jqtheplantnoob

I have to disagree with the neons are delicate thing. I cycled a tank with some (before I knew any better) and their still alive close to a year later. The likely culprit is your Angels. BTW I also had a betta who helped himself to neons until they fought back and nipped the christ out of him, he's now in solitary confinement (a 2.5 gallon tank).

yannzgob

I've had similar problems with neons recently. I had bought six, three days later, I was down to three (those three survivors are still alive and kicking today, though). One of the fishes had died in the bag during transport. One disappeared body and soul the following night. The last one to die was agonizing the same morning. I bought it to the LFS to show them and I got the three refunded. Got lucky for that.

The water of my NPT was almost nitrate-free and had a stable pH of around 7.2. No ferts, no added CO2. Water hadn't been changed in a loooong while, so it was not a matter of chlorines. The ten pristellas I already had have been totally unaffected, neither were the two Synodontis I brought in along with the neons. Those two are still alive and give a show when they venture out of their hideouts.

I guess they were just weaklings.

Yann

jqtheplantnoob

I guess it comes down to the quality of the LFS.

aquabillpers

I've had a school of half dollar-sized angels eat 12 neons in about 3 weeks, in a heavily planted tank.

Yesterday at Petland I saw a tank of large, full-bodied neons for $1.79 each. Had i needed more fish I would have bought them with every confidence that they would survive. I would have taken a week to slowly acclimated them to my water first, though.

Bill

dawntwister

How about a picture of the tank and fish that are dying?

Chemical imbalances can affect the fish. I almost lost my Neon Rainbow until I dosed with Calcium sulphate.

If the fish are gasping at the top there is low O2. I found doing a water change and dosing with Hydro peroxide helped.

queijoman

I think you might be on to something. I might have some kind of chemical imbalance, but I am not sure.

To update everyone, I have since added more neons, angelfish, and guppies. All of which died within days or a week of being introduced. The existing fish in the tank are looking fine and happy, but newbies are having a hard time adjusting... Each time I bought fish I changed ~50% of the water, and have been doing 50% water changes every other week.

geeks_15

I really like neon tetras, but I don't buy them anymore. I've had the same situation with them repeatedly dying. I've tried in heavily planted, well established, soft acidic water tanks (RO) and they still die. I bought some from more reputable LFS's but still had little success. I'm leary of buying any fish at the big box pet stores anymore.

You can also add german blue rams to that list. I spent about a year trying to match the water chemisty to their natural habitat by mixing RO water and tap water with no success keeping these fish. I've had much more success with apistos.

The only rams or neons I would buy would have to be locally raised. I still haven't even tried that. Too gunshy.

bartoli

My neon tetra tank is also heavily planted with soft acidic water. But I have seen pH fluctuated quite a bit in that kind of water. Thus, I use pressurized CO2 with a CO2 controller to have the pH remains low and stable.