or closed?


----------



## Beck17 (Nov 18, 2009)

Thanks everybody. I had done a fishless cycle, but in the morning (before I went to buy fish) I added AquaSafe. Could that be it? The bag was floated open. No new sealant or anything toxic that I know of.

The two fish I saw that were still barely alive were floating vertically (mouth up but mid tank).

I guess I'll drain and start over.

I'm just really bummed because I had a nice tropical community for years, then we had an ice storm, no electric for a week, and I lost them all. I was so devastated it took me years to get back into even wanting fish again, kwim? So I figure I'd go with cold water to avoid the problem and now this happens....

Thanks again


----------



## bmlbytes (Aug 1, 2009)

If you know that the tank is cycled you should probably have a test kit, am I right? Check the ammonia levels.

Also, is the bottle of AquaSafe new or from when you had fish before?

I would drain the tank and start over. Use some Seachem Stability to make the tank cycle instantly.


----------



## Beck17 (Nov 18, 2009)

Same AquaSafe from years ago, is that how I screwed up?

Ok, thanks, never heard of instant cycles. Cool!


----------



## bmlbytes (Aug 1, 2009)

Well as emc7 pointed out, the old dechlorinators react weird with chloramine. They put the chloramine and chlorine in our waters now, when they used to only use chlorine. I would buy a new bottle of AquaSafe to be safe. It doesn't cost much, even for a big bottle. 

Also, Stability doesn't exactly instant cycle. It still takes about a week for it to properly cycle and become independent (meaning you wont have to add more Stability). It does make it safe for you to add fish right away though. You just cant use it in acidic water, so make sure your pH is above 7.0. Ron_v tested the effects of Stability and he said it works great in basic water, but it doesn't work at all in acidic water.


----------



## emc7 (Jul 23, 2005)

Floating open bags is not the best practice (pH in the bag water can change when exposed to air), but unless the fish were in the bag for many hours, I don't think that would kill the fish, especially, since you did some acclimation by adding tank water to the bag. Read the label on the old aquasafe. Chloramine has been in use for years and most water conditioners have dealt with it for a while, but not forever. I assume if you did a fishless cycle you knew you didn't have ammonia or nitrite before adding fish. Did you do a big water change right before adding fish? Spot check the pH also, sometimes the nitrates will cause it to fall. If you drain and refill the tank (100% water change) and use the same filter, you most likely won't have to repeat the whole cycle. If the problem was something like ammonia, that should solve it. If the issue was something like insecticide that got sprayed on the tank while it was stored, you might kill more fish. Suggest you start with only one next time. What did you use to fishless cycle? Was it ammonia? Were there any other ingredients in the ammonia?


----------



## Beck17 (Nov 18, 2009)

Thanks again.


----------



## redpaulhus (Jan 18, 2005)

Also - personally in a 72g I would start with one goldfish, and give it about a month if you "fast cycle" it using an additive like Stability (or if you fishless cycle it first), two months if you don't, and then add about one fish every month or two until you reach your stocking capacity.
Since I'm too lazy to change water more than 50% per week, I stock goldfish at no more than one per 20g. 
So if it were my tank I would eventually have 3 goldfish in a 72g, maybe 4 if I'm expecting to be able to make the water changes more frequent than weekly (keeping in mind that the goal is to have 100% survival, they should be bigger than a tennisball in a year, should reach grapefruit size in a few years, will eventually approach volleyball size, and should live decades).


----------

