Worring about my fish

[Jamie P Holcomb]

Hey everyone,

I am a little worried about my fish they have all of a sudden stopped eating, or at least coming to the surface to get the food.  In fact I haven't seen any fish in the last couple of days. The water is so murky that I can't see the bottom but I was able to see the fish as they came up for food. The other day I used a brush to move some the waste at the bottom of the tank around in hopes that it would find it's way to the pump and up into the grow bed. This is when I stopped seeing fish at feeding time. Have I done something terrible wrong?

Any help or reassurance would be greatly appreciated.

Jamie

[Jamie P Holcomb]

Thanks for the response, I have been taking a look at parameters. Water temps have been a constant 76-78 pretty much ever since I put them in there. pH is and has been at 6.6 for some time. I have been trying to get that up with AquaUp, but I only use it once a day and allow it to cycle through for at least 24 hours before doing it again. I really haven't been able to get pH to move that much. The other 3 parameters might be a cause for concern though. Ammonia is at .25-.5ppm, Nitites are in that same range and Nitrates are somewhere around 5ppm.

[Alex Veidel]

Well, using the brush might have scared them a little....My fish tend to freak out whenever I put a net in there, and for some reason it takes them a day or two to recover from the shock of it all. (might need to start acclimating them to that or something....)

I would test your water parameters and watch for pH swings or changes in temperature. There might be another factor causing them stress.