Problem freshwater tank.

Question
Our 9 year-old son asked for a fish tank for his birthday.  We had a ten gallon tank prior and cleaned it up and fired it up.  The gravel and internal decorations were all knew, cleaned and rinsed thoroughly.  Once the tank stabalzed and balanced we added one male gold sailfin molly and two females, one blue colored Gourami and a plecostomis.  In just a few days the tank began to go haywire.  It clouded up and the balances went nuts.  It has been a battle ever since.                          

I have lost all faith in our pet store.  They just keep giving us chemicals to try, none of which work.  We added a bio-wheel filter and have tried amonia reducers, Ntraban, "Stability" etc. etc.   I have done several 50% water changes and it helps, but it never fully clears.  The water I take out is greyish to brown.  I have thoroughly siphon cleaned the gravel when doing this and still I get no where.  I always use the Aqu-safe chemicals when changing water and follow instructions endlessly, but NEVER does the tank clear.  It also goes through filters fast.  I mean one filter a week.                   

HELP  What am I doing wrong ? ! ? ! ? !               

Amazingly, NO FISH HAVE DIED!  EIther they are insanely durable, or I am really lucky.

Answer
Hi Ken,

I'm sorry to hear about your troubles. Probably the reason that your fish have stayed alive is that you've been diligent with water changes - often times, this is all you need to keep them surviving. Of course, what you strive for is to keep them thriving! Let me explain, I have lots to say about your situation, which is not an uncommon one...

The root of the problem here is that you have a very small tank. 10 gallons of water is basically just two bait buckets put together - it's not a whole lot of real estate. While you could have done much worse for stocking (I have heard tales of oscars in 10 gallon tanks, or a dozen feeder goldfish) you really don't have any fish suitable for a 10 gallon tank in your 10 gallon tank. The mollies are one of the most sensitive of livebearers, high nitrates bother them and the minute the water starts to get acidic (more on this later), they become unhappy and usually come down with things like fungus or finrot. It is so much easier to keep them in salty (brackish) water, that many people have come to the conclusion that mollies just AREN'T community fish...they are brackish fish, and should be kept, if anything, in a brackish community alongside fish like glassfish or perhaps bumblebee gobies.

Here's more about mollies and their care:
http://www.wetwebmedia.com/FWSubWebIndex/mollies.htm

Now, mollies need at least a 29 gallon tank as their permanent home. Blue gouramis (I believe you are talking about three-spot gouramis, Trichogaster trichopterus, Google that scientific name to be sure) grow fairly large and arguably need bigger than a 29 gallon tank eventually, although I have kept them in this sized tank and they are fine for a long while...although can become aggressive.

The plecostomus, which was probably sold as a "tank cleaner" is perhaps the most inappropriate inhabitant of all. I have had plecostomuses that, within a matter of a few years, will outgrow 75 gallon tanks - they honestly get to be over a foot long! They poop like crazy, because their long digestive tracks break down fiber like nobody's business! While this does not affect water quality too much, it is sure unsightly to see. If you are not seeing this now, you probably have a tiny juvenile...trust me, they get BIG! See below:
http://aquanic.org/images/photos/ill-in/new/slides/slides%205/untitled32.jpg

So, bottom line, none of your fish fit long term in a 10 gallon tank. If you can return them and start again, stocking your tank with small fish (I can provide plenty of suggestions here) then you will be ultimately much better off! Even with smaller fish, you will need to understand about your water chemistry and water quality...

The pet stores can be very frustrating in just the way you describe, recommending this and that potion, to no avail. I know it seems like they are just taking advantage of you, which may be the case, but I find that more often than not, these salespeople are just ignorant and uninformed. Unless they themselves keep aquariums, they probably don't do any research independently, and the training they receive is usually just perfunctory. You need to do your own research. It won't take very long for you to become a better expert than the pet store sales staff, generally!

