# All my fish hanging at the top of tank after water change?



## tbarabash (May 18, 2011)

I have a 36G bowfront, been set up for about 2 weeks now Didn't have much of a cycle, tested daily for 2 weeks and had just a bit of an ammonia bump when I added the second batch of fishes to the tank but established eheim 2217 took care of everything and ammonia,nitrite were at 0 within 24h and never went above that again.


Tank stats:
Fluorite and eco complete topped with just a bit of fluval stratum so cories dont cut their faces up 
Eheim 2217 seeded w/ established media, substrate and plants from previous tank I ripped down
2x Aqualife 30" t5ho fixtures w/ 4x24" bulbs (1x6700 2x6000 1xroseate) sitting on top of glass lid on tank
Pressurized co2 to have drop checker lime green for most of the day
EI dosing, root tabs cut up and spread throughout
Temperature holding at 78f
tests 7.2/0/0/5 gh/kh ?? no test kit at the moment but always had been medium hardness and nothing too extreme so shouldn't be an issue

Tank has about 6 guppies, few juvi endlers livebearers, 5 panda cories, 6 pygmy cories, 3 harlequin rasbora, one shadow tetra that has been alive ever since I cycled my first tank with him, 1x orange oto, 2x regular oto and a handful of amano shrimp.

My fish had been hanging around the top of the tank for the past couple days, I thought it might have been too much CO2 but drop checker was always nice green and never went yellow, but I turned it down anyways til DC was dark forest green. Tested water parameters suspecting it may be something not checking out right, but tested as 7.2/0/0/0. The cories are acting normally around bottom of the tank but everyone else seems stressed, hanging out at the top of the tank in the corners not swimming much. Threw on an airstone, pointed spraybar at the top of the water and went to sleep. Still there this morning when I woke up. I put a bottle of purigen in the filter just in case and then did a 50% water change, planted a bunch of HC I had broken up last night that needed to be put in, filled tank back up, did another (treating with prime both times) 25% water change and filled it back up. All the fish still seem stressed out and even now the panda cories are hanging in the middle part of the tank where I've never seen them venture up to much. Even my assassin snails are slowly sliding up the glass and wood to get a little bit higher.

I haven't introduced any new equipment, wood, fish, anything.. All fish look relatively healthy, a bunch of the guppies have some nipped fins from an arsehole bumblebee goby that was chasing them around munhing on fins until I ripped him out but nothing I would think would cause an infection. Never had an issue with my city's water before so I'm really quite puzzled as to what could be going on?:iamwithst

Fish still seem kinda freaked out, just hovering in the topmost corner of the tank staring at the wall. 

On the plus side, my plants are doing well  HC carpet should hopefully take hold and carpet nicely by 5 or 6 weeks time, I had a ton of it and planted them in 3-4 stems and quite densely haha


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## Geminiluna (Jul 24, 2007)

I read this a couple times and didn't see mention of what you use to treat your city water or if you age it for any time before putting it into the tank. Are you treating it or aging it? Are you matching the temperature?


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## slavecorps (Jul 7, 2009)

How much water did you change? Did you clean your filter at the same time? It sounds like you wiped out your bacteria population and your tank is going through a cycle. The fauna is going to the top of the tank because there is likely an ammonia spike that is causing them to venture higher in the water column where there is usually higher levels of oxygen.Keep the air pump going and keep breaking the surface tension of the water with your filters outlet pipe. Add a fast acting bacteria suppliment if you can. You shouldnt change so much water at once. I usually only do about 25% every few weeks.


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## tbarabash (May 18, 2011)

Oh yea I use prime to treat my water. Usually about 1.5x the dose and I usually get the water temp within a couple degrees of tank water. Doesn't make sense how I would have killed any filter bacteria, my filter was off for about 1m while I put purigen in otherwise it was running the whole time with properly treated water. Filter maintenance wasn't today. That things got so much filter media haha I doubt I'll need to clean it for months.


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## trixella (Jan 24, 2011)

I wonder if they're reacting to the fertilizers?


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## tbarabash (May 18, 2011)

Hm they're the same fish I had in my other tank with all the same plants, ferts, substrates, equipment, everything haha. Only thing that changed is more lights... but here it's 2am and drop chcker is blue, just tested my water AGAIN and it's 7.4/0/0/0. Still in the top corner. it's pissing me off now haha


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## trixella (Jan 24, 2011)

Maybe take a water sample to your lfs and get them to test it just to rule out your test kit being inaccurate. Does your water smell at all? Your substrate could be releasing hydrogen sulfide.


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