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I noticed a cotton growth on one of my Black skirt tetras. I just started treating it with Methylene blue. I belive I caused this problem by trying to rid the snails from my tank. I put 15 pennies in the filter after reading a post about how the copper would kill the snails. I had the pennies in the filter for a week and there still is snails in the tank.

My tank is 26 gal.
4 Black skirts
2 dwarf gouramis
4 cories
1 bn
1 betta
NitrAte - 40
NitrIte - 0
Ammonia - 0
temp. 78 (just increased from 76)
I'd also like to add that this tetra that's infected is old. I've had him for at least 8 yrs.

I don't know why your tetra has cotton fungus, but I used the Maracyn when my guppy had gotten a fungus and worked really well.

As far as the pennies go, I believe the pennies have to be before a certain year for them to do anygood because the newer pennies are made from a copper plated steel and are not pure like they used to be. I think it's years prior to 1992.

ya that tetra does seem pretty old. i see you have 1betta in your tank, is it a female? if not i suggest getting one if u want to get rid of snails. i have a female betta in my tank and shes eaten al of them!

I believe the year for pennies is before 1985 or so. Also, pennies take longer than a week to work as they only slowly leech out enough copper to kill off snails.

I had pennies in my filter for a few months and the snails disappeared... and then I found the mother of all pest snails in my tank (well, the biggest one I had ever seen). It must have been a tough little bugger to live through the copper treatment AND grow to be nearly a cm in diameter. Haven't seen any others besides that one, though. *crosses fingers*

~Meow. Thus spoke the cat.~

The pennies are older, most are from the 70's. I stopped using them when I saw the cotton. Now the cotton is gone from the tetra. When I fed them today he didn't eat. He mouthed the food and spit it out.

The betta in the tank is a male. He dosen't bother the snails.