First sick fish - Got Ammonia?

[HanoverFist]

Woke up this morning to my new six-line wrasse lying on the bottom breathing heavy. Ammonia tested at 0.50 ppm. One fin is frayed.

Fairly certain that either my overfeeding in the QT triggered an ammonia spike last nite. It's only been 2 days in QT so wasn't that much food (lies!!). But is some on bottom of tank I planned on vacuuming out today with a WC. Only other thought is the wrasses mucus coat caused it. But I'm doubting that.

I have roughly a pound of LR and a sponge filter in tank (10g half full). So it's biological filter should have been up to snuff.

I've transferred it to a container with SW I made yesterday for the WC's and added an airstone, but I'm not seeing much improvement. Also treated the QT with some Prime.

From what I've read he's basically doomed isn't he?

I have furan-2 for anti-bacterial dips. But first I have to get it back up and swimming.

Any suggestions? My first time dealing with an unhealthy fish. Don't want to lose my g/f's fish if I can help it.

 

[HanoverFist]

Sigh nevermind. He passed while I was posting.

Lesson learned the hard way. QT's require substantial biological filtration, not just minimal, and as much water volume as you can manage. Both of those things would have prevented this. Few rocks and a sponge in a 5g of water didn't cut it.

Bye Squizzgar. Sorry you never got to jam with Pickles, Toki and Murderface.

 

[MrTuskfish]

1# of LR and a sponge filter (air driven, I assume) and 5 gals (why 1/2 a tank full?)of water is no way to keep any fish. If the bio-filter was "up to snuff", you wouldn't have any ammonia. You can't just start a bio-filter, it takes time.I'd suggest you do a lot of reading and research before buying any more fish; the hobby would hate to lose you because you don't do your homework.

 

[HanoverFist]

They were all "alive". Came from DT since I was removing them anyways.

It just wasn't enough for a high metabolism (read: pees alot) type fish. I only used a sponge identical to this one to QT two clowns in same tank for 6 weeks with no problems. The LR was extra. My blenny went through the same qt.

And there was probably closer to 7-8g of water.