1 fish, 2 fish, dead fish!

[NuraNori]

So where do I begin...

I've had ich on and off in my 75G tank since I have inherited it. Since I occasionally loose a new fish to ich and the 6 residents will get ich from time to time, I decided to take it upon myself to irradicate ich in my DT.

Since I had a 40 Gallon tank I decided to try the hyposalinity treatment and leave my DT fishless for 6-8 weeks. This was after some extensive reading on the subject and thought I had it down.

So I set up the 40 gallon with a powerhead, heater and some PVC pieces for hiding places. Had the salinity at 1.013, nitrates undectable, nitrites 0 and ammonia 0. The pH was buffered to 8.3 and the temp was consistent with the DT.

I then thought I was ready to rock and went fishing!! So I spent most of last night catching 2 out of the 6 fish and placed them into the 40 gallon tank. They seemed happy swimming around last night. When checked this morning they were still doing well (swimming around actively) and off to work I went. I came home this afternoon (4pm) to a dead Damsel and a trigger that was breathing quite rapidly. The trigger was still swimming around and seemed to be coping.

I then checked the parameters and the only one showing anything out of the ordinary was the ammonia 0.25. So I prepared myself for a water change and the trigger started to deteriorate rapidly. By the time I got things organized for the water change it was dead.

So I am now frustrated and still want to get the ich out of my DT. I want to know where I went wrong and what I can do to avoid this happening again.

....