# Funky smelling



## onna (Jan 29, 2010)

I was rearranging my tank yesterday and noticed it had a funky almost swamp like smell to it, thought I was smelling things and had the husband smell and he said it was almost like iron. Its been set up and running since Feb. 2nd, added 3 mollies on the 4th and on the 16th added 1 BN and 12 ghost shrimp. The tank has since settled out to about 7.0ph, nitrate 0, nitrite 10. As of Tuesday I've pulled out all the mollies to treat one for dropsy, one for ich and the other has clamped fins. v.v" Everything else is doing good in the tank, even found out the BN is a female and hubby has a male in his tank. The filtration is Aquatech 10-20 with biological filter but no carbon and never had this smell until this past week when the molly picked up the dropsy. I'm not sure if the soil sand with sand cap is too thick or not. In some places its about 2in thick total to 3in thick. Could this be part of the issue and I need to start the tank over?


Onna


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## Diana K (Dec 20, 2007)

Maybe. 
When you say 'swamp smell' is this a plant and soil sort of smell, or sort of like compost or a 'swamp gas' sort of smell? 
Most of my tanks have a faint 'earthy' sort of fragrance, but I have to really get close to smell it. Not a bad fragrance at all. When something goes wrong (dead fish, filter slowing down...) then other smells develop. 

If your tank does not smell good, then there may be something wrong. 

Cyanobacteria also smells bad, but I don't know how to describe it. 

Poke the deep areas of the substrate with a fork or chopstick. Do bubbles come out? Get chose enough to smell the bubbles. If it smells like 'swamp gas' this is not good. 2 weeks is really fast for this to develop, though.


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## onna (Jan 29, 2010)

I guess it would be almost a plant and soil smell not entirely sure on what the bubbles smell like since I had the tank about 1/3 drained so I could move plants around and clean the bottom up.


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## Kosh42|EFG (Jul 4, 2007)

Is it possible that the sand cap on the soil is causing the substrate to become anoixic? Think that's the term, but I mean too starved of oxygen so its going off as the right sort of bacteria can't grow in there....


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## onna (Jan 29, 2010)

Messed with the tank a bit today, been having green water issues too. I had the water checked and nothing extreme Ph7 Am .25 maybe lower, Nitrate 0, Nitrite 0 Gh 80 Kh 0. Think I got the GH and Kh right, the chick wasn't sure on which was which and got me confused. v.v" I just started to get out the top layer of sand and able to get a good whiff of the tank before and while taking about a 1/3 of it out and it's definitely the bubbles that smell not the tank water. It's an almost boggy/earthy/decomposing plant smell to it. The BN and ghost shrimp seem to be doing fine, cut back on feedings and planning on picking up some zucchini tomorrow for her. I guess it might be because of the sand cap being too thick. 


Still tinkering with this kind of set up, though would there be big difference in using play sand to pool sand for these setups?




Onna


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## Rusalka (Jun 11, 2008)

If it smells like rotten eggs, 'toots', or 'sulphur', that is not good. All other dirt and earthy smells are OK.

Is your tank relatively new? All tanks will bubble like crazy when the soil is first submerged. 

However a 2-3 inch substrate is a little thick and might become a problem in the future - especially since a sand cap doesn't 'breathe' as much as gravel. BUT i have a tank with a similar thickness that did go rotten and i was able to bring it back to health by doing two things:

- The first was manual soil 'aerations' with a skewer, or chop stick. I just poked the soil and released the gas every couple of days. If alot of gas was released I would do a water change so that it would not harm my fish. I also kept fresh activated charcoal in my filter during this time.

- The second thing I did was to put in tons of plants that have really powerful root systems. Like Sagittaria subulata - as much as it can be a pain by being so invasive, i credit it with saving my tank, it kept on spreading while other plants were dying off. Also tiger lotus', vals, and various swords helped too. My tank ended up looking like a jungle, but it is healthy and all my fish have been going strong since. This tactic might be a good preventative for you, and if you start with heavier rooting plants now you can avoid problems in the future. 

Does anyone else have other 'heavy rooting' plant suggestions?


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## Jane in Upton (Aug 10, 2005)

onna said:


> Still tinkering with this kind of set up, though would there be big difference in using play sand to pool sand for these setups?
> 
> Onna


Yes, the play sand is very fine, and will compact much more easily. With less exchange with the water column above, this can lead to the soil layer becoming anoxic, as a previous poster mentioned.

