# HELP: Guppy dieing every week



## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

Hi Guys

Since i started my new tank two months ago my guppy dieing at least 1 per week, sometimes two. I was cycling it for 2 weeks without any fish with filter media from my old tank. And only after I put a couple fish. They wore fine and after I added prime bio support and few more fish and couple of dwarf African frogs. Every week I was discovering guppy with torn tail and fins.And it was becoming worth on daily bases. More torn tales. I removed the frogs (thinking they are attacking my guppies at night) and gave them to my friend (who put them together with guppies and has no problems with them what so ever).
In my case I'm still loosing 1-2 guppies per week (mostly females). But this time no torn tales or fins. I'm attaching 4 pictures. First two of my latest dieing female guppy. She became very skinny and I don't think will last more that a day. But she does not show any visible sines of damage. Next picture of the tank in general and last picture of the guppy who I think will die next. 
My tank is 30Gl tank that currently has life plants, and two filters, AC50 and AC30. Fish: 3 female betta fish and 14 guppies (6 males and 8 females). No ammonia and PH is 7
Any advice why my guppy looks so strange and why they continue o die ids appreciated.


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## BillD (Jun 5, 2006)

What temperature is the tank at and how often and how much water do you change? I always kept guppies in unheated tanks, as they tend to live longer. Unless you added ammonia to the tank, the first two weeks the tank did not cycle.
Regardless, since there seems to be an issue here, I would do a large water change, of at least 50% and another a day later. That will reduce any water borne pathogens or toxins. Guppies are not the hardy fish they once were.
The fish in the last pic looks fine, as do the fish in the tank pic. The pics of of the fish that died looked like they were old and wasted. With the tank fairly well planted you really shouldn't be having problems with that relatively small number of fish.


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

BillD said:


> What temperature is the tank at and how often and how much water do you change? I always kept guppies in unheated tanks, as they tend to live longer. Unless you added ammonia to the tank, the first two weeks the tank did not cycle.
> Regardless, since there seems to be an issue here, I would do a large water change, of at least 50% and another a day later. That will reduce any water borne pathogens or toxins. Guppies are not the hardy fish they once were.


Temperature is 23.5C, Water changes 10% every week. I use to have them in my 10Gl tank with other fish and never had those issues. And my 10GL was cycled same way. Now I'm afraid to move rest of the fish from 10Gl to my new one as I'm trying to dedicate it to shrimps only.


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## solarz (Aug 31, 2010)

What's your nitrite and nitrates? What other fish do you have in there?


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

solarz said:


> What's your nitrite and nitrates? What other fish do you have in there?


I'm going to test the watter tonight. I also have 3 female bettas there. But they don't seem to attach anybody (beside them selfs but not to the death, mostly for territory) unless the fish is already weak.


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## solarz (Aug 31, 2010)

ppaskova said:


> I'm going to test the watter tonight. I also have 3 female bettas there. But they don't seem to attach anybody (beside them selfs but not to the death, mostly for territory) unless the fish is already weak.


Bettas are known to be aggressive toward guppies.

You say the guppies are skinny? What happens at feeding time? Do they get their share of food?


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## Splash768 (Mar 29, 2011)

I notice in your first two pictures with the dying female guppy that there are some white stuff coming out of its butt. It looks like it's expelling some of its gut. Can you confirm if that is what is happening? And have you seen this white gut expulsion with any other dying guppies?


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

solarz said:


> Bettas are known to be aggressive toward guppies.
> 
> You say the guppies are skinny? What happens at feeding time? Do they get their share of food?


I feed them once a day and they all getting enough food as the food getting dissolved there in about 5 min or so. I've seen the dieing one eating before she died. I also noticed that when she was very weak she got sucked into the filter and being stuck there she was attacked by one of the bettas. But I did not not notice bettas attacking any other fish, unless they come very close to them and try to steal their food. Also it's no visible damages on the dead fish.


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

Splash768 said:


> I notice in your first two pictures with the dying female guppy that there are some white stuff coming out of its butt. It looks like it's expelling some of its gut. Can you confirm if that is what is happening? And have you seen this white gut expulsion with any other dying guppies?


Yes it looks that way, that some other ones who died had the same stuff before they died as well.


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## Splash768 (Mar 29, 2011)

ppaskova said:


> Yes it looks that way, that some other ones who died had the same stuff before they died as well.


I don't know the exact name of the disease, but I had lost 20 some mollies due this wasting disease where the symptoms is first you see this white/pink bit of gut expelling from its butt and within 2 weeks, the fish goes from a healthy full stomach to a skinny emaciated form like the dying guppy picture where the stomach appears to be sunken in. The fish will continue to eat and swim, but before it dies of weakness it will swim in a wobbly manner. I lost 1 or 2 mollies every week when this disease was happening.

Does any of this symptoms sound familiar to you?


