[AquaticLife] Newbie with a fungus problem?
It might be time to look at a more serious med or treatment. It seems that there may be some internal bacterial issues going on (you mentioned the rounded look which could be digestive related but could also be internal bacterial issues causing swelling) and the salted water treatment will not really help with most of those. You should start looking for a antibiotic food or a broad spectrum water based treatment. Jungle sells an antibiotic food that is supposed to have some decent antibiotics in it, although Jungle doesn’t publish what they are but I’ve seen a few websites that have found what those ingredient were. I’ve used it before as one part of a treatment program so I’m not sure if it was the primary thing that helped or not but the fish recovered. It’s not cheap though… but then neither are the water based antibiotics. If you go with the antibiotic food, you can continue the salt treatment and possible raise the salt back up to the 0.5% (since that seemed to be working).
You could also try a separate salt water dip on the fish that is not improving externally… the salted water dip would be up to 30 minutes in a 1% solution or even up to a 3% solution (1% = 10 teaspoons per gallon). You would do this treatment in a separate 5G bucket with an air stone in it. First fill the bucket with 2G of removed tank water so it’s the same water that the fish is used to and should be around 0.3% (3 teaspoons per gallon) right now. After moving the fish and having the airstone going, start increasing the salt level, using a cup (8 oz.) of water and adding the increased 1 teaspoon of salt per gallon (that’s two more teaspoons of salt in the 8 oz. cup of water), EVERY MINUTE OR TWO, WATCHING THE FISH CLOSELY FOR SIGNS OF DISTRESS. Each time you add a cup of warm water with two teaspoons of salt, that would increase the salinity level in the bucket by around 0.1% so you would keep adding the premixed cups of salted water until you have added 7 cups of water. That would bring it up to around 1.0%. If the fish is handling that OK, keep raising it. Have 2G of fresh, same temperature, dechlored water standing by. If at any time, the fish rolls over or starts to show serious signs of distress, slowly pour some of this fresh water into the treatment bucket, 1/2 gallon at a time, to lower the salinity level back down to a tolerable level. Once the fish is tolerating the level, leave it for another 15-20 minutes (for a total of 30 minutes from the time you started the treatment). After that, slowly add the rest of that standby freshwater which will lower the salinity level in the bucket back down to the 0.5% range and then you can net the fish and move it back to the main tank.
If you can afford and decide on a water based antibiotic, get a broad spectrum antibiotic or a combined product like Maracyn 1 & 2. There are others so make sure they treat gram negative and gram positive bacteria and then check what’s available and affordable and make your decision. I’m not sure if they can all be used along with the salted water treatment but I imagine they can. If the package says OK for fresh and salt water fish, then it’s OK to use and continue the salted water treatment as well.
Here are more articles to read on salted water treatment of goldfish and other fish. http://www.aquarticles.com/articles/ponds/Kebus_Salt_Treatments.html http://koivetforum.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=ce4k929hfd45hkmui0sct4m7o0 &topic=32.0
And the applicable “Dip” paragraph from TheSkepticalAquarist article http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/docs/health/salt.shtml http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/docs/health/salt.shtml#saltbath “Salt dips and salt baths. Solutions of salt– sometimes right up to marine concentrations (35 parts per thousand)– are recommended as a short-term prophylactic bath for half an hour to remove parasites from gills, from fins and the outer surface of the epidermis, as Mr. Innes recommended so long ago. Encysted parasites, like mature Ich, are less likely to be affected. Intestinal parasites aren’t affected at all. Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium bathes their new freshwater arrivals in full-strength seawater to rid them of ectoparasites, without losses, said a curator there in a TFH interview a couple of years back. It’s smart to pass your own new arrivals through a half-hour salt bath before putting them in the quarantine tank. A five-gallon covered bucket with an aerator is what you need; follow the link for details. The salt concentration has to be strong enough to make gill flukes drop away. Build up your dosage with pre-dissolved Kosher salt in two or three increments and stand ready to do a 50% water change with aquarium water at the first signs of stress; heavy respiration is an early signal. You’ll want to do a 50% water change anyway, when the time’s up, before netting them into the QTank.”
Lenny Vasbinder Fish Blog - http://GoldLenny.blogspot.com (Links to articles referenced above listed on the right side under Archives - Year, Month and under Labels)
Category: Philippines Internet Koi Society