Here are some websites I highly recommend:
http://freshaquarium.about.com
http://www.firsttankguide.net
http://badmanstropicalfish.com
http://www.wetwebmedia.com

All of those websites will be able to help you along the way. Definitely also check out a book on freshwater aquariums from the public library - a book is a "one stop shopping" resource for info.

What is happening in your tank is called "new tank syndrome" and all it means is that your tank has not cycled yet. If you had a test kit (did the pet store ever recommend you buy one of these? a test kit is money well spent!) you would more than likely be seeing levels of ammonia and nitrite, and these NEED to be 0 ppm. In a healthy, established tank, this is always so. When there are sufficient colonies of beneficial bacteria in your aquarium, the ammonia and nitrite will be converted into nitrate with an A, which is much less harmful than either ammonia or nitrite with an I. Nitrate is either diluted with water changes, or absorbed by fast growing live plants.

There are two things you basically need to keep an eye on in your aquarium: the water quality, meaning ammonia, nitrite and nitrate (this last should be under 20 ppm) and the water chemistry, meaning pH, alkalinity and hardness. Whatever your tap water is, the pH, alkalinity and hardness ought to be about the same in your aquarium. If it is much lower, then you know things are going awry...your aquarium is acidifying too rapidly. This could be because of things like overfeeding, overstocking, but the prime suspect is that your alkalinity is low...test it with a test kit to find out! Mollies like a pH that is higher than neutral, neutral is 7.0. As long as your tap water's pH is 7.0 or higher, that's fine. Now, the alkalinity is what is going to keep the pH buffered. Alkalinity between 0-40 ppm is low, this is BAD NEWS for livebearers like mollies, because it means that the pH will not be buffered well...you need to fix it by adding some buffering agents to your aquarium such as crushed coral. Or, you can mix up a "Malawi salt mix" recipe - Google those three words for more information - and add it once a week. Maybe your alkalinity is moderate or high, in which case you don't need to add anything to new water, except dechlorinator (Aqua Safe by Tetra and Prime by Seachem are both ones I like to use) to remove chlorine and chloramine.

I know this is probably a lot of information to take in...just read on about freshwater aquarium keeping, and save this e-mail. It will start to make sense eventually! Here are some tips for you during this time:

* Feed little. Fish don't need much food, one small meal daily will be just fine. You don't have a big aquarium, as I say, so the margin of error is small...one overfeeding in a 55 gallon tank is not that big of a deal, in a 10 gallon tank it can be a disaster.
* Change water weekly. A tank this size needs 50% weekly changes with its current list of inhabitants. Even with moderate stocking, 25% weekly is still recommended to keep levels where they ought to be.
* Don't add anything but dechlorinator! All of those other potions just interfere and are a waste of money. The only other product I can recommend to you (especially if your tap water is on the soft side) is Tetra's Easy Balance. It keeps pH buffered and absorbs nitrate. It's a fine product to use since it helps keep the chemistry stable in your fish tank, and one jug of it will last a 10 gallon tank for months.
* Get a test kit, and keep an eye on water quality (1. ammonia, 2. nitrite, 3. nitrate) and water chemistry (4. pH, 5. alkalinity and 6. hardness). 1-3 should be as close to 0 ppm as possible, nitrates are allowed to creep up to 20 ppm but no more than that. 4-5 need to be the same as your tap water or as close as possible. If alkalinity is low, you need to buffer it. Going to Google.com and typing:
raising alkalinity aquarium
Will offer lots of suggestions for how to do this.

In the long run, you ought to think about switching out this bunch of fish for something else. The pleco has no place in your tank; consider getting a mystery snail instead to clean up any algae. The mollies would do best in a brackish tank of upwards of 20 gallons. If they stay alive and healthy they will probably breed eventually, so that's going to add to your overstocking problem! The gourami is not the right choice for this aquarium, he'll get too big. Look instead into females bettas (which can be kept with small tetras and such), a male paradisefish (same as above, just don't keep him with other male paradisefish) and small fish like cherry barbs, white cloud mountain minnows, etc. Small tanks really need small fish to thrive!

I hope that helps, take care! Feel free to write back.
Nicole