How To Use Methylene Blue?

So my poor betta has fin rot and he's had it for several weeks. I've already tried salt treatments and just keeping up with water treatments in hopes he would start to heal, but it did nothing so now I'm moving onto another method that was recommended and that was the Methylene Blue bath.

So I bought some and I was reading the directions on the back and they told me how much I should mix in, but the duration confuses me. It says use one drop per 16 fl. oz of water daily for at least 3 days and change water daily.

I know not to use it in my main tank, so this will be going in a quarantine tank I bought today. What confuses me is the daily water changes. I've googled how long to keep the fish in the tank and some say an hour some say only dip for 10 minutes and this kind of misleads me into thinking I should keep the fish in the water and change the water daily.

Can someone please clarify how long I should keep the fish in the water with Methylene Blue. Should I dip him for 10 minutes and return him to main tank after? Should I do it for an hour? Should I keep him in it and change water daily? I'm so confused right now.

 

It's just a few minutes in the bowl of water+blue. You remake that 'dip bath' daily. I think they are still recommending large WC daily on the main tank. What are the parameters in your main tank? Have you tested your tap water parameters?

 

So my poor betta has fin rot and he's had it for several weeks. I've already tried salt treatments and just keeping up with water treatments in hopes he would start to heal, but it did nothing so now I'm moving onto another method that was recommended and that was the Methylene Blue bath.

So I bought some and I was reading the directions on the back and they told me how much I should mix in, but the duration confuses me. It says use one drop per 16 fl. oz of water daily for at least 3 days and change water daily.

I know not to use it in my main tank, so this will be going in a quarantine tank I bought today. What confuses me is the daily water changes. I've googled how long to keep the fish in the tank and some say an hour some say only dip for 10 minutes and this kind of misleads me into thinking I should keep the fish in the water and change the water daily.

Can someone please clarify how long I should keep the fish in the water with Methylene Blue. Should I dip him for 10 minutes and return him to main tank after? Should I do it for an hour? Should I keep him in it and change water daily? I'm so confused right now.

Take the concentrated dip method. Use a different container adding 2 tsp of methylene blue with one gallon of tank water. Don't use freshly conditioned tap water because the water conditioner interferes with the methylene blue. This is a strong 1 time dip. Once the treatment is prepared. Net your fish and dip in the treatment for 10 seconds with fish still in net. Then put fish back in tank and do your normal water changes for your tank. This dip is just a 1 time treatment and won't harm the fish. Infected areas on the fish will be stained blue.

 

It's just a few minutes in the bowl of water+blue. You remake that 'dip bath' daily. I think they are still recommending large WC daily on the main tank. What are the parameters in your main tank? Have you tested your tap water parameters?

I'll check when I get home in a few minutes.

Take the concentrated dip method. Use a different container adding 2 tsp of methylene blue with one gallon of tank water. Don't use freshly conditioned tap water because the water conditioner interferes with the methylene blue. This is a strong 1 time dip. Once the treatment is prepared. Net your fish and dip in the treatment for 10 seconds with fish still in net. Then put fish back in tank and do your normal water changes for your tank. This dip is just a 1 time treatment and won't harm the fish. Infected areas on the fish will be stained blue.

So I don't do this once a day for 3-7 days, only once?

 

That's correct. Within 10 seconds the bacteria will absorb the methylene blue. They will be stained blue and die. I will point out that this is a high dosage dip, which is why it should only done for about10 seconds. Some of the methylene blue will wash off in the tank...hence the partial water changes.

I'll check when I get home in a few minutes.



So I don't do this once a day for 3-7 days, only once?

 

I don't understand why all my parameters are at 0. I haven't done a water change today. My tank is cycled, I even had diatoms appear and bought a nerite snail to help out. Ugh seems like nothing can ever go right for me lol

Alrighty I'll try out the one dip and see if it gets anywhere.

