Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

yesterday one european catfish died and two others got sick.
i got the sick fishes out put them in clean water with some salt, they seemed a lot better this morning.
i run some water tests but couldnt find the problem.
there was enough oxygen, nitrate, ph was normal, no temperature change.
only the ammnium was a little bit high but not dangerously.
this morgning the pump stopped working and the ammium was really high.
half of my fish where dead.

i cleaned the pump and it is working again, the water level was kind of low so i filled it with clean water.
and removed al the dead fish.
but what should i do with the rest of the fish.

keep them in the tank now the pumps work again and the system will clean itself.
or get the fish out and in some clean water and let them recover for a while?

Sorry need more detail to help.
1. How old is your system?
2. What type of beds do you have? Media, DWC or...
3. How much bed space do you have? L X W X H
4. How big is your fish tank?
5. How many fish and approx sizes?
6. What is the ammonia reading in ppm?

Well today I found a dead fish.





Any thoughts?

I think the cutting it open and toothpick down the middle would have done it.

You are not being helpful.

How do the gills look?

Not sure how long it has been dead for. It was floating I don't think it was dead yesterday but it looks pretty fresh.

Looks pretty healthy to me. It didn't choke on another fish (which fell out)?

I wouldn't worry about it unless others start floating.

Yeah looks healthy to me apart from the bit about being dead in all

I've got two ideas one of which is a worry but I don't want to mention them and influence peoples input just yet.

The skin doesn't seem right to me? The weird greenish-yellow hue and the mottling of it's skin seems off to me. But I really have no idea. The gills seem a bit pale or is that normal?

Oh I really have no idea what I'm on about, lol, sorry. I hope you can find out what's wrong if there is something untoward happening.

Posted with permission:

I haven't had to diagnose too many problems with my fish. Generally they are very healthy. The only ones that I lost and suicides and when I've lost fish to low oxygen due to power or equipment failure.

Ehhh...gut smells fishy...in a good way.


Actually smells really fresh ie barely fishy at all.

Just had a thought, what's the size of the feed the fishies are getting? Too small and I think they get diarrhea, too large and they get constipated and potentially die.

I can't remember exactly where I read it, but think the feed is supposed to be about the same size as the fish mouths.

Having a look on the monitor...

It could be an over-feed (gluttony). If the stomach smelt bad then you might associate death with a blocked intestine (with food rotting in the gut) but in the absence of a foul odour, with no other information, I reckon this greedy fish just ate too much in one hit! From here, I count at least eleven lumps?

Gills look ok to me, if not a little pale, but colour can vary a little whilst alive and will sometimes fade slightly when left dead in the water; they're not brown or blotchy though. Liver looks ok too. Some, but not a remarkable amount of fat.

When you cut it open, did it "pop"? Was there a release of "excess" gas? The first photo looks a little bloated, but in the second photo there doesn't look to be enough guts there to "fill" the cavity (not that the entire space gets filled)? Excess "gas" could be result of swim bladder abnormality/infection (sometimes observable as fish will swim upside down or constantly at the surface) but can also happen after death as decay starts (newly dead fish often sink then float after a day or two). Was this fish "significantly" smaller or larger than the others?

Sometimes, fish just die