# Diseases overwhelming tank: Is it time to NUKE it?



## Asterix (Feb 5, 2011)

Started new thread, as problems have drasticly evolved for the worst:

*RECENT UPDATE:* 5 or more diseases at the present time _Tank has 80 gallons + 43 fishes left (different kinds)_

1. All of the guppies are dead, 9 total. Last one must have died last night. Back tail fin was completly gone, he was fine 24 hours ago!!!

2. I thought that I treated the *Aeromonus disease *+ *Rotting fin disease *with the Maracyn medecine. Hope it will not infect again!!!

3. *Ick disease*, still in the tank. More fishes are being contaminated. I raised tempereature to around 30C - 31C. I'm also using Ich-X medication

4. German Blue Rams: They have just started getting sick. I think its *Mouth Fungus disease *and *Cloudy Eye disease *They are both at the bottom of the tank, not swimming and one of them has this whitish bubble covering his entire eye area. It's also starting on his second eye. His lips are also very white!!!!

What is going on!!!! Those stupid guppies from Big Al's (Mississauga) destroyed my tank. Apart of the guppies , I must have lost another 15 fishes. It's been a vicious cycle since the first disease arrived, its now completly screwed up......

Any tips? *Is it time to NUKE MY TANK*? Get rid of all plants, fishes, rocks, gravel etc? It would be financilaly painful to restart from zero, and also the loss of the fishes life would suck!! I got attached to all of these little guys!!!

Thank you,


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## supergourami (Apr 12, 2011)

before you dump everything try using a smaller tank and medicating the fish


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## qwerty (Dec 15, 2009)

There's a few things that make me a little hesitant to pin this all on the guppies...

The tank is only 6 weeks old.

The only cycling process you really did was adding a bacteria booster. People tend to have differing opinions about whether it actually does anything at all.

Your filter was broken and stopped running for 12 hours roughly around the same time you got the guppies.

I'm not familiar with the medications you used in this tank. Did you make sure they wouldn't kill the beneficial bacteria in your filter?

I've never experienced or heard of fin rot being so aggressive in a clean tank that it infects and kills fish overnight.

Your fish are now showing symptoms of diseases that the guppies didn't show.

I watched the tuxedo guppies at that Big Al's that you went to for a couple weeks because I wanted to purchase them as well. I never noticed any sudden drop in the amount they had in the tank, and I didn't note anything in the tank that looked suspicious to me. I ended up purchasing different guppies from 3 different tanks. They have been healthy and have shown no suspicious signs in the two weeks that I've had them.

When I asked in your other thread what your ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels were, you never commented. Were you testing for these while you were cycling with fish? Do you know them now?


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## Asterix (Feb 5, 2011)

Hi,

Sorry for the late reply. I have always had a test kit and have been testing since I set up my tank.

Just got home from work and finished all the tests.

Ammonia @ 0
Nitrite and Nitrate @ very low levels
Ph level are good

You are right when you mention that the guppies did not introduce all of the diseases. They probably brought 2 or 3 of them. The filter breaking down probably did not help. Heater was also down for a few hours.

Tail rot + Aeromonous (For sure)
Ick (could have been from plants that I bought there. They do keep some fish with the plants)

I just made a 25% water change (after doing the tests) and have added the Ick-X medication.

1.Blue Ram are swimming around a little bit but still have this white lip and a white film (bubble) covering his eyes. Not sure what to do?

2. The tail rot is scary!! It really seems to kill in a few hours. I treated the tank for 4 days with a special medication (Maracyn). It all seemed better and then the last guppy dies last night. (found him in the morning with barely a tail and a big hole under his stomach). Must I buy more Maracyn and start over?

3. When Maracyn med was done I started the Ick med. It's been around 3 days of Ick treatment, high temperatures and water changes and the fishes still have white spots and new ones are being infected. What to do?


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## splur (May 11, 2011)

3 days with ich treatment? When I treated ich, it stopped its spread within 2 days without heat. Although I used malachite green, which I think is the hardcore version of ich treatment as it can be toxic, but it sure as hell worked fast and I didn't even do the half of the required treatment.


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## solarz (Aug 31, 2010)

I think the main problem is that you introduced, what, 50 fishes? to an uncycled tank.



> Ammonia @ 0
> Nitrite and Nitrate @ very low levels
> Ph level are good


Nitrite level needs to be ZERO in order for the tank to be cycled. The fact that you have/had over 50 fishes in your tank, and still report very low levels of nitrate indicates that either something is wrong with your test kit, or you did not test properly.

