i did a waterchange and now my fish are dying!?

[talktomrgibson]

hi guys, i'm not exacly a n00b to fishkeeping but i wouldn't say by any stretch of the imagination that i know exactly what i'm doing, i have been thinking about moving my tank for a while and today was the day, i have previously done a 1/3 water change about every weekend. today i did 2/3 so that i could lift the tank, i moved it and did the water change. i have in the tank 1 hatchet fish, 18tetras, 2 bronze corys, and 2 blue rams at the moment and am setting it up to add some discus. i did the water change, and lowered the ph by .2 so that it was 6.8 not 7.0 added the water ager, and now every one of my tetras is floating upside down and not looking in a good way, they are not dead YET but are about to be there. the Rams are fine, corys are fine, pleco can't be found anywhere, hopefully he wasn't attatched to the logs lol (probably hiding somewhere) hatchet is fine, everything is fine except the neons.... any idea ??!!!

nic

[Merrilyn]

Hi Nic. Tetras, particularly neons, are the "canary in the coalmine" of the fish world. As soon as there is something wrong with your water, the neons will go belly up.

A few things to look at - did you add the chlorine remover before or after you filled the tank. It must be added before you fill the tank or the chlorine in the water while the tank is filling will damage the gills.

The other thing is, fresh chlorine will kill the bacteria in your bio filter, although I think it's a bit early for that to be showing up.

Can you do a nitrite and ammonia test. I'm sure it's a problem with the water.

Add a little cooking salt, one teaspoon to 40 litres of water to help the neons breathe. Don't go above that amount, because catfish dont appreciate it.

Dissolve it well before adding it to the tank so there is an even concentration all through the water.

[ILLUSN]

did you use hot water to do your water change?(from the hot water tap) or

does your dechlorinater remove chloroamine as well as chlorine?

did you cold shock the fish with the clean water?