# I NEED URGENT HELP



## Stephstyles21 (Nov 20, 2021)

My Red belly piranha is about five years old and about 5 inches long
I have him in a 20 gallon tank I have a 30 gallon that I want to move him to in the future
For past two days he has been laying on his side of the bottom of the tank and has turned black
He hasn’t been wanting to eat anything for the past week besides yesterday I fed him some fish with a fork and it looked like he almost choked on it 
I feed him little frozen fish 
I read that if they don’t eat the fish to take it out but I haven’t been doing that in hopes he would eat it. So I’m thinking that’s why the nitrate is so high 
Please help me fix this problem I don’t know what the hell im doing 

water chemistry is
Nitrate 180
Nitrite 0
PH 6
GH 180-200
KH 0


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## Formerly_KSLS (Nov 20, 2021)

Your nitrates are to high. I would do a 50% water change and then retest. Stop feeding him for now and stop leaving food in the tank. What temp do you have it at and how often are you cleaning and doing water changes.
A 20G is way to small for a fish that size which is probably why you are having issues in the first place. That fish should be in nothing less than a 55G. It also appears he has some gill curl going on and that due to poor living conditions.


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## Stephstyles21 (Nov 20, 2021)

Formerly_KSLS said:


> Your nitrates are to high. I would do a 50% water change and then retest. Stop feeding him for now and stop leaving food in the tank. What temp do you have it at and how often are you cleaning and doing water changes.
> A 20G is way to small for a fish that size which is probably why you are having issues in the first place. That fish should be in nothing less than a 55G. It also appears he has some gill curl going on and that due to poor living conditions.


Thank you for replying! I did a water change and got a nitrate reducing pad and it seams to be going down. Temperature is at 78
I need to be better at cleaning and doing regular water changes


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## Formerly_KSLS (Nov 20, 2021)

That’s good. He really needs a more suitable tank size. The bigger the tank the easier it is to maintain. That 20G will be hard to keep. I’d upgrade him soon to the 30G and see if you can find him a 55G. Water changes should be done weekly.


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## fiveo93 (Jan 19, 2004)

Perfectly said KSLS


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