HELP ME ASAP ALMOST ALL OF FISH DIED

[steve]

I got a FX5 yesterday I put it on my 100g and everything was working great I went to bed a very happy man. I woke up this morning to almost all of my fish being dead. I checked the water it is perfect what the hell happened!!!!!!! I moved my smaller fish to a hospital tank because he was just sitting on the bottom not doing well.

[biggin]

What did you put in your Fx5? Media?

[biggin]

Did you just remove your old filtration?

[rolloffhill]

New or used?

[steve]

I think I figured it out. I bought it used they unhooked it from the tank while I was there. I did not rinse the media out thinking there was good bacteria in there so when I turned it on it shot out all types of gunk ie fish crap came shooting out. I did not think much of it as the time but what this did was make a massive ammonia spike and killed my fish. Did a 50% water change will contiue to moniter the situation. Geeze what a boneheaded move

[steve]

I learned one big thing from this. Always have a ammonia test kit. The strips I have now do not have ammonia and the Nitrates and nitrites looked fine but the ammonia was way way high. What an expensive lesson to learn,

[greeneyed]

Sorry to hear that.
What all did you have in there?

[steve]

I lost 2 female fronts 5" each 2 ink calvus 4" each pair of featherfins that were doin the breading dance and a few other tangs that I dont remember their names.

[T.c.T]

Sorry for your lost.
I bought an used canister last week. But I cleaned it inside out throughly before I used it on my tank. It was so dirty that took me the whole hour to clean.

[supersmirky]

Wow....lost some good ones there! Sorry to hear about that! They sell those little suction cup testers that can test up to 3 months with a single cartridge. Might be worth the $12

[tsunderl]

Wow Steve! Sorry to hear about that. Hopefully things will settle down soon.

I've never put much stock in the water testing strips and always use the ones with the tubes and drops that make me look like a mad scientist. Bit more trouble, but I think they are more accurate.

[EAST_TX_RN]

Oh, I am so sorry Steve! I had a similar problem a while back, forgot to add the chemicals when doing a w/c, and killed all but my female BN and a lab fry in my 55. I cried and cried over it! I had the fish for a long time too. Is there anything we can do to help? I have some Kenyi fish that pop fry on a regular basis,so if you want to change to something different, I can give you some of the next bunch.

[steve]

I appreciate it but I have some others coming in that are 8-10". You livr and learn I guess just remember always clean out a used filter before using it.