[Mr_Bubbles]

I'm curious, since most of these nice show tanks you see people have generally have a bunch of small fish, is this because larger fish don't suit a planted tank? I have a leopard bush fish (labyrinth fish) who is suppose to be very hardy but with the co2 going he keeps breathing heavy. I keep turning it down, but he still breaths heavy, i have a 75 gallon tank with an atomic diffuser on one side, with my powerhead and filter blowing the bubbles to the other side to help spread the co2. I'm dealing with BBA badly now and kinda lost as to what to do, are some fish (perhaps bigger fish who take in more O2?) just not suited for a planted tank? I hate to get rid of him as I've had him since getting into the hobby but i also don't want an algae farm nor do i want to have him in unsuiting conditions. I'm using a milwaukee regulator and just turned it down to about 2bps which seems low to me and have one filter outlet causing surface agitation and now just turned on two bubblers. Any thoughts?

Thanks!

 

[ValMM]

What are the parameters of your tank? How much light and fertilizers are you using? This will help people to give you advice.

 

[Mr_Bubbles]

i unforunately don't have tests kits to measure anything, I'm thinking the heavy breathing is due to a lack of O2, a lot of people have recommended some surface agitation but a bit of this still didn't seem to cut it, once i put these bubblers on too, i noticed the heavy breathing calmed down drastically, I think I'm going to try leaving them on 24/7 (despite not much caring for their appearance) and just turn the co2 up a bit, see if i can get a good saturation of each. I'll have to see what the color of my drop checkers are like tomorrow and how the fish do. I've also read that using a big canister filter uses up a lot of O2 for the colonized bacteria, which i didn't know and my filter is rated for an aquarium up to 5 times the size of mine, so maybe that's playing a part too.

 

[Luecke1548]

labyrinth fish need to breath from the surface, even a tank full of O2 they will breath from the surface

 

[Mr_Bubbles]

yeah i know that, but they shouldn't be breathing so heavily, my bolivian rams breathe faster too, so i think it must be an O2 issue. I figured the bush fish would be the tougher one due to being a labyrinth fish but he's the one most noticeably breathing heavy

 

[HD Blazingwolf]

filters will only colonize enough bacteria to susttain themselves.. no food = no bacteria.. it doesn't matter how big the filter is.

im guessing ammonia spike or lots of stuff breaking down in the tank causing lots of bacteria to respirate and grow potentially big colonies..

surface agitation is key.
if u have bba u either have too much light or 2 little c02. they go hand in hand.

im assuming u have a nitrite or ammonia problem... c02 fish become lethargic and don't gasp much.. they act kinda stupid like someone has given them drugs

 

[wendyjo]

If you're going to keep fish then you need to invest in a master test kit. Testing your water should always be the very first step in trying to determine the cause of issues in the tank.

 

[Mr_Bubbles]

HD Blazingwolf : that's the issue though, I'm sure I need more co2, but can't add it without the rams and bush fish breathing heavy, 2 t5ho bulbs don't seem like they should be too much.
However I have noticed quite a lot of co2 sitting at surface and someone suggested that perhaps this is preventing O2 from getting into the tank properly, I'll have to play around and try and find what works I guess.
I don't think it's ammonia or nitrite, the fish aren't lazy, just some faster breathing from the rams and heavier breathing from the bush fish