Water change and sudden death

[houstonhobby]

A few weeks ago I was doing a lot of water changes in my 120 because I was fighting blue green algae. Using tap water and Amquel. One day when I got home from work all three of my clown loaches were dead. The other fish in the tank seemed fine.

Sunday I did a 20% water change in a 20xh that had two swordtail females,
and three leopard leaf fish. Unbeknownst to me they were doing work on the
water main up the block. Monday when I go home from work the swordtails
were dead. The leopard leaf fish were fine.

Is this just me? I'm starting to get scared of making water changes.

Thanks,
Rod

[metageologist]

its possible the water company basicaly shocked the water to kill any bacteria that might have entered the system while working on the water lines resulting in a highter clorine levels than your water treatment could handle

hope this helps

[lauraleellbp]

Are you using Amquel or Amquel+?

I personally had so many issues with the old Amquel a long time ago that I won't use it.

If that's not the issue, my best guess also would be that there's been some sort of change in your tap water.

I lost my own 2 clown loaches (I'd had for close to 8 years ) the same way; there wasn't anything I could determine that had changed from the tests I have, but I lost 2 clown loaches, a Tiger barb, and a few cherry barbs immediately after a few successive water changes.

You might try setting the water out overnight before using it? My own best guess about what happened to my fish is that there were some dissolved gasses in the water...

[robbob2112]

The other possibility is that the PH is considerably different out of the tap than what is in your tank... i.e. I have a cichlid tank at ph of 8.1 but PH out of the tap at 7.1... if I change the water without adding baking soda to buffer the new water being put it it causes the fish to breath heavy and flash for several hours... obviously distressed... change with baking soda and it is all good.

We will assume you have matched the tap water temp to within a degree or so of the tank water.

If your fish show distress with water changes, do changes more often, but smaller... i.e. instead of a weekly 30% do bi-weekly 15~20%... see if that reduces the stress.

[robbob2112]

Originally Posted by houstonhobby

A Unbeknownst to me they were doing work on the
water main up the block.
Thanks,
Rod

Missed this the first time... anytime they open up a line, they shock the water to clear any bacteria from it...

[indovinavi]

Originally Posted by robbob2112

Missed this the first time... anytime they open up a line, they shock the water to clear any bacteria from it...

Okay.. so does this tend to happen often? That might be what got my clown loach too after my wc. I understand they don't have scales so they're real sensitive to the quality of the H20 & that day I didn't let the bucket sit out overnight either. I tend now to over-dose the tetra- aquasafe stuff, figured that a couple of extra mL's wouldn't hurt either. I live REAL close, like a 1/2 mile from a water treatment plant