Issues with my 10g community

[ReStart]

I've made a few mistakes that have caused me some problems with my 10g community tank and I am going to try to fix a few of them when I finish this post.

1. I used the crushed coral I had saved from way back when, as my substrate and now it tends to make the water hard. It also tends to look dirty. I do enough water changes to keep it in control but I'd rather have the black gravel.

2. A buddy gave me some plants and now I have this black, fuzzy algae crap growing on lot's of surfaces of the tank.

3. Also, when I got those plants, I started to get this hard, brown algae, mostly on the glass.

4. I have a Neon with some kind of "sore" right at the base of his tail, right where flesh goes into fin. It looks like it goes into the spine.

I really think the best solution would be to break it all down, scrub everything with bleach, ditch the plants and start over. Hmm, not going to happen. So, what I AM going to do is this:

Drain about a gallon of water out of said tank, put everything but the fish, plants included, into that tank water. Catch the Neon and euthanize it. Scrape all the algae I can off the tank walls. Scoop all the crushed coral I can, using a small cup, and get rid of it. Drain another gallon of water out, getting as much crap as I can out of the tank.

I will also scrub the filter intake and filter surfaces free of black fuzz, also using tank water, keeping the bio-wheel wet in tank water.

I then scrub all hard decor, rocks, etc. free of the black fuzz, using tank water. Next, I trim any plant that has the black fuzz. Then I'll carefully put the rinsed black gravel into the tank. I then replace the hard decor rocks, etc back into the tank. Then I replant. I'll put root tabs under most plants.

I know this will only reduce the brown algae and the black fuzz but at least I'll now have the substrate I wanted and the tank will be clean of any old waste.

I might get lucky in two ways. I might actually not get the brown algae and black fuzz back. I also might not go through a full cycle. I'll test of course to see how that goes and use prime and wc's to save the fish. I am not too overstocked right now as some fish went into my 60g when it finished cycle.

I'll keep you posted and if someone sees a major flaw in my thinking, let me know, but quick, cause I'm starting right now. ;-)

[Rohkey]

I don't know a whole lot about coral as substrate and plants in general, live things in the tank are often a huge benefit but need to be taken care of properly to prevent problems.

#4 is what scares me the most. Check out this article Fish Disease - Neon Tetra Disease

If that seems like something your fish may have, your whole tank could be in danger. If it is this particular disease, it'll be nearly impossible to rid your tank of it no matter how many water changes and tank clean ups you attempt. If it isn't this disease, it could be some sort of parasite, it would be a good idea to look into some sort of bacterial medication for the rest of your fish. Even though it's called Neon Tetra Disease, any fish can get it as the article explains. I recently had a Cherry Barb die of something similar, he showed a lot of the symptoms outlined in that article and had a white bulge on his 2nd dorsal fin. I isolated him about an hour or two before he expired and I am keeping a watchful eye on my tank to see if other fish start showing symptoms and am waiting to add fish until I'm confident it's safe.

Best of luck with the tank, though! Remember algae isn't necessarily harmful to the fish or anything, it can actually be beneficial..but it certainly can be an eyesore which is why people don't want it in their tanks.

[ReStart]

Crap. I had a platy die the other day for no reason I could see. I noticed in last few days, my female mollie was looking a little pale.

This whole thing has been sort of a "Hold my beer and watch this" kinda thing. Iv'e gotten everything out, put the black gravel in, I need some more, and am getting ready to add decor and plants.

If it turns out to be this, I'll just have to kill everything in the tank, serilize it all and ReStart. Not funny in this case.

Wish me luck and thanks for the link.

[jrman83]

How many fish are still in this tank? Your Tetra could have just had a fungus, nothing more. The algae you saw sounds like staghorn algae. My guess is once you got plants in there you felt you needed to leave the light on even longer? In one of my tanks I have it is the only type of algae I fight and it usually comes from leaving the light on a tad too long. If you want to plant the tank, then plant it. Get a bag of eco and a bunch of stem plants and step back and watch how great your tank can start looking.

[ReStart]

Thanks jrman. I hope that's it. Right now I have two molies, three neons, one platy, two zebras, two cory cats and one Flame Gourammi.

I bought the Carib Sea, Flora Max and put about two inches over the 1/4 inch of crushed coral. I could not get all the coral out of the tank. It was a real mess with what I did. I was saying to myself, an hour ago, whoever was holding my beer should have kicked my ass and told me to go on about my buisiness. But now that it's done, I'm glad I did it.

I have the same plants in there as before, I trimed any algae leaves, etc. but I am sure there are some stray "cells" in there like a cancer. This Neon disease scares the crap out of me. If I get careless and use the 10g net or someting, in my 60g and my Rainbows die, well, I'll have to take a week off work.


I replanted it all and did the decor the way I wanted and it looks nice now, just a bit cloudy. I did a couple of 25% wc in the process because the water got so cloudy I thought it was dangerous for the fish. I'll test the water tonight, tomorrow, etc. I won't be surprised if I get a cycle or mini-cycle.

Oh, and by the way, I'm going to reduce the light hours by 1 and see how that goes. I need to put some root tabs in but enough stress (mine and theirs!) for one day.

[ReStart]

Well, this morning the rest of my Neons were dead. Not sure why as they did not have any fungus or velvet or anything like that. Maybe the chemisty change when everything got stirred up. At one point, it looked like a mud puddle.

I hate it but I went into this process and "Expected some losses" as a friend of mine said. The tank is clear as a mountain stream and all water parms are fine. 0,0,0 7.2
Who knows? I am going to do a 50% wc when I get home just in case I interjected something not detectable. Maybe another 50% tomorrow. I think a capful of prime can't hurt so I'll do that now.

Man, I should have put the fish into the other ten and just broke it down to parade rest and started over. No worse outcome and I'd have gotten rid of the crushed coral completely.

Live and learn I guess. Maybe someone else can learn from this mistake.