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darters sensitivity?


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#21 gerald

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Posted 08 September 2015 - 10:58 AM

Fast-growing plants are the most reliable way to keep ammonia low.  Duckweed, Frogbit, Guppy-grass, Hornwort, Elodea, Vallisneria, etc.  Plants have the added advantage (over nitrifying bacteria) that the nitrogen in the ammonia gets bound up in plant tissue, which you remove by harvesting plants, rather than being converted to nitrAte and released back into the water, as bacteria do.  


Gerald Pottern
-----------------------
Hangin' on the Neuse
"Taxonomy is the diaper used to organize the mess of evolution into discrete packages" - M.Sandel


#22 Clayton

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Posted 09 September 2015 - 09:50 AM

Fast-growing plants are the most reliable way to keep ammonia low.  Duckweed, Frogbit, Guppy-grass, Hornwort, Elodea, Vallisneria, etc.  Plants have the added advantage (over nitrifying bacteria) that the nitrogen in the ammonia gets bound up in plant tissue, which you remove by harvesting plants, rather than being converted to nitrAte and released back into the water, as bacteria do.  

Could you explain this further?  Do the plants not simply use the nitrate once it has been converted by the bacteria?  I've never heard of plants using ammonia directly.



#23 Matt DeLaVega

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Posted 09 September 2015 - 11:16 AM

They use some ammonium directly. But I had thought that ammonia itself had to be broken down as well. I did not think that Gerald was saying they use it directly, just that they bind up extra nitrogen that you can easily remove by harvesting.


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#24 gerald

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Posted 10 September 2015 - 09:47 AM

Yes most aquatic plants use ammonium (NH4+) directly, and it requires less energy for plants to process ammonium than to use nitrate.   Check out Diana Walstad's Ecology of the Planted Aquarium.  At pH less than 8, nearly all of the total "ammonia" (NH3 and NH4+ combined is what we measure with an ammonia test kit) in water is in the NH4+ form.  At pH 9, NH3 and NH4+ forms of ammonia are about equal, and at pH above 9, NH3 is the predominant form.  Why?  Because at high pH there is a shortage of free H+ ions available to combine with NH3 to make NH4+.  With enough fast-growing plants (relative to animal load), bacterial "cycling" becomes irrelevant, except maybe in tanks kept at high pH (8.5 or higher)


Gerald Pottern
-----------------------
Hangin' on the Neuse
"Taxonomy is the diaper used to organize the mess of evolution into discrete packages" - M.Sandel


#25 Leo1234

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Posted 13 September 2015 - 08:00 PM

So I have good news and bad news. The good news is that I got the ammonia to 0ppm or close to 0ppm. The bad news is I lost about 30 fish in the process.
Would Missouri longear sunfish get too big to keep with rainbow darters, redbelly dace, and other stream fish? I am waiting for everything to settle before I will get anything.



#26 Matt DeLaVega

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Posted 13 September 2015 - 09:16 PM

The ammonia is probably low since there are few fish left. Either keep it cycled by feeding pure ammonia, stocking it with feeder goldfish, or some other method, or add fish back really slow.


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#27 littlen

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Posted 13 September 2015 - 09:31 PM

Could they eat them? Yes. But if you kept the Longears well fed, and provide lots of structure and hides for the darters to dip in and out of---they should be able to coexist in a large tank like yours. I'd say go for it.

Like Matt said, add all new fish a few at a time so your filters have time to adjust and can keep up with the additional bioload.
Nick L.

#28 keepnatives

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Posted 13 September 2015 - 09:57 PM

I'd add to what Nick posted to start with the non-sunfish and finally add the sunfish as juveniles.


Mike Lucas
Mohawk-Hudson Watershed
Schenectady NY

#29 Leo1234

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Posted 14 September 2015 - 08:33 PM

3 of my golden shiners are gasping for air at the surface and I lost 2 redside dace. I have 2 air pumps with 2 air stones each and 2 powerheads. The redside dace have been in hotter water before than they are now. What do you think it is?



#30 Matt DeLaVega

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Posted 14 September 2015 - 09:39 PM

Chloramine? Maybe your dechlor does not work on chloramine and is leaving ammonia as a byproduct. Just a thought, your water may not even be treated with cloramine, but somehow you must have crap water. With your drought, who knows what is in that stuff. I don't think I would drink it. Your fish might be canaries in the coal mine. Anyone else locally having similar problems?

 

 Then again it may be something you are doing. I am sure you have read about the nitrogen cycle in depth, and understand that it can be interrupted fairly easily. Could you have killed too much bacteria via the large water change?


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#31 Leo1234

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Posted 15 September 2015 - 02:06 PM

I don't think our water has chloramine unless they just changed it. I really can't figure out what is going on. everything I test seems okay. I just keep losing fish. I lost 2 golden shiners, my last scarlet shiner, and a dace overnight. It seems to be only affecting my fish. I have snails, plants and a freshwater clam and all of them are doing great.



#32 Matt DeLaVega

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Posted 15 September 2015 - 02:24 PM

Check with your water company so you can rule that out Leo. Gets you one step closer in narrowing down the problem.


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#33 Leo1234

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Posted 15 September 2015 - 02:41 PM

so I just checked all of my dechlor and they all remove chloramine. 



#34 Matt DeLaVega

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Posted 15 September 2015 - 03:23 PM

Well that is ruled out. Have you done full water tests in the last couple days?


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#35 Matt DeLaVega

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Posted 15 September 2015 - 03:32 PM

Wait do cloramine treatments just break it into chlorine and ammonia? Is the biofiltration expected to deal with the ammonia? If so is your system up to dealing with the excess ammonia? I honestly don't know, just throwing out questions. I would still want to know if my water company uses chlorine or chloramine.

 

 It just seems to me that it has to be your water. Too many deaths, and too many species. A pathogen does not seem right.


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#36 Leo1234

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Posted 15 September 2015 - 03:32 PM

yep. everything looks like it is within the range that is great. I guess I can do another test today and post the results later if you would like.



#37 Matt DeLaVega

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Posted 15 September 2015 - 03:37 PM

Glad they are good. We are not trying to prove anything to me. I am just trying to give you some things to consider. I think you might do well by sending a PM to Gerald. He is pretty good with this stuff.


The member formerly known as Skipjack


#38 gerald

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Posted 15 September 2015 - 09:17 PM

Sorry, I cant tell from the descriptions of symptoms what the cause is - disease, water issues, bad food, ...?

Just not enough info for me to make any good guesses.


Gerald Pottern
-----------------------
Hangin' on the Neuse
"Taxonomy is the diaper used to organize the mess of evolution into discrete packages" - M.Sandel


#39 Leo1234

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Posted 15 September 2015 - 09:30 PM

The weird thing is that the fish don't show any symptoms until 1-4 hour before they die. Right within that time they just lose all ability to swim and sometimes even have a seizure. Before they die, their colors fade to near white. Other than that they really don't do much. Most of my fish die at night. Some do breath heavily before they die. 



#40 littlen

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Posted 16 September 2015 - 06:01 AM

If I had to guess, it sounds like a WQ issue.  But I agree there isn't enough info.  Hopefully you can identify and resolve the issue before you bring home any more fish as they'll likely suffer the same fate.  Grab a bunch of guppies as your next 'canneries'.  If they can't survive, you've got a bigger problem.


Nick L.




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