What kind of test kit do you have? Is it a liquid drop test kit, or paper strips? Please report the actual PPM instead of just "very low levels".


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## Asterix (Feb 5, 2011)

The test kit is called API Freshwater Master Test Kit (liquid)
Always followed instructions and waited 5 minutes for results.

Ammonia = Test came out yellow indicating 0 ppm

Nitrite = Test came out clear blue indicating 0 ppm (not even close to purple)

Nitrate = Test came out yellow/light orange, my guess following the chart would be nothing higher than 5.0 ppm.

All of the fishes in the tank are pretty small. Longest would be 2 inches.


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## solarz (Aug 31, 2010)

Asterix said:


> The test kit is called API Freshwater Master Test Kit (liquid)
> Always followed instructions and waited 5 minutes for results.
> 
> Ammonia = Test came out yellow indicating 0 ppm
> ...


Did you shake Nitrate bottle #2 for at least 30 seconds, and then the test tube for at least 60 seconds?

In fact, it's a good practice to shake all the test bottles before using.

Anyway, the only thing you can do right now is continue with the necessary treatments and hope that some fish survive.


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## Asterix (Feb 5, 2011)

Yes, I was shaking the N.2 for 30sec before use and then the glass container for 1 minute after as indicated in instructions.

Any tips for the Blue Rams? Weird white bubble (film) around the eyes and white lips.

I will continue Ich-X treatment (must go to store to buy more) and keep the temperature at 31C. I will do water changes everyday to keep oxygen in the water. 

I always dread the morning since I often find dead fish or new diseases since the outbreaks started.....


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## splur (May 11, 2011)

I think I'd cry in your situation.

If your Ich-X treatment still doesn't work in getting rid of the ich in a couple days, I'd honestly consider switching to something more effective such as malachite green unless you've got invertebrates or molluscs in the tank.

Wish I could help you with what's happening with your blue rams, sounds fungal but I've never actually had that happen to me.


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## qwerty (Dec 15, 2009)

I suppose if frequent large water changes are being performed then very low nitrates like that would be possible... You also mentioned plants, and depending what type and how many, I could understand having very low nitrates like that.

You understand the confusion though. Fish produce ammonia. Ammonia is metabolized to eventually become nitrate. We know fish are producing ammonia, so when a tank reads 0, 0, 0 you have to ask "where the hell is the ammonia going?".

It's difficult (for me at least) to give you good advice on this really. I think this is an example where an ounce of prevention is worth 80gal of cure.

At the same time I'm not willing to advise you to cull 50 fish.

Malachite green is very good stuff but it will kill the bacteria in your filter setting you back at square one with an uncycled tank. Another reason quarantine tanks are useful. You might be able to get away with using 5gal buckets or something with a few fish to each bucket.

Even when the fish with ich are cured, you'll still have ich in the main tank until it's killed off by medication.

That's about the extent of advice I can give you. My advice for the future would be that a quarantine tank is always a good idea to set up. Running a backup filter on your tank is also a good idea just incase the main filter stops working. Also, because you can use it to keep extra media for setting up the quarantine tank when you need to. Fishless cycling with ammonia will save yourself a lot of work and hassle. Otherwise at the very least seed your filter with someone else's used media from an established tank. Add fish to the tank slowly after a quarantine period, and I personally measure ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate about twice a week until the tank is fully stocked and running steady, and measure every time I notice a sick fish, or a fish has died.

My hope is that someone here can give you better and more specific advice for the diseases you're dealing with.


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## Zebrapl3co (Mar 29, 2006)

I don't agree with culling the tank. You bought the fish so it's your responsibility to sit through this with them till the end. So man up and bite the bullet. I promise you this, when it's all done, you'll be a much more better and experience person than many other guys.
Going back to your tank, I don't even now where to start. You've been picking up a lot bad advice from a bunch of amateurs. Some are more into the argument than actually helping you.

I don't know how long you've been running your setup before your filter went down. But for starter, as I've said. When your filter goes down. It's a life and death emergency. You don't wait 2 or 3 days to replace it with a new filter.
2nd, like I said, watch out for your tank cycling when you start it back up.

What you're going through now is almost a play by play classical symptons of a tank going through a complete cycle. 
a) your tank cycles because your filter have been reset 
b) your fish gets poisoned and becomes weaken with stress 
c) with a weaken immue system, disease set in.
d) fish dies and pollute the water even more. This leads to a more visious cycle and the tank goes in to a melt down and fish starts to float left and right.

