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ok so i have a 29g live bearers tank with 4 platties, 1 platy fry, 1 female guppy, 1 jet black molly, 2 dalmation mollies, 2 sailfin mollies, and about 7 feeder guppies.

i have some diminished amazon swords, 2 hybrid aponogeton plants, 1 hybrid lily plant, some various ferns, and a surplus of hornwort...

i am curently dosing the tank with an ich med (malachite green) and melafix. i added the sail fins and dalmations two days ago and the jet black two days prior.

they were all doing fine. i started adding some regular aquarium salts yesterday after reading that the livebearer gestation periods is faster with the present, and that the sailfins need salts...

i added about 2 table sppons of API aquarium salt and then it appears that the scales on my sail fins have been rubbed off or somehing...

any ideas???

they are acting healthy and normally...

no water params as i have no kit

thanks!

\\\\\\\"an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure\\\\\\\"

Hi there,
my guess is the scales are missing because they have
rubbed them off by itching on something. Having raised many many batches of sailfin fry, and keeping adult sailfin mollies for long term lifespans, I can assure you they do Not need any salt in their water.
What they need is good clean water.
You should invest in a water testing kit.
29g is in my opinion a little too small for sailfin mollies, who can reach 6+ inches in mature males.

The chances are, your recent additions of fish while treating with meds (kind of a no-no), and unhealthy fish in the tank (ich infested), has caused the new fish to be very unhappy and probably itching themselves.

For future notice, dont add new fish to your tank while you are treating with meds, or while fish in the tank are sick. You should wait at least 1 week after treatment of meds are complete, and do 2-3 water changes prior to adding new fish as well.
Good luck.


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i noticed the ich after i added the new sail fins...

and i will do a 30-40% WC tomorrow to try to reduce the salts in the water then... and a test kit is on my next-to-buy-list, but is a little over my budget for right now...

another weird thing is that the female sailfin and one of the dalmations are siting at the top of the water motionless, but not dead... they show no sign of other complications...

there is no media in the filter right now thought due to the medications and the treatment...

i will halt the treatment tomorrow as well because of the temperature rasing and the medication and no more visable signs of the parasites. thanks for all of your help!

PS the LFS guy said they wouldnt grow much bigger than they are already... (about 3 inches in total)...

the platties and guppies are not showing any sign of stress other than one of the platties hasn't been feeding regularly for a couple of weeks and is slender but i am gonna QT her with the betta to allow her to feed a little mor and plump up...

i am gonna lower the temperature from about 80F to about 75F on the thermostat to allow for cool off and less stressing on the mollies.

thanks for the reply.

\\\\\\\"an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure\\\\\\\"

i am gonna lower the temperature from about 80F to about 75F on the thermostat to allow for cool off and less stressing on the mollies.

Dont do this. This causes extreme stress to fish. Also,
treatments for ich are much less successful in lower temps. Always Raise the temperature for Ich, do not lower it.

Sailfin mollies can reach 6 inches. Here is several links of information for you. You should always take the info the LFS gives you with a grain of salt and do you own research. Said ppl also often say clown loaches grow to be 6 inches and bala sharks no more than 8, which is less than half these fishes total adult size.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailfin_molly
http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/livebearers2/p/redsailmolly.htm
http://www.e-aquarium.com.au/sailfin_molly.htm
http://fish.mongabay.com/species/Poecilia_velifera.html
http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Display.cfm?pCatId=1022


Also,
How long has your tank been set up? The fish at the surface of the water suggest low oxygen in the blood, possibly NitrIte poisoning.
Do you have an air stone in the tank?



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found some more ick dots on my black molly...

redosed with malachite green...

a closer looks howed that maybe they are just losing a bit of color and a few scales on the female... it might have something to to with a rock i have... but until i can buy suction cups for my heater the rock is gonna have to stay to keep the heater submergeed...

temp is staying at 80F and gonna do a WC tomorrow... hopefully all goes well!

\\\\\\\"an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure\\\\\\\"

found some more ick dots on my black molly...

redosed with malachite green...

a closer looks howed that maybe they are just losing a bit of color and a few scales on the female... it might have something to to with a rock i have... but until i can buy suction cups for my heater the rock is gonna have to stay to keep the heater submergeed...

temp is staying at 80F and gonna do a WC tomorrow... hopefully all goes well!

\\\\\\\"an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure\\\\\\\"

as for the scales disappering im not so sure, but the saltwater probably didnt have to do with the missing scales, adding salt should have no effect on the mollys of any of the fish

i like feesh

the tank has i high flow and air is in the water column through the surface agitation (bubbles are visible...) i used t have an airstone/areator, but it stopped working and after various repairs it found its way to the trash... after feeding just now the mollies at the surface decided to dive beneath and now they are acting normally...

the informatio on the links provided varies... some of these sights say they get up to 51mm whick i believe is only 5.1cm... about 3inches...

another site says 4-6 inches...

another says "UP To 6 inches"...

etc!


\\\\\\\"an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure\\\\\\\"

Saltwater also holds less oxygen, which could be why some of the fish were at the surface. Sailfin mollys live in rivers varying from fresh, brackish, to full marine conditions. I think sailfin mollies do tend to be larger if kept in brackish/marine conditions and also heard up to 6 inches. Unless they were wild caught they are probably generations removed from contact with salt in the water.

Sorry but I'm not sure of the cause for the scale loss.

As far as fish stores, I tend to do the research on my own. Unless it's a specialty shop, there is a somewhat good chance they don't exactly know what they are talking about when it comes to certain things. I have heard some pretty crazy things from those people.

What does that mean, Bob? "Till the cows come home." Where have the cows been?

lol true, but he usually asks me stuff about if i have the right food and if i have a heater and filtration and one time he wouldnt sell me platties when i first started my tanks because the tank hadn't been cycled and i was ignorant to this so he said to just get some orandas and wait til the cycle is complete then he would trade them...

and well after a little while afriends said my tank smelled and decide to spray febreeze in there and that was the end of those guys but i soon got the knoack for my fishie "thumb"...

if that was irrelevant sorry... but the guy is usually pretty trust worthy other than a few instances...


and thanks for the feedback...!

\\\\\\\"an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure\\\\\\\"

I would do a small water change & see how it goes. You only need to remove the charcole from the filter & not all the filter media.

Try to invest in a quarantine tank, in the near future.

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http://www.maltaaquarist.com

i am actually waiting till i get some more money to buy a QT tank or a filter for my tank that i think is a 3g but it might actually be more like a 5 or 6g... i have filter cartriges so i just took out the cartridge... as i dont have any filter pad by themselves and dont want to waste meds... also tank is looking healthier and i will continue ich treatment for another week at temp is arround 85-87... the thermostat is a little weird o my heater and my thermometer broke.. need to get a new one...

THANKS FOR ALL YOUR HELP AND THE REPLIES!/:'

\\\\\\\"an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of the cure\\\\\\\"