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I was wondering whehter or not fin rot always begins on the outer edges of the fin. One of my gold rams seems to have an area that starts fron inner middle edge of his caudal fin.

I have not posted my parameters because unfortunately I think he had this at the pet store. My bf told the guy at the lfs to give us any ones. I did choose a few but one of the ones we got seemed to have a whitening area on his fin, I wasn't sure if I was seeing corerectly and the fish was already netted so I didn't want to irk the pet store guy BUT I should have followed my instincts.

It seems to be more noticeable now and I think i even noticed a small hole in the tail.

I have a 5 1/2 gallon tank which I was supposed to set up for my my son's ADF but it looks like I may need to use it as a quarantine tank. It is currently EMPTY now. My question is, what should I do to set up this tank as a hospital tank?

As far as my own water parameters, I only have the following tests...
Ammonia (Wardley)---a few years old
pH (Wardley)--also a few years old
Nitrates--I bought this 4 days ago when I read about the rams' sensitivity to nitrates.

I will test my parameters now, although I am unsure if I have enough information to be of use.

I have a 20H tank. I have a Blackskirt Tetra, 2 Blue Rams, and 2 Gold Rams. I have an AquaClear 150. I use StressCoat.

My ammonia came up as undetectable.
My pH came up as 7.4 or possibly higher because it seemed a little darker than the highest range on my card.
My nitrates came in somewhere between 0 and 5. The color seemed between these two.
The temoerature in the tank is 79 degrees Fahreneheit.

Did I fail to include some important information? How come no one has responded?

daviine

I will see if I can help with my limited knowledge.

Fin Rot and Tail Rot.
It is a not exactly what bacteria are responsible for causing this problem. This disease usually only efects injured or fish living in poorly maintained conditions. The bacteria seems to enter through wounds. Prevention is basically keep a healthy tank.
There are many prepared medications and should always be followed as per instructions.

As to your question starting at the outside edges I could not find any referance to this, though in my experience this is where I have either seen or heard it develops.

Keith

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I've only had one experience dealing with fin rot, in my case it was bacterial fin rot brought on by changing of the substrate in a used tank I purchesed (I knew @the time I should have netted out the fish, but I'm really bad @netting fish >.&lt. The fins seemed to melt away starting from the outer edges.

There are a number of medications for fin rot out there, I used jungle Labs fungus clear tank buddies (handles both bacterial and fungal fin rot) followed by a weeks dosing of melafix to help in the healing process. IME melafix isnt enough to actually arrest fin rot.

My question is, what should I do to set up this tank as a hospital tank?

If you have a matured filter that can be moved to that tank you can use that, however many medications will damage and destroy the biofilter, keeping surface agitation up, and on top of waterchanges (daily if not more, making up for lost medication) will help. Adding some live plants will help by providing a safty zone for the fish as well as consuming some of the ammonia that the fish create.
Looking over your numbers, your nitrAte seems fine, however what condtions the fish were in @the shop we can't know.

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Thank you very much! Now...let me make sure I understand....I have an Aquaclear 150 on my 20H. Are you suggesting that I move my filter over to the 5 1/2 gallon?

I'm not sure but I think I have two sponges in the filer. Is it okay to remove one of the sponges and just set it in the tank? Or will putting some gravel in a pantyhose bag accomplish anything?


Are any of these moving in the right direction?

Well you dont want to move the only filter on the tank over to the hospital tank, only if you're running an additional filter should you move one.
You can try moving one of the sponges over if you've got an airstone and airpump you can use the sponge with the airstone for some filtration, you will be losing some of your biofiltration in the main tank when you move the sponge. You'll need to sanatize (boiling water) the sponge after use in the hospital tank before moving it back to the main tank so you dont bring anything back with it. Additionally it'll need 3-4 weeks to regrow it's bacteria.

Adding a bit of the gravel in some pantyhose will likely be easier as you can simply stop using the gravel in the tanks when you're done with it (I'll add mine to flowerpots). The idea is to get some of your biological filtration from the main tank to the hospital tank. Since it's present on every surface in a cycled tank you have numerous options. You just want to make sure that whatever you do chose won't remove too much of the bacteria (ie:moving the entire filter) but will bring enough with it to help out.

