Earlier this summer, I discovered that Ellie loved my brother's aquarium so I decided to get her one. I got a all-in-one package from Wal-Mart. Then I got the gravel, fake plants and 6 fish (2 black, 4 orange). Everything was great for a while until we went away for vacation and all 4 orange fish died. I consulted my brother and he said I needed a heater. So I got one and everything was fine. He also said I needed a plant to keep the water fresh so I got one of those too. A snail showed up with the plant and everything was fine. Then my parents got Ellie some fish because the aquarium was a bit boring with just two fish. Now, I had 4 black and 4 orange fish. Then we started to have an algae problem so I mentioned to Joe that we needed a placostimus (algae eating fish). The next night he came home with 2 placostimuses and 4 neon tetras. Now I had 14 fish in a 10 gallon tank.
Then the four neon tetras died all pretty close to each other. The algae started taking over and I noticed the fish had little white spots on them. This was Ick and required action. These were all signs of stress on the tank. So I changed 25% of the water, as directed by my brother, only I screwed up when I put the new water in. The new water was too hot and too much temp change kills fish. Since then (48 hours ago) two orange fish have died and one is basically dead now.
(eta: I just killed the dying orange one. He wasn't going to get better and I didn't want him to suffer.)
Anyway, I feel bad that I'm killing all these fish. I was actually trying to give them a nice place to live and they ended up dead. I feel stupid that I'm actually sad about this, but I am. Not super sad, but a little sad.
Then the four neon tetras died all pretty close to each other. The algae started taking over and I noticed the fish had little white spots on them. This was Ick and required action. These were all signs of stress on the tank. So I changed 25% of the water, as directed by my brother, only I screwed up when I put the new water in. The new water was too hot and too much temp change kills fish. Since then (48 hours ago) two orange fish have died and one is basically dead now.
(eta: I just killed the dying orange one. He wasn't going to get better and I didn't want him to suffer.)
Anyway, I feel bad that I'm killing all these fish. I was actually trying to give them a nice place to live and they ended up dead. I feel stupid that I'm actually sad about this, but I am. Not super sad, but a little sad.