I've won a couple of commets at the fair back in october and well they both died, but before they did one started floating with his tail up in the air and he would swim frantically to get back down. After a while this became something of a neurological problem and when the fish would go to swim he would end up swimming spirals. The other commet began acting like this as well soon after the original one died. This has happened to many of my bettas too. At fish I thought it was Fish TB but now my newest common Valentine is starting to act the same way. I just say her swim one spiral and her tail keeps bobbing up. It looks a bit like SBD but I don't think that it is. We have really soft water so I was wondering if maybe our ph is unstable and that's what's causing them to act so weird (for upwards of a month) before they finally die. Does this sound reasonable? Does anybody else have any ideas? I'm really afraid for my fishy friends!

Hi SMN,

Have you tested the pH, GH and KH of the water? Have you adjusted the pH at all?Have any of your fish developed what looks like a milky film on their skin?

Funnily enough, this sort of behaviour sounds like poisoning to me... do you have tap or well water?

It does sound like there's something up with the water.

Did you disinfect the tank before using it again? Do you share equipment between tanks?

I do share the equipment, but I ALWAYS use it first in the goldfish tank and then the other fish and I rinse it in really hot water for a while after I'm done using it. We have well water and I haven't done anything to pH. I don't even own a pH test kit (which I'm hoping to change today.) I don't use any the fish are in my room and I don't use any perfumes or air fresheners. I thought it sounded like poisoning too but I don't know what it could be that's getting in my tank.

I did disinfect the tank after I had the comets in it.

Random passing thought? Could stagnant water be poisoning them because the filter is taller than the tank and I believe that the water sometimes gets stagnant and then that stagnant water end up in the tank when I add more water in.

And no, no milky film or anything. Their bodies actually look really good aside from a few scales that were missing when I got them.

I'd get your pH and hardness tested asap. If you have really soft water then the pH might well be fluctuating.

How did you disinfect the tank - what did you use?

Have you had your well water tested for heavy metals and other substances like sulphur? Your plumbing... do you have copper pipes?

When you break your filter down for cleaning, does it actually have dirty stagnant water in it, or can you see it releasing dirty water when you do water changes?

When I disinfected it I used a little bit of clorox (1/4 to 1/2 gallon max) And I rinsed it out with both cold and super hot water until I couldn't smell anymore clorox and then rinsed it again a few more times just to be on the safe side.

Theway doesn't look dirty in the filter it just smells bad, really, really bad. And it's different type smell too. It smells almost sweet in a totally gross way.

I'll get those tested ASAP (pH and gH or is it kH? I'll have to look that up.)

I'll also ask my mom and/or dad about the copper plumbing and I'm not sure whether or not we've ever had the water tested for heavy metals. I'll have to check.

-Edit- and its a ten gallon tank that they are in. Ammonia is 0 and Nitrite is about .25 which is why I have been doing frequent water changes. And nitrates are really low as well.

That's your trouble right there. The horrible sweet smell? That's putrefaction. There is obviously a load of gunk rotting and festering in there which is a massive source of dangerous contamination in the tank - replace that filter as soon as you possibly can!

The other problem is that decomposition releases acids into the water so the rot in the filter is probably making your pH drop too; when you do a water change it rises again... and so on.

And I know I don't need to tell you that a 10 gallon tank is too small for 2 goldies...

Get the fish store to test pH, GH and KH for you. Ask for the actual readings, not just OK/ Not OK answers. And get yourself a pH kit because you really need to keep an eye on this regularly.

Hope this helps.

That helps a whole lot!! My grandma is giving me a bit of cash for sweeping out her garage and I talked to my mom and we're planning to go the the pet store today to get the test kits and I'll pay her back when my Nana pays me. Yup, two goldies to one ten gallon is a no, no but its all that I had at the time and I do plan to upgrade in the not to distant future. Thanks a bunch for your help! I'll take care of that as best I can ASAP and hopefully the goldies will make it. The smaller one isn't acting like anything's going on yet so hopefully it'll stay that way!

I also had two other goldies in this tank before. A bubble eye and a fantail. They were both doing very well and then they just died. Fine when I went to sleep and dead when I woke up in the morning. Isn't that a sign of a pH crash? I had forgotten about that until just this moment.

Yep, sudden deaths are often due to pH crashes. pH and KH are the important things to test. GH isn't as critical, but it's nice to know.

What kind of filter do you have?

Its a whisper mini filter. It pumps about 70gph. It was all I had on hand and the tank doesn't have all ten gallons in it. Currently it has about 6-7 gallons in it. I will definately make sure that I get those things tested today.

I went ahead and checked on the plumbing pipes and they're PVC. I don't think our water have any heavy metals in it because our water is VERY drinkable. We wouldn't be able to drink it if it had all of those metals in it would we? Or am I just totally wrong again?

Okay I just tested my water and the tap runs at 7.0 or 7.2 I can't exactly remember (I'll check) and the water that is in the fish tank is higher than 7.6. I don't know how much higher because my scale ended at 7.6. The water's only been in the tank a week and all that's added is Aquarium salt. I put the aquarium salt in there when I noticed that I had some nitrites. What should I do to make my water suitable again and keep it from being unstable and harming my fish?