Wtf?

[Fre nchy]

My Angel fish has a whitish substance on it's skin that looks almost as if it was shedding it's skin (like a snake) - in fact, it looks exactly like that, but there's nothing really coming off it (yet?). I called Tetra Care and asked and they said it was probably just a poor water quality issue (we had ridiculously high Nitrite levels (over 10 on the ppm chart for strips) for the last week - now it's like 2.0). I think I'm going to do a water change later today.

Is there a specific disease that could be causing this or is it just water quality?

[xoolooxunny]

it could be fungus, and I know for a fact that angels require very good water quality, with 50% changes a week.

[Drumachine09]

2ppm nitrites is extremely deadly. It sounds like your tank isnt cycled. You need to do a HUGE water change STAT!

[Drumachine09]

Oh, it could also be a poor slime coat. I think stress coat helps to fix that. That or mela/pima fix

[Fre nchy]

50% weekly? I tend to work more on the side of the less you do to the tank the better (let their ecosystem work on itself) since everytime I put something in it, something dies. Only until recently I didn't do anything except water changes (biweekly) and water conditioner, and that did just fine. But since I had the money to actlually purchase all that jazz my fish have been dying. So I'm wonderin outta anyone's personal experience whether my beliefs tend to achieve more efficient results or the "scientific" beliefs are as the good idea? Going through my six-seven months of aquaria keeping the leave it alone theory proves more visible as a positive conclusion.

[Drumachine09]

50% weekly? I tend to work more on the side of the less you do to the tank the better (let their ecosystem work on itself) since everytime I put something in it, something dies. Only until recently I didn't do anything except water changes (biweekly) and water conditioner, and that did just fine. But since I had the money to actlually purchase all that jazz my fish have been dying. So I'm wonderin outta anyone's personal experience whether my beliefs tend to achieve more efficient results or the "scientific" beliefs are as the good idea? Going through my six-seven months of aquaria keeping the leave it alone theory proves more visible as a positive conclusion.


there was a talk about this earlier, and doing water changes is necasarry. Did you cycle your tank?

[Chrona]

50% weekly? I tend to work more on the side of the less you do to the tank the better (let their ecosystem work on itself) since everytime I put something in it, something dies. Only until recently I didn't do anything except water changes (biweekly) and water conditioner, and that did just fine. But since I had the money to actlually purchase all that jazz my fish have been dying. So I'm wonderin outta anyone's personal experience whether my beliefs tend to achieve more efficient results or the "scientific" beliefs are as the good idea? Going through my six-seven months of aquaria keeping the leave it alone theory proves more visible as a positive conclusion.

If the fish died after a water change, then you are either not adding a water conditioner that removes metals/chlorine/chloramine or are not adjusting the temperature prior to adding it. An aquarium is far from natural. In nature, constant rain will replenish stagnant bodies of water. This, obviously, does not occur in aquariums naturally, and has to be replicated via water changes. Even if you have the live plants to uptake all of the nitrates that would otherwise eventually poison the fish, you still need a source of trace elements. In nature, things are balanced after millions of years of imbalance. The slightest disturbance can kill everything. The same applies to aquariums, though it happens much faster.

It's not just scientific beliefs either. Water changes is pretty much considered the cure-all for most issues by the vast majority of the aquarium hobby. And that is a LOT of total experience. Personally I think personal experience/anecdotes is only a portion of what it takes to successfully keep aquariums. Unless you know the reasoning behind your decisions, then you will constantly be plagued by choices based on faulty experience gained in an uncontrolled environment where 20 other factors could have contributed to a phenomenom.