So the first thing you need to do is get your tank cycled. From your reading, it may look like it's cycled. So let's hope it is, but still watch your water carefully by testing it daily. I hope it's not a stalled cycle.

For the disease, I don't think you pick it up from BA. The Ick, might be a possibility, but the rest of the disease is always present in everyones tank. It's just that the fish where healthy and can shrug off the disease in the past.

Treatment:
For the Ick, you can continue to use Ick-X medication if it looks like it's working. But if not, you need to resort to something stronger like malachite green, as sugguested by a few of the members. One brand call "Quick Cure" is very effective, but it's also a carcinogenic compound. So you save their life, but might shorten their life spand. The proper way to elimiate Ick is the continue your treatment until you don't see any spots on your fish anymore. Then continue the treatment for another 7 days. This is because the life cycle of Ick is basically 7 days. They are immune to the treatment most of the time. The only time when they are most vulnerable is when they are in the larvae stage. So in order to get every single one of them, you need to do that 7 extra days to eradicate them. Just a note, there is a new stain which people refer to as the super Ick, these guys have a 10 days cycle. So if you did the extra 7 days and they come back again in a week or a month, then you need to do the extra 10 days.
Some extra tips on how to make things better, I think you've read these here and there. But I'll go over again:
1) Turn up your temps to 30C. This will help speed up the Ick's incubation and hatching time and therefore moving them to the larvae stage where they are vulnerable to the chemicals.
2) Because of the increase in temperature, O2 will dissipate more, so you need to make up for this loss by adding an air stone to increase the surface area to allow more O2 exchange.
3) Add sea salt or epson salt. The recommend dosage is 1 tablespoon per 10G of water. But I would say with your condition, put 2 or 3 tablespoon of sea salt or epson salt for your entire 80G tank. I can't remember who, but who ever said that 1 tblsp of salt on a 80G can cause osmotic shock was a joker. Why add salt? this helps calm the fish. Their system don't have to work so hard to balance the water in their body and the water outside. It lowers their stress level. This is an old pro's trick. Some people add a bit of salt in their tank during every water change.
4) Gravel vac the surface of your tank every 2 days during the treatment. You do this because you want to pick up any fallen Ick eggs before they hatched. It's optional because if they hatch, the med should do their trick.

Then next time you get ick again, you might want to look into the natural treatment of ick. But since you're into meds, it's bad to stop in the middle.

As for the fungus and fin rot, get a bottle of Prima-fix. They smell, but it's a natural remedy works very well and won't conflict with your ick med.

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## Asterix (Feb 5, 2011)

Hi,

Thank you for all the tips, just got home. The filter was down for about 10 hours and also the heater (80 gallon tank). THis might have started the whole death cycle (with BA guppies)

Please don't get me wrong. I wrote "should I NUKE the tank" because I had no idea what to do and needed some responses, quick. I really got attached to my little fishes and my girlfriend and I have been saddened every time one goes down (or is showing a sign of disease). We are really not enjoying this. Seeing a fish grow in your tank from a small little thing to something bigger really gets you attached.....

*There have been no death from "fish rot" or "aeromonous disease" in 24 hours (touch wood)

*Ick disease is still present. Pretty much all Cardinal Tetras (15) have it (but less spots compared to yesterday) + 1 Red Phantom Tetra has the spots. My water is at 31C. Cant use anything stronger since I have 3 Sterba Cory + 4 ghost shrimp

*My German Blue Ram is still showing signs of diseases. Both of his eyes are now covered with a white, transparent film (bubble) + his back fin seems to have a small hole (I think). He is also very agressive to all fishes (was not like that before) The other ram is ok (touch wood). *Any tips?*

I'm also taking care of a baby molly in a small seperate tank (2G). I'll keep her in there for now. She is too small and I do not want her to get contaminated.


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## splur (May 11, 2011)

Both your filter and heater broke? How the hell?

I certainly hope you've replaced both.


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## Asterix (Feb 5, 2011)

Nope...

Filter broke and was replaced (parts) but I accidentally shut down the heater during that period. My mistake...


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## dchow (Oct 30, 2009)

It's more than likely that the disease(s) will always be present in the tank and only appeared because of something causing stress which weakened the immune system.

I know for a fact when I started my nephew's guppy tank columnaris was a huge huge problem and much of what you described with the frayed fins, quick death, and "holes" around the gill plates describes this disease. That being said, columnaris is very difficult to treat and most people recommend a mix of Maracyn and Maracyn II to cover the bacteria that may cause this. If you end up needing to buy these products they are MUCH cheaper at Petsmart than they are at BA.