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

Splash768 said:


> I don't know the exact name of the disease, but I had lost 20 some mollies due this wasting disease where the symptoms is first you see this white/pink bit of gut expelling from its butt and within 2 weeks, the fish goes from a healthy full stomach to a skinny emaciated form like the dying guppy picture where the stomach appears to be sunken in. The fish will continue to eat and swim, but before it dies of weakness it will swim in a wobbly manner. I lost 1 or 2 mollies every week when this disease was happening.
> 
> Does any of this symptoms sound familiar to you?


Yes, they do. How to fix it ? Or just wait until I loose all of them and start over or just wait when some of them will die ? Any suggestions ???


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## Splash768 (Mar 29, 2011)

ppaskova said:


> Yes, they do. How to fix it ? Or just wait until I loose all of them and start over or just wait when some of them will die ? Any suggestions ???


I would take out any fish that appears healthy still at the moment and quarantine the sick ones by themselves. Any fish with any signs of thin stomach or stuff coming out of its gut need to be grouped with the sick. And any fish starting to show any symptoms within the healthy group needs to be removed asap. That's the best you can do, there isn't much hope for the ones that has the symptoms.

I still have 2 mollies that survived, both of them was in contact with sick fishes but they never got sick for some reason. Still pretty low rate of survival.


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## Splash768 (Mar 29, 2011)

Pretty sure the disease came from a couple of platies from BA, it was pretty contagious among live bearers. It killed the platies and a few guppies and the mollies. But before I knew what was happening, I also had tetras and cories living with them. The tetras and cories were not affected.


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## Kan (Nov 12, 2011)

Did you get your guppies from pet store? imported guppies are known to have many different disease. If you see in the store some dead guppy that's a bad sign 

If you have any aquarium salt you might wanna try putting some in.


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## damsel_den (Oct 31, 2011)

Iv been out of FW for ages so I might not be right but Do they ever have red strings coming out of their bottom? You might mistake it for poop. Take a close look because Camallanus has the same kindof symptoms I'm pretty sure


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

Splash768 said:


> Pretty sure the disease came from a couple of platies from BA, it was pretty contagious among live bearers. It killed the platies and a few guppies and the mollies. But before I knew what was happening, I also had tetras and cories living with them. The tetras and cories were not affected.


Well it is very hard to determine which ones are thick right now as they look healthy at the moment. For what signs should I look for now ? Yes some of them came from BA (and all of them are alive and well, with exception of the one who is on the picture, who have been with me for 2 months now). But most of the ones who died came from my friend, who's fishes are not dieing. Also in BA, where I buy them, Fish room manager my personal friend who knows fish as nobody else and always very careful to get me a good fish. In the past 2 years buying from him I never had any problems.


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

Kan said:


> Did you get your guppies from pet store? imported guppies are known to have many different disease. If you see in the store some dead guppy that's a bad sign
> 
> If you have any aquarium salt you might wanna try putting some in.


Yes I do have salt. How much should I put in 30GL ?


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## BillD (Jun 5, 2006)

White fecal matter is often a symptom of parasitic infection. This can be treated with Jungle Parasite Clear (it may be Tetra Parasite Clear now). It is relatively inexpensive and cures a number of parasitic problems. A friend who works at BA's tells me the guppies are among the hardest fish for them to keep alive, along with the imported angels.


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

Yes I do have salt. But I'm not sure I can use it as I have life plants in it and specialty Amazon sword. And I heard that amazon sword does not like the salt


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

BillD said:


> White fecal matter is often a symptom of parasitic infection. This can be treated with Jungle Parasite Clear (it may be Tetra Parasite Clear now). It is relatively inexpensive and cures a number of parasitic problems. A friend who works at BA's tells me the guppies are among the hardest fish for them to keep alive, along with the imported angels.


Here is picture of another fish that I just got from BAs 2 weeks ago that does not look right to me. Can it be mikobacterioz ?


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## BillD (Jun 5, 2006)

It is difficult to tell what may be wrong with that fish, although it does look like it has seen better days. Diagnosing fish diseases can be very difficult at best. Some are obvious but many aren't. Without doing cultures and examining with a microscope, the best we can do more often than not is to guess at the disease and guess at the treatment. As well, often the cost of treatment far exceeds the value of the fish, and far too often treatments/medicines don't work. As an example, the recommended dosages of most over the counter antibiotics is too low. This apparently is done to placate the FDA so their sale is allowed. The problem is that the drugs don't work at those dosages and their usage just adds to the problem of developing drug resistant bacteria.


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## oldgerry (Dec 20, 2011)

I just got over what sounds to be the same problem. Tried just about everything. Finally Tetra Parasite Clear seems to have cleared up the tank. Did the initial treatment and followed once a week for three weeks. Now I feel things are finally stable. Mine started after introducing guppies from previous mentioned place, will stay clear of there for awhile.


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## ppaskova (Apr 27, 2010)

Do you guy know if Tetra Parasite Clear is save for amano shrimps ? As I have 8 amano shrimps in this tank that taking care of my agile issues and I don't want to kill them.


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## oldgerry (Dec 20, 2011)

I do not have shrimps, but on the Petsmart site under Parasite Guard it states:Caution: Harmful to crustaceans (shrimp or crabs). Keep out of reach of children. For aquarium use only. Not for use on food fish.


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