# Help Me! My Fish Are On Their Last Fins! High Nitrite Readings!



## Tasha89 (Nov 10, 2008)

Hey!

My question is...

How do I lower my nitrite levels pronto?!

I have a 45L-50L tank, been running for about a month now.

I waited just over a week before adding any fish and everything was fine.

I went to my local pet store on Sat and bough 4 clown loaches and a betta/beta?! I introduced them into my tank and they were absolutely fine...or so I thought! I came home on Sun morning to find ALL 4 of my loaches had perrished!

I took the 4 bodies back to the store and they suggested doing a water test. As i'm new to this I never even though of testing the water before! (I'm a disgrace I know!!)

They gave me a test kit as a refund for the loaches (how kind!) got the following readings...

PH 8.0
Ammonia 0.1
Nitrite 0.5
Nitrate 10mg

Whoops...!

If I hadn't have put those new fish in i'd have never noticed, but now all my other fish are having difficulty breathing and a few are developing a red darkening at their gills. Also the water is quite cloudy.

I was advised by the store to add a Green-X phosphate remover which would remove the nitrite as well. I've done a 15% water change yesterday as well to dilute the nitrite. The cloudy water has cleared up tremendously but the nitrite reading is exactly the same!! I intend to do another water change tonight. Maybe 25% at least? I've also added an extra filter (only a small 20L one i've had for a while) as it sprays air in the tank as well as filtering the water in the event that it might aid their breathing. I still have my other filter whirring away as normal.

My betta is still in my tank but looking a bit on the bad side. I also have

6 danios
4 neons
1 plec
3 live plants as well

Over the past 4-5 days i've lost

1 neon
3 platy's one was pregnant as well cry1.gif
4 clown loaches

I would appreciate any help at all!

Thanks,

Natasha


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## viseversa (Oct 10, 2008)

Filters normally take about 4 weeks to mature, so introducing fish after only a week will put a massive overload on the filter, resulting in high readings, if you get some Tetra safe start, this can be added to new aquariums (on day one) along with fish, this should sort your problem out, you might have to top up every time you do a water change or if your levels increase again, once added just keep an eye out on your readings, if you know anyone local to you who has a fish tank that has been set up and if fully matured ask them if you can have some filter muck, and put this into your filter  this will also help in speeding up the filter process, hope all goes well


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## Tasha89 (Nov 10, 2008)

Hey,

Thanks for that.

I did 2 50% water changes yesterday a couple of hours between each other and tested the water before I went to bed, again PH, Ammonia, Nitrate is spot on. Luckily it looks like i've managed to dilute the Nitrite slightly as the reading has gone down from 0.5 to 0.25! Thank god! I'm still not out of the blue though, I lost my plec, 2 danios and another neon when I got home from work so i'm pretty gutted.

I've still got my betta and he looks like he's a fighter so i'm confident he'll pull through. I'm just a bit worried about my 4 danios and 3 neons. They're all still breathing quite rapidly and there's still a dark red shade to their gills. I don't think they're gonna pull through. we'll see anyway.

Thanks again, i'll keep you updated!

Natasha


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## viseversa (Oct 10, 2008)

When you do a water change (esp 50%) the test results will come back the same as your tap water (or close to it) this WILL soon rise again, and as your tank has only been up and running for a week then im guessing (and pretty sure) that your readings have not peaked yet, these will go off the scale :yikes:

When your tank has matured remember to only wash your filter in fish tank water or you will kill the bacteria that has colonized in them and it will start all over again


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