cloudy water & scared fish

[BAM]

My tank has been up and running about 7 months, 6 with discus, and about 2 and a half months since any new fish. The whole tank was treated as a quaranteen (prazi, metro, and piperazine, 2 weeks each, for 6 weeks total) when the last fish arrived. The quaranteen was completed, and everything was going fine. 2 weeks ago I developed a greenish colored cloudy water problem, which I have taken care of with a UV unit adn water changes. Water is gernerally changed at 30% 4-5 times a week. Water is RO with Kent RO Right added back. When I put in the RO unit, the attitude in the tank improved alot.

Now that the water is clear again, the fish are freaking out like new fish in a new tank. Is this common?

BAM

[CARY_GLdiscus]

Sorry To Hear!

But IMO You do not have a good Cycle yet! I mean With all Your W/c's and Med Treatments
I Highly Dought you have any good bioload at all. This could be why Your Water is So cloudy. why so many big W/C's ? Also You should only be keeping your lights on for 8 or less Hours a day This Could be the reason for green water! What kind of lights are You useing? T5 ,T12 ?

Well Please keep us posted and also try giveing Us some of Your water parmeters.


HTH
Takecare
Cary Gld!

[BAM]

Cary (& others)

Thanks for the repy, and I wil try to give you more "history" and a time line.

I have had a 20 gallon tank for 8 years with a penguin biowheel filter, with tetras and corys primarily. Successfully kept cardinal teteras and some of the easier tetras as well.

Got a 70 gallon tank for Christmas, 2007 and got it running about Jan 1st with flourite for substrate a large great piece of cedar drift wood and some amazon swords. The filter is a marineland 350, the one with 2 biowheels. The temperature is 85-86 degrees F. I have a metal halide light - love the glitter for 11 hours - and use a 65 watt 460 actinic to transistion from day to nightime moonlights. Have not gernerally had a big problem with algae, have needed to wipe down the glass every 4-7 days. Note - The light does not seem to be a problem for the discus, which are most active in late afternoon when the metal halide is on and afterward when the blue light is on. Some of my fish are active first thing in the morning, others are "late sleepers".

I use a 20 gallon tank for change water storage, and change about 30% 4 or 5 times a week. Everything I ahev read indicate that discus like alot of clean water changes. Should I back off?

Got my first 3 discus Feb 1st, a 2", a 3 ", and a 4 ". Not a good number. After a month of fighting, I had one 4" red melon discus. Tried 3 more 2" from my LFS March 1st with the same result, one red melon. Found info that I needed 5-6 the same size, so I brought home 5 from my LFS 3-3.5" in late March. The result was better but not good.

About this time, April 1st, I found Simply Discus.

I felt the fish were not comfortable in the tank, and read about and suspected the cedar driftwood might be leaching irritatiing oils into the water, or it was the water. I have had a foamy "scum" that the filter return pushed to the far side of the tank and I skim off. I suspected it was from the driftwood. I lost one LFS fish to jumping out through a half inch wide opening next to the filter. The driftwood came out, which was hard, I really liked how it looked, but the driftwood was not the problem. The fish did not become more comfortable and the surface scum did not go away.

Also, in late March I also began vaccuuming the gravel much more vigorously. I originally thought that in a planted tank, I should only vaccuum debris on top of the gravel, but some of what I read indicated that more vigorous regular cleaning was needed. Th plants have suffered. I am still somewhat confused as to how and how often to vaccuum rather than just change the water. I want a tank (in my family room) that looks attractive, has gravel, driftwood, some plants like amazon swords.

In late April, I moved one of the LFS discus to the 20 gallon tank, now at my office. He was not eating, was being picked on heavily, and just hid in a corner. In the company of tetras and a small angel fish, he improved a great deal, his fins healed, and I saw "happy fish" for the first time in May. I also lost another LFS fish to panicy swimming and crashing into the sides of the tank which left me with 4, the original red melon, and 3 LFS fish. Despite the losses, i felt things were going better, but not good.

In May, I "found" Discus Madness in north Jersey and bought 3 more 3.5" discus. I used teh 20 gallon tank at my office as a test a week ahead of the big tank, and treated both with a full cleanup with metro for 2 weeks, piperazine for 2 weeks and prazi for 3 weeks. Things were pretty good, but the discus were not as comfortable as the one at my office which was in RO water. I also did not like the color of the 14,000K original bulb in metal halide light, so I replaced it with a 10,000K daylight, and added african driftwood from Discus Madness.

My water at home is well water. It comes out of the ground at pH of 5.0 and rises into the mid to high 6's as it sits. airation speeds the change. The GH and KH are less than 1, by a count the drop test kit, but a TDS meter reads 55 ppm, which tells me there are salts not being read by the dropper test. Nitrate is about 5ppm out of the well. Ammonia and nitrite reading from the tank have been zero. PH is 6.6 to 6.8.

In late June I hooked up an RO unit at home, and the TDS reading dropped to 2-3ppm. I also switched from SeaChem's "Equilibrium to Kent's RO Right on advise from Discus Madness, to make the TDS about 100 ppm in the change water. I like using the Kent product much more.

With the addition of the RO unit, I had HAPPY discus at home for the first time. Following a "deep" vaccuuming about July 1st, I began to get the cloudy water, which became green and really cloudy over the weekend of the 4th of July while I was away for 3 days. I had been planning to get a UV anyway, so I got one, and it cleared the water.

The discus were really happy "hiding" in the cloudy water. When it cleared, they were skiddish like new fish for close to a week. I lost another LFS discus to panic swimming. Things have settled down again, but the 2 remaining LFS fish are stressed, fins beat up etc. The 3 from Discus Madness seem fine.

Am planning to switch to an Eheim canister - have not been happy with the big biowheel. Need advise on how to vaccuum the gravel, deeply or surface, in a planted tank.

I feel I have made progress, but have not arrived.

Thanks for your help.

BAM