Sick tadpoles!!! Pleeeease help! :'''(

[AlliMarieFitz]

One of them has just died (( the other one is very sick. Here's the story: I got two leopard frog (I was told) tadpoles from a pet store Tuesday evening (it is now Saturday night so I have had them about 4 days). They are in a 20gal tank with a filter, two snails, and some live plants (dracaena and anubias). I have been feeding them a tiny bit of pure organic spirulina, but that is all as the pet store guy told me not to feed them for 3 days while they for adjusted (seemed cruel to starve them completely though). They seemed fine for the first day or two, although I was always worried about the littler one (the one who just passed away) because he had a little bit of cloudiness over his eyes and he was less energetic. Anyway yesterday he was looking really sick, very listless, hanging around the surface a lot, sleeping in extra weird positions. But the larger one (calling him Tails for his crooked tail) seemed alright. Then today the little one was very very sick and during the night had developed sort of rusty red spots on his underbelly, like he was bleeding under his skin or something? And now Tails is looking bad too, he doesn't have the red spots but he was being frantic for a little- like erratic movement, gasping for air (there is aeration in the tank though), swimming poorly and with difficulty, etc... Now he is lying still at the bottom of the tank, still breathing. I tested the water a few hours ago and the pH was good, slightly alkaline, no nitrates, very hard water though, and the ammonia levels were high. I added Prime directly to the tank- double the dosage because it doesn't appear to be bringing the ammonia levels down? I have tested it twice since, once after each addition of Prime. The water was dechlorinated before the tadpoles were put in the tank. I will post pictures. CAN ANYBODY HELP ME SAVE TAILS??? I am so upset, this is awful, I can't watch him die too and I feel like it is my fault because I don't really know what I'm doing so I'm probably making some horribly obvious and fatal mistake. Please, any help would be hugely appreciated!! This is the little one before he got really sick. You can see how his eyes were a little cloudy.This is right before he died. You can kind of make out the shadowy red spots where his hips would be if he had hips. Please help!! Tails is now swimming kind of like shuddering and then sinking/resting in between. I don't want him to suffer ((((

[AlliMarieFitz]

Oh my god!! He's not dead! He is taking breaks from breathing but maybe there is enough O2 in the water that is keeping him alive? I just tested the ammonia again, it seems to be at ~0.5-1.0. I have treated my 20gal tank with a 50gal dose now... Should I treat it again? I don't want to poison the tadpoles the bottle says can be used up to 5x regular strength for emergency nitrite detoxification, but I am treating for ammonia, not nitrites. What do I do???

[Jessalyn]

I'm by no means an expert on tadpoles, but one of the top killers is doing too big of a water change, did you use some of the water they were originally in? And too hot/cold temps could possibly be effecting them too. Hopefully someone with more experience can help you out, good luck!


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[Mentat]

Hello and welcome to FF ! High levels of ammonia are indicative of a not cycled tank. Did you set-up the aquarium recently? Are those snails moving around/alive or closed up in shells? If so, could be dead and adding more ammonia to water. There is not much you can do for Ammonia burns other that moving the surviving tadpole to a cycled tank.

If tank is new set-up; do you have another older tank with filter material you could move into this tank? Need to start doing small 10% water changes couple times a day to bring that ammonia level down until aquarium cycles. Stop using Prime to try to reduce ammonia and nitrates; it interferes with the natural denitrification cycle. There are products in market that will accelerate cycling; try and get a bottle of Seachem Stability and follow the bottle label directions.

Also, adding 1 tablespoon of aquarium or kosher salt per 5 gal. of water to tank will reduce the toxic effect of ammonia.