Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I have kept fish for years & never had too many problems, but my mum is new to her 4ft aquarium.
She rang me last night to let me know she'd lost her 1st fish, a molly.
She rang again today to say she'd had another death, a clown loach.
My first reaction was it has to be NTS, it is roughly 6 weeks since she added approx 30 fish all at the same time.
I advised her to do a 1/4 of a tank water change, but to keep some of the old water to be tested.
My brother arrived an hour later with his top of the rang testing kit & tested the old water.
He says it is definately not NTS as all the levels are actually too low, rather than too high & he is now concerned that we may have made matters worse, as the levels are now going to be even lower since the water change.
I personally can't see how it is possible for the levels to be this low after intoducing so many new fish six weeks ago, so I am absolutely foxed.
Whislt disscusing this, my mum asked me if I knew what would be the perfect levels for clown loaches & I replied I haven't got a clue, but I will try to look it up on the internet.
Then I stumbled across this site & thought it was a brilliant idea to post here & see if anyone could help?
Do any of you know what the nitrate/nitrite/ph/etc levels should be for the clown loach to be happy?
Thank you for any replies,

Like you I don't understand how the levels could be too low unless he meant the ph. For any fish you want amonia and nitrites to be 0 and nitrates to be under 40 ppm. You can find some information on the clown loach at badmanstropicalfish.com/profiles/profile13.html.

To PHLaurie, thank you for the information & the link on clowns.
It does appear my brother had misread his test kit.
The amonia was 1.1ppm, nitrites & nitrates were 0 & ph was 7, so it does seem it was NTS afterall.
Mum has had a very happy tank since the water change & has not lost anymore fish since.
The link is very usefull, it also answered another mystery to do with a clown loach, he had a really happy clown loach that used to dance all the time, then one day it just starved itself to death.
This link has information on breeding clowns in captivity & it suggests that they will only breed after 7 yrs old & whilst building up to breeding it will only eat live food, which unfortunately my brother never uses & by the time we tried different foods & put bloodworm in it was too far gone.
At least we know this now & can prevent this happening again.
Thank you,

You're very welcome and I'm very glad to hear that the tank is doing well now. Badmanstropicalfish.com is one of my favorite sites.