 

Another possible approach would be to have two bowls of water, one with just tank water. After the blue dip, you can do a quick rinse dip in the second one. Even so, I wonder how much blue would actually get into the main tank necessitating an actual water change?

 

Another possible approach would be to have two bowls of water, one with just tank water. After the blue dip, you can do a quick rinse dip in the second one. Even so, I wonder how much blue would actually get into the main tank necessitating an actual water change?

From what I've been reading there shouldn't be enough of it left on the fish to affect the bacteria in the main tank. I could be wrong though.

 

Your water perameters can be perfect because the Nitrosomas an Nitrobacter are growing well and doing their jobs, but other bacteria are also in the water. Some of those other bacteria like the ones that cause fin rot are harmful. It's got nothing to do with water perameters. There are bacteria, tiny cells of green algae, fungI spores, and mold spores floating in the air all around us all the time and they manage to get into the aquarium water. Most are just harmless organisms that wind up in the water that we're not even aware of. That is until we buy the wrong aquarium plant, snail, or infected fish.

I don't understand why all my parameters are at 0. I haven't done a water change today. My tank is cycled, I even had diatoms appear and bought a nerite snail to help out. Ugh seems like nothing can ever go right for me lol

Alrighty I'll try out the one dip and see if it gets anywhere.

 

Another possible approach would be to have two bowls of water, one with just tank water. After the blue dip, you can do a quick rinse dip in the second one. Even so, I wonder how much blue would actually get into the main tank necessitating an actual water change?

I used m. blue baths on a goldfish last year. It was a weaker bath than I'm seeing here and he stayed in it for 30 minutes daily. What I'm here to point out though... Doing this without rinsing the fish and net killed the cycle in the main tank. The fish was bathed, netted, and transferred back to his tank. The residual m. blue that went in with him, even at the weaker solution, killed the cycle.

At that time my fish was very ill and I was watching parameters like a hawk. I am certain that his cycle was fine before starting the baths, so this makes me certain that the low concentrations of m. blue entering the tank is the only thing to blame for killing the bacteria in his filter.

 

Your water perameters can be perfect because the Nitrosomas an Nitrobacter are growing well and doing their jobs, but other bacteria are also in the water. Some of those other bacteria like the ones that cause fin rot are harmful. It's got nothing to do with water perameters. There are bacteria, tiny cells of green algae, fungI spores, and mold spores floating in the air all around us all the time and they manage to get into the aquarium water. Most are just harmless organisms that wind up in the water that we're not even aware of. That is until we buy the wrong aquarium plant, snail, or infected fish.

I was just concerned because I figured there would at least be nitrates showing up, or even a bit of ammonia, but if it's nothing to stress over I won't lol

I used m. blue baths on a goldfish last year. It was a weaker bath than I'm seeing here and he stayed in it for 30 minutes daily. What I'm here to point out though... Doing this without rinsing the fish and net killed the cycle in the main tank. The fish was bathed, netted, and transferred back to his tank. The residual m. blue that went in with him, even at the weaker solution, killed the cycle.

At that time my fish was very ill and I was watching parameters like a hawk. I am certain that his cycle was fine before starting the baths, so this makes me certain that the low concentrations of m. blue entering the tank is the only thing to blame for killing the bacteria in his filter.

Alright I'll definitely make a separate bowl to rinse him in. Should I wait until all the blue disappears before placing him back in his tank?

 

Alright I'll definitely make a separate bowl to rinse him in. Should I wait until all the blue disappears before placing him back in his tank?

No, the rincing bowl is a good idea, but the bacteria and infected areas will remained stained. I use the rincing bowl when I do the out of water cotton swab method. It's only done on severe cases of bacterial infections and complicated so I won't bother with details.

 

Thank you everyone for your help. It's so hard to tell where the affected areas are since my fish is already blue

 

Thank you everyone for your help. It's so hard to tell where the affected areas are since my fish is already blue

Good point...then no worries!