Something very strange has just happened. After introducing my first 4 Guppies to my new fresh water aquarium yesterday, I noticed one of them had disappeared this morning.

I searched high & low & decied to move the tank out to investigate the back & found the poor missing Guppy stuck on the filter intake. Surely this is highly un-normal & I have never heard of this happening.

We are using the Fluval 1 Plus filter, which came with the tank we bought, & it doesn't have an adjustable speed on it.

Anyone know how to avoid this happening again, as I am sure it was a horrible way to die.

It's very unusual for a healthy fish to get sucked into a filter intake, unless the filter is ridiculously strong (not the case with a Fluval 1 Plus!). I'd suggest that the fish died of another cause and got sucked into the filter afterwards. As long as your other fish look healthy I'd put it down to bad luck and not worry too much - guppies in general aren't as robust as they were ten years ago and a loss of one out of four in a new tank isn't uncommon.
Make sure you're testing the Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate levels of the water regularly and hopefully you can avoid any further losses.

Thank you very much for your reply, Marc.

Sadly I have lost a further 2 fish out of my original 4 today . It seems they got stuck in the bubbles at the back of my tank(from a rubber bubble tube attached to an air pump) & just keeled over on their backs & floated up to the surface dead. I am now left with a very lonely orange tailed Guppy, which looks healthy enough.

Luckily I only started with 4 fish I guess !.

Can you recommend any good testing kits on the market that test for Ammonia & Nitrates, as I tested the water for Ph, hard water & buffering zones before I bought the fish & the water seemed OK.

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Fish are pretty strong little critters and don't tend to get stuck, like Marc mentioned, in water or air flows. They usually manage to thrash themselves free.

However if they're dead or nearly dead they will easily get pulled in by currents.

I always liked the Interpet testing kits. There used to be an all in one starter kit.

You can always take a small sample of water to the shop and get them to test it.

Thanks for the reply, Fishadmin.

I lost the last guppie last night so will invest in a multi test kit & leave the tank fish free for a week.

The shop I bought the fish from tested the water before I bought the guppies & said the water was OK - all I saw was some pink liquid in a test tube, so I'm not sure what test he did.

Hello/Help me please!!

I have a 110 litre aquarium and a number of fish (will list at bottom) I recently added four female guppies and two male.

Almost as soon as they were in one or two of my three black widow tetras picked out one of the male guppies and started attacked him, biting pieces from his tail. (I had three black widows for a long time then two died, I replaced them with these two newer ones about 2 months ago).

The older black widow was not involved and I couldnt tell if it was one or both of the newer ones so I have quarantined them both.

Unfortunately, by this time the other fish noticed the injured guppy and all hell broke loose, as you can imagine.

I still have the two quaruntined (how do you spell that?)and was looking for some advice on how to proceed.

I am concerned that if I reintroduce the two bad boys they will simply work their way through the remaining guppies. Was the guppy weak in a way only the the other fish could sense, triggering the attack?

Any help you can provide would be very very welcome!!

Fish owned: 3 Silver (Bala) Sharks, 3 flame tetras, 3 silvertip tetras, 3 black widow tetras, 2 cardinal tetras, 1 gold spotted plec, 1 red tailed black shark, 1 ram, 1 kribensis, 6 sorry 5 guppies.

Very sorry to hear about your guppies. I am concerned about the shop you are buying your fish from - they should really have let you know what they were testing for, and explained the Nitrogen cycle to you - it's very simple, really!
Any good all-in-one starter test kit should include tests for Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrate and pH, and have a simple-to-understand booklet explaining why you are testing for these.
I have been using Tetratest's range of kits for the past four years religiously, and can highly recommend them, but will also agree with Fishadmin that Interpet's range are just as good.
Hope you have more luck when you restock - I would suggest starting with something slightly hardier than guppies, for instance platies, black neon tetras, or black widow tetras. There are many more species which would be just as suitable, as long as you make sure your water is toxin-free to begin with.
Good luck,
Marc

Male guppies are the whipping-boys of any fish tank, unfortunately - any aggression is usually directed at them because of their large, colourful tails which means they can't swim away as fasy as they often need to. I'm frankly surprised that your Kribensis didn't beat the Black Widows to it - I once lost half a dozen guppies to a lone Krib in the space of ten minutes!
Black Widows are usually fairly peaceful community fish, but like any animals, some are naturally more aggressive than others, and I have witnessed many a nipped fin from a pugnacious widow. They tend to be better in groups of six or more, as the aggression tends to be contained within the group rather than directed at other fish in the tank, so maybe you could try adding a few to see if this helps the situation. Otherwise, my only suggestion is to take the guppies back to where you bought them and replace them with fish that are less of an easy target.
Hope this helps,
Marc

Thanks again for your reply :o)

I just rang the LFS that sold the guppies to me after they did the water test & spoke to the Manager. I told him that the test water came back pink & I was told that I could buy up to 4 guppies, as they are hardy fish.

According to the Manager of the shop, guppies are not hardy & I should not have been sold fish to go in my tank yet. He was very concerned that one of his staff had given me wrong information & told me to go back to the shop & ask to speak to him personally. He said he would re test the water for everything (inc ammonia & nitrites), reimburse the price of the guppies & recommend some hardier fish.

I have just ordered the Tetra Test Laborette & will start testing as soon as it arrives, so I become used to using it.

Hi everyone. I’m another newbie to tropical fish keeping so you will have to be patient with me. I have done a lot of research but there are still some things which I’m unsure of and clarifying.

I have just bought, from a friend, a tank and various bits and bobs. The tank measures 48” (W) x 18” (H) x 15” (D). According to PFK website this gives a volume of about 210 litres when filled completely, which obviously it won’t. The tanks comes with a solid base cabinet with lots of storage and a matching hood.

Just to let you know I want a nice simple community tank to start with and slowly develop it into a more varied collection.

I also have an Interpet Prime 30 external canister filter, which I believe is a suitable filter for this tank size.

I have two fluorescent light tubes, about 40 inches long, rated at 40W each. Is this enough? I am going to start with some plastic plants and hopefully some real plants too.

2 x heaters. One is 150W and the other is 200W. Would these both be used for the volume of water (one at each end?). I know it is a bit of a general question but lets assume the tank will be about 25C ish.

Just two more questions!! What is a “Interpet Airvoloution Mini”? I am assuming, by the looks of it, that you plug a small hose into which pumps air out the other end into the tank.

Last One. I have read that under gravel filters are good to use to keep the gravel/stones in the bottom of the tank cleaner. Are they worthwhile? Can they be used in conjunction with my existing filter?

Thanks for any help you can give me. I’m sure I will be asking about a lot more stuff!!!

Andy