Tropical Fish Forum
Tropical Fish Keeping Help and Advice => Fish Health => Topic started by: Bazza2000 on August 19, 2019, 07:01:21 PM
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Hi,
Could anyone give me some advice as to whether this sword looks unhealthy. She has been staying on the gravel at the bottom of the tank and not moving a lot. Haven't observed her feeding over the past couple of days either. I can't see anything obvious from the photos, but wanted to see if any experts could see anything, or recommend any other cause. I've recently replaced a few plants, but had noticed she was sitting on the bottom before they where added.
Thanks,
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With livebearers the first thing to check is the hardness of your tap water. Livebearers are hard water fish and don't do well in soft water.
Once we know your hardness, we can eliminate that (or otherwise) as a cause. You should be able to find your hardness on your water compnay's website - you need a number and the unit.
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Hi Sue,
Thanks for the quick response, I can't get an exact reading for my postcode on the water board website, but the LFS mentioned it is between 9-14 degrees hardness. I have 4 swordtails, 3 females (1 of which is lethargic) and 1 male, the other 3 appear to be fine.
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Let us know how it goes Bazza. Maybe get one of those water testing kits to get an accurate reading for sure. https://amzn.to/2MvxqY2
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There are some water company websites that are not helpful, unfortunately
Hardness shouldn't come as a range, it should be a single figure - though I don't know if test strips give a range as I haven't used them myself. Depending on just where your hardness comes in that range, it could be a bit on the soft side for swordtails which need hardness 10 to 25 dH.
It could be that the individual fish is weaker than the others. They've been through a lot since they were born. Keep an eye on her.
Just a thought - she's not heavily pregnant is she? Livebearers do behave differently when they are near to giving birth.