Do I need to use medication?

I'm a noob, so sorry if this is a dumb question.

But recently I had a mass die off of many of my fish, and after posting a thread on here, the general consensus was that the killer was collumnaris. However, I don't want to treat using medicine incase it is NOT collumnaris... then I'd just kill my nitrosomas and nitrobacteria and send my tank through . Right? (Not sure on this...)

So I was wondering if all or most common fish ailments can be cured solely with temperature increase or decrease and increased salinity? I'm no expert in identifying fish diseases and I don't want to take the risks of medicating without proof.

Are there any bacteria/fungus/parasites that CANNOT be cured or treated given patience, temperature change and salt? If so, what are they? (I want to be prepared for the next time my fish start going belly up...)

Thanks so much

....anyone?..

 

....anyone?..

I'll bite. Yeah, there are plenty of things that salt and heat won't fix. Columnaris is probably a good candidate for that group, especially since temp increases are a bad thing and salt is probably not strong enough to kill it in aggressive cases. There are other non-meds like potassium permanganate and methylene blue that can pick up where salt leaves off and really do some beneficial things. But when it comes down to it, there will still be internal parasites and bacterial infections that will likely have to be treated with regular meds. Clean water and a non stressful environment for the fish are great medicine too.

 

Thanks afremont - I will likely transfer the 2 angels to a 10 gallon tank for treatment with maracyn 1 and maracyn 2. Hope it works. Unfortunately, there's no way I can tell if it is EFFECTIVE or not, because there are no visual symptoms of this unknown disease that my tank may or may not have...

 

sahmadi, I looked over some of your other threads and noticed you do 50% water changes with RO water. Do you remineralize the water?

I've never had Maracyn 1 or Maracyn 2 harm my cycle. It's not that it can't happen but they are some of the very few meds that I have used without that problem. I thought you might like a little reassurance in that regard, but lets see if your water changes may have been causing this issue before you medicate the fish.

 

I do not remineralize the RO water. Is this something that should be done? If so, how?

I always thought angelfish preferred soft/acidic water.. never heard of remineralizing?

Thanks for the insight on those medications - I'll keep it in mind.

Random fact: Toosie is my cockatiel's name It means 'grey' (because he's a standard grey) in farsi, I think.

 

Tetra came out with a medication that is an across the board treatment for fugus and/or bacterial infections as well as parasites. It comes in pill form. I tried it and it worked for me..... It is called Lifequard by Tetra. You might want to give this one a try.

 

Hahaha, that's awesome! If the bird has my sense of humour you are in trouble though.

As for the RO water, the answer is Yes. It is very important to remineralize RO water. The reason for this is this water is lacking in most everything a fish needs in order to survive. The little that is in it won't be enough to keep any number of fish alive for long. The fish that do survive will deplete the essential elements in the water fairly rapidly and when you add more fish, those fish will not be able to access any of the nutrients and will parish.

While many types of fish do like soft/acidic water, they still need a certain amount of minerals in the water, so there is actually such a thing as too soft.

Some people will remineralize RO water with Discus Buffer, but I just use my regular tap water mixed with my RO to remineralize it. I always use the same ratio so that the water I use in my water changes is made the exact same way as the water that is in the tank. You will need a GH/KH test kit if you don't already have one, to remineralize the water to a safe level for the fish.

Another reason using straight RO water is dangerous is because it lacks buffering capacity. Without enough buffer, pH will drop drastically any time an acid is introduced to the tank. Acids accumulate naturally in the aquarium just though the nitrogen cycle alone. Fish respirations contribute to the creation of carbonic acid, and if you have driftwood you would also have tannic acid. A healthy buffering capacity, measured using a KH test, will absorb these acids and prevent the pH from being affected. Without a healthy buffer these acids will have a heavy impact on the pH of the water and if pH drops too low it makes conditions impossible for fish to survive.

My suspicion is you have been experiencing problems due to one if not both of these reasons. Unless you plan on breeding your angels, or if they are wild caught, or unless your tap water is excessively hard, your fish may do just fine if you chose to switch them over to your regular tap water. If you do this though, you will want to slowly acclimate your current fish to the harder water. You will have to slowly introduce a harder water source or Discus buffer, which ever method you opt for, even if you don't switch them all the way over to tap water.

That's a lot for you to think about, but me and Toosie Cockatiel will be around for moral support.