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Here is what I did...I put some gravel in a pantyhose and put it in the tank along with the water fron the main tank. The airstone has been sitting in my main tank unused for a couple of months so I used that as well for the bacteria. I hooked it up for surface agitation... Now I don't have any medication right now because I haven't seen the medication you have mentioned and I want to use what you're using.

I will look again for the medication. I need to free up some outlets so that I can plug the heater in.

Is there anything else I need to know or do?

Thank you so much. I truly appreciate it!

You've got the hospital part set up right. Only other thing I'd suggest is to keep the lights low. If there's a light on the tank leave it off except for feeding and inspection. This will allow the fish the rest time that it needs to help recover.
I don't normally like suggesting chain stores, but petsmart does carry the jungle labs line. I'm fairly sure petco does as well. If you're working with your local store and they don't carry the jungle line look for Furan-2 from Aquarium pharmaceuticals. It has similar active ingredients and should work just as if not better than the jungle labs one. Specifically you're looking for Nitrofurazone, and furazolidone in the active ingredients.

^_^[hr width='40%']"Has someone taken your faith? It's real, the pain you feel.
The life, the love, You die to heal.
The hope that starts, The broken hearts...
I’ve got another confession my friend, I’m no fool.
I’m getting tired of starting again, Somewhere new."
*refighting lost battles*

I'm pretty sure this is the last question...thanks for all of your help thus far.

I noticed that the Jungle Fungus Clear Tank Buddies and the Furan-2 are dosed per ten gallon. If I were using the Tank Buddies would I cut it or if i were using the Furan-2 would I pour only a little over half in the tank?

Would using the tablet or capsule as is be overdosing my 5.5 gallon?

Thanks!

Right 5 gallon, yes you'll want to cut the dose for half that ammount so you're getting the correct dose for 5 gallons.

Best of luck on it! Keep us posted.

^_^[hr width='40%']"Has someone taken your faith? It's real, the pain you feel.
The life, the love, You die to heal.
The hope that starts, The broken hearts...
I’ve got another confession my friend, I’m no fool.
I’m getting tired of starting again, Somewhere new."
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Well.....today my order of Jungle Tank Buddies Fungus Clear came in that I ordered from Big Als Online....it came so quickly! I wasn't expecting it to arrive so quickly so I bought the Furan-2.

Well, I had my boyfriend divide the capsule in half since it seemed like it would be a pain...and indeed it was....

I wanted to ask if I could switch over to the Tank Buddies..although I assumed that the answer would be no but I was hoping that I could.....

At any rate, to cut my ramblings short, I came home to post here and sadly my fish is doing worse than he was before I put the medication in.

I didn't notice it before, but I did notice that the fish seemed to be breathing differently after I put the medication in last night.....

So, at this point, I guess I'll just wait for the inevitable.

Thanks for all your help!!!!



Last edited by daviine at 10-Jun-2005 15:17

The addition of any medication can stress fish out quite a bit. Gasping is pretty common unfortunately. Increasing aeration in the QT tank and making sure the lights are dim and that the hospital tank is not disturbed should help... If the fish is looking REALLY bad you can do water changes and add activated carbon to "pull" the medication ASAP. Some fish just do not respond well to certain meds.

Thanks CareBear Overlord!

I thought of filtering the medication out but decided that maybe it was a side effect that I didn't know about. Unfortunately, the fish died. What made me most upset is that before I could examine the fish, my boyfriend netted the fish out and flushed the fish down the toilet!!!!

Again, I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who tried to help me!

Last edited by daviine at 10-Jun-2005 21:16

Sorry for your loss.

Watch the other fish and be prepared to act quickly if any of them start showing symtoms. Hopefully it won't spread to the others. *crosses fingers*

Oh dear real sorry bout that daviine.
Seems even worse when you're trying hard to save them and you lose them.
Agreed on keeping a close eye on the tank. You'll want to be able to act as fast as possible if and when other fish show symptoms.

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