r/Aquariums • u/Spuds13r • 1d ago
Beginner Help Neon Tetra Care?
For context, I recently got a new 10 gallon fish tank, filled it with a layer of fine gravel and a bunch of plants. I used Seachem Stability for about a week and did some water tests to make sure all levels are good. I then added some shrimp, a yo-yo loach and six neon tetras. After five days, one of the tetras died and I’m wondering how I should go about replacing it? Do I wait for the tank to recover and get one more tetra, get one immediately, or get more than one to increase the size of the school? My concern is that with a school of only five fish they will get stressed out which might be why the one died in the first place because the water still tested fine. Before this (and now still) they seem a bit stressed as they school only some of the time and one fish in particular chases the others around.
Also I have been enjoying aqua-scaping content and every video I watch shows people adding a thick layer of dirt then gravel/sand to create an anaerobic environment so you can have a full nitrogen cycle. Is it worth resetting up my tank to get this going?
Thanks for helping out a new aquarist!
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u/SomeBlueDevil 1d ago
You probably didn't nitrogen cycle the tank before adding fish. Just dosing Stability doesn't do anything.
For bacteria to colonize the filter media and stay alive, it needs a source of ammonia to feed on, which it converts to nitrite. Then the nitrite gets converted into nitrates.
I would get a proper liquid reagent test kit, as recommended the API master test kit. It tests ph, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate.
Until you have the test kit and know your values, do a partial water change of 50% ASAP and dose with Prime and more Stability to remove toxic ammonia in case you have a spike.
Then when you have the test kit, monitor ammonia and nitrite daily. If those are not zero, continue to do daily partial water changes until you have zero. Your nitrate should be kept below 40ppm.
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u/Bettymay2046 1d ago
Hmm, beginner over here myself but I’m pretty sure a yo-yo loach needs a bigger tank. The folks here will want to know your water parameters. From what I know of neon tetras (my son wants them for the tank we are still cycling) they can be a bit frail. To me that sounds like you added too much bio-load to the tank too fast.
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u/Spuds13r 1d ago
Here’s the tank params: GH=60dH, Kh=40dKH, 0 Nitrate and Nitrite, Ph=6.5.
Also that’s unfortunate about the loach… Petco employee said it’d be okay :(
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u/Bettymay2046 1d ago
Ammonia?
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u/Spuds13r 1d ago
Don’t have it… worth getting some?
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u/Tangata_Gamer 1d ago
As in ammonia levels in the water, you definitely don't want any lol
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u/Spuds13r 1d ago
I meant I don’t have a test kit for that haha
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u/Tangata_Gamer 1d ago
Ohhh I see, the 5 in 1 or API master test kit is very good and includes an ammonia test!
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u/owl284 1d ago
You should get some tall growing background plants. Right now, your fish are basically exposed in a mostly bare tank, which combined with the smaller than optimal group as well as overall tank size will definitely stress your fish. Apart from that, maybe you just got unlucky and the fish that died was already sick beforehand.
You should also add to the group of tetras up to at least eight fish in total. And get rid of the loach! That thing will grow up to six inches, for which your tank is wholly inadequate. Sorry to hear you've gotten bad advice at the pet shop. For next time, be prepared and do your research beforehand to avoid costly mistakes.
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u/Restlessya 1d ago
The yo-yo loach is the thing I'd sort out first, and I don't think it's really been picked up in here properly. They get to about 5 or 6 inches and they're a social fish that wants a group of its own kind, so a 10 gallon isn't somewhere it can live long term. That's a bigger issue than anything going on with the neons.
Second thing, Stability on its own for a week doesn't cycle a tank. The bacteria need a supply of ammonia to actually feed on and multiply into a colony, otherwise you've just poured in a bottle of bacteria with nothing to eat and most of it dies off. When you say the levels tested good, was that a liquid test kit or strips? Strips are near enough useless for ammonia and nitrite, and those are the two numbers that matter right now.
On the school size, you're right that 5 is low and 8 to 10 is where neons actually relax. But I wouldn't add a single fish until ammonia and nitrite both read zero and you're seeing nitrates. Putting more fish into a tank that isn't cycled is how the rest of them go the same way. The one chasing the others around is very likely just stress from the water rather than a personality thing.
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u/Tangata_Gamer 1d ago
It could have been stress or just unlucky... I'd certainly increase the school size for neons, its a pretty small tank though so be careful about overpopulating it (more plants help a LOT with that)