Hey friends –
today I woke up to fungus looking stuff all over my rummynose tetras, and two on the brink of death. All of the rummynose have been in the tank for over a year, but I did put a bunch of other fish in there a few weeks ago which all seem fine.
Weird timing Im recovering from brain surgery and can’t drive and there is a snowstorm today so no one can get to me, so it’s unlikely I’ll be able to get to the fish store today to get a tank antibiotic, though I can order some. I also can’t do a water change right now (surgery recovery). But I’ll make that happen asap.
Any suggestions of anything I can do right now given these constraints? Aquarium home remedy? I feel sad sitting here watching them die and not being able to do anything, and it is obviously spreading really fast.
Thanks everyone
Posted by Key_Veterinarian_494
8 Comments
Possibly (non-iodized) salt could help. It won’t be good for the plants though. What other fish are in the tank?
Looks like a really severe ick outbreak. I’ve had success with Hikari Ick-x to get rid of it when you do get a chance to go to the store, or order online.
I usually prefer using a treatment like ich x to treat ich, but given your current situation you may want to look into the temperature approach where you raise the temp to quicken the lifecycle of ich.
That is, of course, assuming it is ich and not something else. Are the dots a consistent size? Are they raised or fairly flat? Are they fuzzy looking? These questions may help you narrow down what it is with more confidence.
That’s ich
This is definitely ich. Same thing happened to me, bought treatment from Amazon online, worked instantly and haven’t had it since
If you have a heater in your tank, you should turn it up until you can get meds
Order ich -X or another formalin based treatment online and pay whatever you need to for expedited delivery. All I can say for sure is it is one of the protozoan ectoparasites and unless you by some miracle have kosher, pickling, or aquarium salt nothing you have in your cupboards is going to be much use. If you do have one of those, 3 tsp/gal and keep temps exactly where they are. The plants won’t like it but it’s a heavy infestation that needs urgent treatment.
Ich, looks like sugar or salt sprinkled on the fishes body. The sugar looking stuff is just part of its life cycle, its essentially a shell, and it will feed on the fishes body, once it hatches it becomes free swimming and will attach itself to another host and create another hard shell. Ich can’t be killed while inside the shell. Medicine like ich-x works great to kill the ich while it is free swimming. You can also kill ich with heat alone. The ich parasite dies in water 87F or higher. Raising the temp will cause the life cycle to speed up and cause them to hatch quicker. Raise the tank to 87F or above until at least 1 week past when you stop seeing the sugar/salt on the fishes body. Siphon vacuuming the bottoms of the tank can help reduce their numbers, too. Replace all water with the same temp water. Also, increase the airflow, cus hotter water holds less oxygen. Tropical fish can handle high temps. Just raise it slowly over a day or so.