When you say 2 inches to 3 inches thick, do you mean 1 to 1.5 inches of soil, plus 1 to 1.5 inches of sand? Or are you meaning the sand layer only? If you meant just the sand layer, then that is a very thick cap. If that is the case, can you skim off some of the sand cap?

I like the suggestion of plants with really tough root systems! Good idea.


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## onna (Jan 29, 2010)

Think the soil is about 2.5 inches and sand is about 1/2 an inch, I'm working on scraping off the excess sand just taking it slow so not to stress the fish in there more than what they are. So far I've taken out about about as much would fit in a empty cool whip container so far.


Onna


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## Rusalka (Jun 11, 2008)

Yeah that is a pretty thick soil layer. So I would take preventative measures. 

Also, in addition to manual aeration, and adding heavy rooters, you could add a burrowing snail, like Malaysian Trumpet Snails. 

Good luck!


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## Diana K (Dec 20, 2007)

.5" of sand is not even enough play sand to compact, not a problem. 
Soil 2.5" is enough to be a problem if it is a fine soil, and no dense rooting plants.


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## onna (Jan 29, 2010)

Its a bit hard to measure exactly, the tank sits between a table and a corner, but the sand depth varies between 1/2 in. to 1 inch. So far the biggest plant in the tank is a type of Amazon sword, its got 2 babies out so far and we've got the 3rd one sitting in the 20g long tank. I'll probably pull some more sand out this weekend or next week. Between pulling the sand out, doing a 50% water change and cutting the lights to about 6-8hrs or less has helped with the green water issue, even sitting by the window.


Onna


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## Diana K (Dec 20, 2007)

I see earlier in this thread you posted that the ammonia was showing a trace, a bit under .25 ppm. This is enough to stress the fish a LOT, trigger diseases including dropsy, columnaris and Ich, and to start green water algae growing. 
The green water algae, as undesireable as it usually is, really is GOOD at this point: it is removing the toxic ammonia from the tank. 
Other test results:
NH3/NH4- Ammonia. Highly toxic to fish. When the water is higher pH (over 7) the ammonia is in its more toxic form. 
NO2- Nitrite. Also toxic to the fish. A dash of salt (Sodium Chloride) will reduce the amount of nitrite that crosses the gills. The dose is 1 teaspoon of salt per 20 gallons. You may only need this in the tank for a couple of weeks, until the nitrite is under control. Mollies are fine with salt, not a problem at all, but plants do not like it. This is a very low dose, well tolerated by plants and fish.
NO3- the end result of a healthy growth of nitrifying bacteria. When there are plenty of these beneficial bacteria there will be 0 ppm ammonia and nitrite, and rising nitrate. 
Plants and algae use nitrogen as fertilizer, and will keep these levels low. More plants, and good light so the plants are thiving will help keep these levels low.
GH- a measure of Calcium and Magnesium. Necessary for plants and fish. Most plants will thrive with GH at least 3 or 4 degrees, and higher is not a problem. Livebearing fish (Mollies) prefer a much higher GH (over 10 degrees)
KH- carbonates. Some plants can use carbonates as an alternate source of carbon, but this is secondary. Carbonates are a buffer that stablilizes the pH. Plants are not very picky about KH or pH, but a KH from about 3 degrees on up will stablize the pH better than if the carbonates are lower. Livebearing fish (Mollies, again) thrive in harder, alkaline water, and I would try to get the KH up closer to 10 degrees, the pH into the mid to upper 7s. 
pH is not as important. If you can get the GH and KH into the correct range for the plants and fish, let the pH do what it wants. 
Except!!! While there is ammonia in the tank, a higher pH makes the ammonia more toxic. Take your time changing the KH (which will change the pH). Do this slowly, and keep track of the ammonia. By the time the nitrifying bacteria are well established, and can keep the ammonia at 0 ppm, then you can keep the pH between about 7.5-8, a reasonable level for Mollies. 
Thriving plants will also help keep the ammonia and nitrite at 0 ppm, and may also use up most or all of the nitrate.

Best to get your own test kit, not rely on store people. As you found out, they are not always sure of what they are doing. Each one will read the test a bit differently, leading to missinterpretations that may suggest some problems when really nothing is wrong, or missing the hint of a problem that could be controlled, given a proper early warning, if you only knew about it in time.

Another quick note: 'Funky smelling' can also be rising ammonia, most people would say the aquarium smells like cat pee.


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