hi guys, im new to all this.

as you can see from my attachment i have a huge cloudy water problem.
i did a full water change yesterday, and my water was crystal all day, no change in the slightest, i woke up this morning to this (see attachment). and through out the day its gotten worse.

i used my tap water conditioner, aquatic salt, cycle, and waste control yesterday after the change.
during the change i throughly cleaned all decor and gravel until the water ran clean, and i have 2 lemon goldfish, 2 small gold fish, a 2" ghost koi and a 6" Ginrin Sanke koi.
the tank is only 55 liters but im getting a larger one next week, the tank was a fine size until i got the Ginrin Sanke. but before i did a water change my water was cloudy, which was partial reason for the full water change.

is this normal? how long should it last?

thanks for your help

Attached Images

IMG-20110414-00081.jpg (239.9 KB, 29 views)

The tank is about 14 gallons so you know the tank is very badly over stocked just the goldfish will need at least 50 gallons Koi can be kept in stocktanks but we are talking about 100's of gallons
As far as the cloudy water it look like a bacteria bloom. Most likely for over stocking and over cleaning. I would normally recommend testing water for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, and pH but truely till you up grade the tank I think it will be hard to get a handle on the water


Rick

__________________

to much fish in a tiny tank is asking for trouble .

i completely agree that my tank is over stocked, and i would just leave it there and put it down to overstocking, BUT this happened when i just have 4 1" goldfish, so i know there must be something else contributing to this....

agreed, probably a bacterial bloom.. make sure you cycle that new tank too!

goldfish, koi, carp family all are very beautiful, very dirty fish. Bacteria only needs waste to grow. a 100% water change stresses the fish and there are still things, even in the water change water that the bacteria can grow on. What you need is a biofilter that is fully cycled = has grown to be big enough to handle all the waste from the fish that you have, size and number. Every time you add a new fish, you add to the bioload, and the biofilter has to grow to meet the new load. When you added your new fish, there was going to be a window where the biofilter wasn't going to be able to handle all the ammonia, and there would be extra. I'm a bit worried that you may have overcleaned as a reaction to the cloudiness (which is really just a bloom of bacteria reacting to the excess ammonia, and can be a good thing, since the bacteria eat up the ammonia and keep it from hurting your fish, and then die back when the excess food is gone) sometimes overcleaning can damage your biofilter, pushing you back even further, lengthening the amount of time your biofilter will need to get in balance with your fish. I would recommend feeding little, if at all, and waiting the biobloom out. It will eventually run out of food as your biofilter catches up to your fishes' output. Then, when the bloom falls off, slowly increase your amount of feeding back to normal so you don't have a sudden spike in ammonia that would encourage another bloom.
I agree, you'll need bigger housing for your fish, you wouldn't want them dwarfed and their internal organs damaged in the process, but I do think in the short run you can get your tank under control.

i had that same problem! after i got 5 small fancy goldfish for like a week the 35gallon tank got cloudy. i didnt properly cycle my tank 1st (i just learned about that) so i dont know if that contributed to it.
i did a 50% water change and then a few 25% changes it still didnt go away for about a week.... and then one day it did O_o?
i have no idea how but the tank suddenly became crystal clear so i think it finally adjusted (as the prevous post said about biofilters).
Maybe keep up with weekly 25% water changes and dont leave the lights on too long. if its not hurting the fish then u could just wait it out...

__________________
------------------------------
35 gallon tank
4 ryukin goldfish (4 - 5 inches)

5.5 Gallon Planted tank
1 halfmoon betta
2 ADFs

UPDATE,

what happened was i saw all my fish at the top of my water "gasping" for air, i looked into this and read some where that if the cloud is bad bacteria then it will take out alot of oxygen from the water, i read that a few grams of bacteria can consume as much oxygen as a adult, so i immediately did a 100% water change, added my conditioner, aquatic salt, waste control and cycle. i DID NOT place the gravel in, im going to get some natural colored gravel or sand. the water stayed clean for some time, i didnt clean the filter in the water change, just rinsed it in the old tank water. the tank has gone slighty cloudy now, but no where near as bad as it was. its been a day or two now and im happy that the tank is cycleing its self now, and the fish seem happy, no more "gasping".
thanks

They're not gasping any more because the 100% water change got rid of all the ammonia that was burning their gills before and causing irreparable damage to the tissues, preventing them from breathing. Within a day or two, you're going to be right back where you started. You acknowledge that the aquarium is overstocked, so get rid of some of the fish and start lighter; one fish is all I'd do in there, and even then it's going to outgrow that tank in short order.

Your problem is a vastly overstocked tank that has no chance to properly cycle because of the amount of ammonia being poured into it by those fish. get rid of the koi and most of the other goldfish, or you're going to keep having this issue (up until it kills everything in your aquarium).

__________________

When you do a x% water change, do you need to re-add conditioners etc?

Most water conditioners are only effective for 24 hours. Any time you add new water to your tank, you need to add water conditioner. I use Prime, as it also helps to bind some of the toxins in the water and makes them less harmful to the fish.

Well you should b getting ur new tank soon right? I would suggest partial water changes often until then. Do u have an air bubble pump in there? I dunno But it may help

__________________
------------------------------
35 gallon tank
4 ryukin goldfish (4 - 5 inches)

5.5 Gallon Planted tank
1 halfmoon betta
2 ADFs

good good. But when you get the new tank, be sure to cycle it completely before you add the fish or you'll go through more issues.

yoshimitsu, have you purchased any testing materials yet? If you have future problems, this will help us give you more accurate help when you need it. At the very least get some test strips and shoot for getting some liquid tests. Or both! Test strips are quick and easy but not as accurate as the liquids. But they can give you an idea of whats going on. If you see that there is a change in color on the nitrates, nitrites and ammonia, then you have them and should do a water change or you'll know that your tank is not fully cycled. The Liquid test strips will give you better numbers of these parameters which is quite useful for nitrates down the road to know how much water you need to change and after you watch it for long enough, you'll be able to figure out how many times a week/month you need to change it.