I can get more indepth with how to use your tap water to remineralize your RO but I have no experience using Discus Buffer so if you choose that method to remineralize, hopefully somebody else on the forum will be able to help you, or you may find the info you need doing a search on google.

 

Thanks afremont - I will likely transfer the 2 angels to a 10 gallon tank for treatment with maracyn 1 and maracyn 2. Hope it works. Unfortunately, there's no way I can tell if it is EFFECTIVE or not, because there are no visual symptoms of this unknown disease that my tank may or may not have...

That seems kind of odd. I'm confused as to how the "consensus" is that it is columnaris if there isn't any visual symptom? I would think that for it to be columnaris, you had fish that had white, cottony growths primarily near the gills and mouth or at least something you could see somewhere. What symptoms do they have, are they just suddenly dropping dead with no warning?

Fish doctoring items I currently have on hand:
hospital tank, heater, aquarium salt, epsom salt, clove oil, melafix, pimafix, quickcure, methylene blue, potassium permanganate, tetra parasite guard, maracyn 1 and 2, praziquantel food pellets, kanamycin, some other antifungals just in case. I lost a fish by not being prepared and the fish had the audacity to get sick outside business hours. So it might be overkill, but I feel better prepared now. It's not like I can rush my fish to the vet.

 

Ok guys, so here's the current situation:

My remaining fish seem happy and healthy.

I visited the Reef Aquarium Shop in Indianapolis today (which was AMAZING!), and had some conversations with a few old fish keepers... Go figure, they all had different opinions from yours!! :/ So I went ahead an purchased melafix, Algone filter media, and some duckweed to keep nitrates stable.

I still have no idea what happened to cause this die off, but I'll just be observing the fish for 2 to 3 weeks while medicating with melafix. Hopefully everything will be ok till then


Thanks everybody for the help! What a great hobby where there are so many kind people willing to help!

 

In addition, I'll be slowly converting back to tap water:
1) Because the store I buy my fish from live in tap water, so it will make acclimation easier
2) So I don't have to fill up 20 gallon jugs of water every Friday !!
3) Something about trace elements needed for fish to be healthy? .. Hmm.

Btw, my tap water is super hard - about 8.5 pH.

 

Have you done an actual hardness test on the tap water? A higher pH doesn't always indicate super hard water. pH is quite a bit more complex than that. Also, sometimes the pH of tap water when tested right away is not the true pH of your water. Excess amounts of certain gases and the lack of other gases are usually responsible for this. To find the true pH of your water, run a little water into an uncovered container and let it sit out for a few days and then test the pH. This allows the water to exchange gases. If you want to be able to test the pH sooner, you can add a bubbler to the container because this will help the gas exchange to happen quicker. Usually 24 hours is long enough. By doing this test, you may find that your pH will either increase or decrease but it will be what you can expect your aquarium water to test at unless pH altering items such as peat, driftwood, some rocks, etc. are added to the aquarium.

Oh, and I think I called them essential elements. I should have called them electrolytes because that might have given you more of an idea what I was refering to, and it will also help you find what you are looking for if you want to do a google search to learn more about them.

 

Have you done an actual hardness test on the tap water? A higher pH doesn't always indicate super hard water. pH is quite a bit more complex than that. Also, sometimes the pH of tap water when tested right away is not the true pH of your water. Excess amounts of certain gases and the lack of other gases are usually responsible for this. To find the true pH of your water, run a little water into an uncovered container and let it sit out for a few days and then test the pH. This allows the water to exchange gases. If you want to be able to test the pH sooner, you can add a bubbler to the container because this will help the gas exchange to happen quicker. Usually 24 hours is long enough. By doing this test, you may find that your pH will either increase or decrease but it will be what you can expect your aquarium water to test at unless pH altering items such as peat, driftwood, some rocks, etc. are added to the aquarium.

Oh, and I think I called them essential elements. I should have called them electrolytes because that might have given you more of an idea what I was refering to, and it will also help you find what you are looking for if you want to do a google search to learn more about them.

No, I have not tested the hardness. What brand would you recommend? How important is hardness, really?

 

It's not so important that I would ask you to buy a test kit to test it, especially now that you don't need it to remineralize RO water. I'm sure it will be fine for your fish. I just wanted to let you know that the pH wasn't the best indicator of how hard your water is.