Unfortunately, the products will kill the bacteria nitrification bacteria you need...

Most of the guppy stock he started with is now gone and he has ones that grew up in his tank.


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## destructo (Aug 12, 2009)

I had something similar happen to my tank about a year ago. I later figured out that I overstocked the tank and too quickly at that, giving my filter no chance to catch up. Not saying this is your reason, but that's what happened to me.

I would agree with the others in keeping up with the meds and seeing how things play out. I would make sure to do water changes every couple of days, use a gravel vac, and wipe down the sides of the tank. 

As for your equipment, get a filter and heater that doesn't turn off or break down. Get an air pump and air stone to add o2 into the water, I would recommend a Whisper. 

For your Rams, from what I have learned Rams like "old water", in that it would be best to add them later down the road when your tank has been problem free for a while and your filter is running smoothly. I am not sure what is wrong with them but I know they don't take to meds very well.

I think your best bet and this is what i had to do, is to really wait things out and let your system balance out. Wait over a month after things are better to add more fish, and when you do add them, only add a couple at a time. 

It sucks to loose fish, especially when you become attached to them. I hope this helps and you are not discouraged as I am sure everyone on here has gone through something just like this at one point.


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## rubadub (Sep 12, 2010)

last time i had an ich breakout in my tank i just used aquarium salt and bumped the temp to 81f
way less toxic to the fish then medicating 
and mind u i had nothing but scaleless fish at that time 
i dosed at a max of 3tbls per gallon
i dosed 1 tbls the first 12 hours
then another the next 12 and teh last one 12 hours after that
took 3-4 days to clear the tank

and remember while ich is on the fish it's not treatable
only when the ich breaks off and drops is when it can be killed
bumping the temp just speeds up ichs life cycle making the medication work faster
so dont expect to see ich gone overnight


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## Zebrapl3co (Mar 29, 2006)

Asterix said:


> ...Please don't get me wrong. I wrote "should I NUKE the tank" because I had no idea what to do and needed some responses, quick. I really got attached to my little fishes and my girlfriend and I have been saddened every time one goes down (or is showing a sign of disease). We are really not enjoying this. Seeing a fish grow in your tank from a small little thing to something bigger really gets you attached.....


Sorry, I might have put it a bit forcefully, but I just didn't want to see you give up so easily.



> *There have been no death from "fish rot" or "aeromonous disease" in 24 hours (touch wood)


Give Prima-fix/Mela-fix a try, you won't regret it. It's something I have at all times, even when I don't have a use for it. They help fish with wounds heal faster and prevents the onset of bad bacterial infection.



> *My German Blue Ram is still showing signs of diseases. Both of his eyes are now covered with a white, transparent film (bubble) + his back fin seems to have a small hole (I think). He is also very agressive to all fishes (was not like that before) The other ram is ok (touch wood). *Any tips?*


Prima-fix will work for the transparent film, it should work for the hole in the fin, but if it's a hole in the body. Then you need Maracyn and Maracyn II as suguested by dchow. If you have to treat it with Maracyn, then you need to make use of your 2G. These meds are way too expensive to treat a 80G. I've had a few rainbows that have this problem. Unfortunately, the med is so tough on their system that mines usually live for 2 months or so after I re-introduce them back in to the community tank. So ... you have to make a touhg call on this one. Personally, I would probably see if the Prima-fix will work and if it doesn't I would just let this one go, instead of risking a younger healthy fish.

Good luck, I hope things will start to turn around for you.

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## Chris S (Dec 19, 2007)

Likely your tank has Ich (parasite and only if _you_ have diagnosed it properly) and nothing else. What you are seeing are secondary bacterial infections due to stress and physical damage.

Quick Cure works great for Ich (formalin + malachite green) as long as you don't care about snails or shrimps or anything. Use it as directed.

In conjunction with this I would suggest using Furan 2 to help heal and control these secondary bacterial infections. Use this as directed also.


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## rubadub (Sep 12, 2010)

and for the cloudy eyes on ur ram
just do frequent water changes
which u should be doing now anyway to get rid of the ich
gravel vac 15% of ur water i would say every day some may argue this point because of ur meds 
and it should fix itself
stressing a fish is a killer and possibly why u lost so many off the bat
just do more frequent water changes till u see things get better in ur tank then u can go back to ur 10% every week when things get better

thats about all the advice i can throw ur way
remember 
if things can be treated without the use of medication do it naturally
medications have the chance to kill even non sick fish


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