Save my clowns and angels

Question
Just thought I would follow up by sending you some pics. Hope you enjoy them. If I can send them. If not, and you want to se them, email me your email address.  My angels are fine. I put four marble angels in the 20 high tank. They are the most aggressive. Leaving 10 in the 55 gal.with the two clowns. I did lose the little clown that was sick. Thanks for your help. Melodie
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The text above is a follow-up to ...

-----Question-----
 I have a 55 gal.tank I initially set up with 7 angels and 1 clown loache. Did great. Almost zero maintenance. Angels got big. 6 months later, added 7 angels, assuming big ones would kill a few. Didn't happen. Now I have 14 huge, beautiful angels, some are mating. 5 are veils. Still doing great. Been over a yr. Ok.  I notice a white, film. Wipe it off. Comes back and before I know it,is covering the bottom and everything else (no live plants)almost completely with this white, cottony, stringy looking stuff. Some of my angels have small cottony patches on their eyes,. Some have a little on their fins. I treat the tank for fungus with tablets. One week later,I take my fish out for the first time and put them in a new mop bucket. Completely clean the aquarium. Even rinsed all the gravel at the sink with a strainer. Changed filter. It was covered in brownish/grey slime. I have an outside filter about 6 in. wide that is suppose to handle up to 40 gal. I also run a UG filter and add extra water movement with a long air bubble wand thing. Didn't lose any fish. Again, doing good. Figured the clown was lonely, so a few weeks later I bought two new ones. Added algae drops.  A week later, exchanged one clown that wasn't lively like the other two, also added a kule loache worm thing my son had to have, and a cory catfish to help with the cottony stuff that is returning. So four small additions to the tank. Changed filter. Start fighting the cotton growth. Add algae drops.  Yesteraday, set up 20 Hi QT tank. One angel has a red eye. One has the slightest piece of 'cotton' on its eye. The veils long back fins look raggedy. Some are coming to the top to get air. Many have an orange coloring across the back. Is the orange color normal? They have had this for a long time. But they are all still perky and eating fine. OK. I'm in trouble. The cotton with stringy stuff is trying to cover the bottom again. It's on eveything. The filter is clogged with brown /grey slime. I'm ready to take the aquarium down again completely for cleaning because I know I can't get that stuff out of the rocks if I don't.  One of the new clown loaches is flashing for days, has become lethargic and appears to be dieing. The two other clowns seem to be trying to encourage it to live. One hour ago,out of shear desparation, I put the poor little clown in the QT I had set up for the angels, as they were zooming in on the clown with extreem interest, as he floated on his side on the gravel. He was much stronger in the net than I thought he would be. The QT tank is 5 degrees colder than the 55 gal. which I have raised the temp a few degrees since yesterday. To my surprise, the clown is suddenly better. He is upright, fins out, colors back, and swimming around just a little. Weird. I know the 55 gal tank is overcrowded. I overfeed. Not enough maintenance.  Questions: Why am I suddenly after a year having an algae problem? How do I get this white cottony stringy crap to go away and stay away? Brown slime-same question. I didn't use to have these problems at all.  Do you think my angels need medicine? What would you recommend, if so? Can I put all of them in the QT tank, clean the 55 gal. Then leave the clowns, kule loach and the 5 veils in the QT tank, returning the other 9 angels and the coy to the 55 gal.? Should I try to clean the 55 gal without moving them, then separate them to relieve the over crowding? I don't know which way to go. My hobby has turned into a pain. Please,any suggestions will be appreciated.
-----Answer-----
Dear Melodie,
Thank you for your most informative letter!

Now I don't mean to sound harsh, but I think your main problem with your tank and your fish is a lack of maintenenace or not enough ot it. I'm certain that your aquarium is certainly in need of partial water changes, filter cleanings, and careful feedings. With 14 large Angelfish and not enough water changes, conditions can get very poor for the fish living within. There is certainly something to that since when you moved the little Clown Loach into the QT tank he suddenly perked up, maybe the water quality was cleaner and better in the QT tank than in the main 55gal?

The annoying whitish stringly material in your aquarium may simply be from lack of maintenance as well, repeated thorough gravel cleanings and careful feedings should help prevent this problem from re-occuring. Lack of maintenance is also why algae problems are occuring, algae thrives on excess nutrients in the water due to leftover fish food or just fish waste themselves. The cottony stuff on the one angelfish's eye and the other angel's red eye and the Clown loaches flashing and lethargic behavior tends to all relate to poor water quality.

I strongly believe that something as simple as doing more frequent partial water changes and upgrading your filter system may be all your fish need. But they need help as soon as possible.
If it were my aquarium, I'd start doing daily 20-30% water changes making sure to gravel vacuum very thoroughly. I would also get rid of the undergravel filter, all these filters tend to do is trap debri underneath the bottom filter plate where is decomposes and vastly degrade water quality. Just try to get rid of that and just run a Hang-on-back (also known as HOB) power filter such as cascade brand or similar brands. I have found that these filters do the best jobs at keeping the water clean and well-oxygenated. Also it may be best to get one that is rated higher than your tank's volume. Make sure to rinse the filter's cartridge at least once or even twice a week, always rinse it in a bucket of tank water and never scrub it in the sink or completely replace the filter, doing this could deplete the good bacteria colony too much.

Be sure to never do a complete tank teardown. This is unneccesary even under this circumstance and doing so just causes your tank to have to cycle again once everything is set back up, triggering ammonia problems.

Please try not to overfeed, I know it's hard especially with as many Angels as you have. Just try to cut back as much as you can at least for now until you can get your tank maintenance and filteration better.

If you feel you need to medicate, I recommend using a combination of "Melafix" and "Pimafix" these are all-natural fish medications that can be safely used together and provide a good antibacterial and anti-fungal treatment that is safe for most all fish. Combinig this with partial water changes should help your fish greatly.

There is nothing better you can do for your fish than frequent water changes. Remember they are living in and breathing in their surroundings and if that water is too dirty, they surely will get very sick.

I hope it is not too late for some of your fish. I imagine your aquarium is beautiful with all those lovely large Angelfish, and you are right about the aquarium being overstocked and not enough maintenance. Just try your best to get things straight without doing a complete tank overhaul and I'm sure your water quality can be straightened out with good hard work!

Best of Luck with everything!
Hope this helps,
Karen~
ps: the orange coloration on the angels is quite normal and tends to appear as a natural coloration

Answer
Hi Melodie!
Due to Allexperts.com privacy policy I cannot give my email address or take email addresses from other people. I'm really sorry about that. However, I would love to see the pictures of the Angelfish and I know of another easy way I could see them. Just visit 'Tropicalresources.net's forum where you can easily post your pictures there and I can easily go there and see them. You will have to register but that is not difficult at all. You could try to send the pictures through PM (private message) on the forum as well (my user name is Zeldamae after my beloved dog!).
I hope this isn't all too much trouble for you.

At "Tropicalresources.net" forum you will also get some of the best advice and help on fishkeeping around! Tropical resources is the internet forum for TFH (Tropical fish hobbyist) Magazine.

I'm so sorry to hear about the loach. I bet he was just too little to recover.
The four Angels in the 20gallon should do excellent--just make sure the water quality is always good for them since I think I remember you saying that the 20gal was a recent setup and it may not have cycled yet.

I hope this helps and as always, feel free to write with anymore concerns!

Angelfish rule!
Karen~