Fish health concerns-- HELP

[syderin23]

I'm going to begin by saying that I only started maintaining an aquarium a little under a year ago(last December), so I am not as experienced as some of you.
I have a 23 gallon tank with four tetras, two dojo loaches, three albino corydoras catfish, one aquatic frog, and One ghost shrimp. I had a plecostamous (I have no clue how it's supposed to be spelled), a zodiac loach, and an upside down catfish, who all three died in the last few days. Something is wrong with my tank and I need to figure it out quickly before I lose my dojo loaches, I love those things more than one should probably love fish.
Yesterday both dojos seemed mostly fine, and today I am seeing small white spots all over my dojos and I need to know if this is definitely ich or not, and what I should do to treat him and the rest of the tank. I will include photos of all the fish in their current state. Any advice would be helpful. I have read that raising the temperature will get rid of ich naturally, but first I want to make sure that is what I am dealing with.


Excuse the food everywhere, they were JUST fed.

 

[syderin23]

This is the better version of the photo above

 

[Toad]

So can you tell us more about your tank? How often do you do water changes? The water looks incredibly cloudy? What kind of filter do you have? Do you test your water for ammonia, nitrates and Nitrites? Have you introduce any nee fish recently? What kind of food are you feeding, I see flakes.

 

[syderin23]

So can you tell us more about your tank? How often do you do water changes? The water looks incredibly cloudy? What kind of filter do you have? Do you test your water for ammonia, nitrates and Nitrites? Have you introduce any nee fish recently? What kind of food are you feeding, I see flakes.

I am feeding them fluval color enhancing flakes and algae wafers, I do about 25% water changes every ~2weeks, the water began to get cloudy yesterday after a 25% water change, I have a 50gal aquaclear filter with activated carbon, ammonia remover and foam inserts, the last new fish I introduced was about three weeks ago and it was the upside down catfish which I lost yesterday, and I do not test the water.

 

[syderin23]

I am feeding them fluval color enhancing flakes and algae wafers, I do about 25% water changes every ~2weeks, the water began to get cloudy yesterday after a 25% water change, I have a 50gal aquaclear filter with activated carbon, ammonia remover and foam inserts, the last new fish I introduced was about three weeks ago and it was the upside down catfish which I lost yesterday, and I do not test the water.

 

[Toad]

I'd do at least 30% water changes every week, and you'll want to vacumn the gravel each time. You'll want to get a test kit as well. It will help you see any possible water issues as well. Make sure to not clean or replace the filter media as well, at most you want to gently rinse it in the old tank water when you change the water. What temp is the water at now?

 

[syderin23]

The water is currently at 73 degrees F.

 

[syderin23]

I will do another water change tonight and vacuum the gravel, here is another picture of the dots on the loach.

 

[V227]

That infection looks like Oodinium. Research that illness. Encountered it some years ago. Treated it much like Ick. Raise temp. To 86 degrees, and frequent partial WC's. The kicker is that you cover the tank with a blanket, blacking out the light. This bug needs light to survive.
You can also treat with salt, one tablespoon per gallon. I'm no expert on meds but if you go that route I believe copper based meds are used.

 

[Toad]

That infection looks like Oodinium. Research that illness. Encountered it some years ago. Treated it much like Ick. Raise temp. To 86 degrees, and frequent partial WC's. The kicker is that you cover the tank with a blanket, blacking out the light. This bug needs light to survive.
You can also treat with salt, one tablespoon per gallon. I'm no expert on meds but if you go that route I believe copper based meds are used.

If it iss this, take the shrimp out before using copper, and not sure how the dojos and cories would do with salt, as they are scaleless. Maybe try heat, blackout and water changes alone would work?

 

[syderin23]

I have read that copper is really bad for the loaches. So far I have done a partial water replacement and vacuumed the gravel. I tested the water, it said that my nitrate level was high and the ph was a little high, but not majorly. I put some ph down drops in and will test for the ph again tomorrow, I'm on my way to get "nitra-zorb" for the nitrate.

 

[syderin23]

Update: I have taken the tetras out as they seem to have fin rot which I have encountered before, so I got them a cure-all and separated them because the cure-all is not safe for scaleless fish. I added VERY little salt (literally like a pinch) and raised the temp to 79 (gradually) and will probably continue raising it tomorrow to 82. I replaced the water with distilled water instead of tap water, added water conditioner and put in "prime" to take the nitrate out. I will be covering them with the blanket as well.

 

[Toad]

Don't touch the ph, swings in ph are worse than having it a little high or low, and you can't afford to stress the fish at all right now. Also, what kind of salt did you add?

 

[syderin23]

Okay. Freshwater salt.

 

[syderin23]

Further update: one of the tetras has died(but let's be honest they're just tetras.) the loaches are still being quite listless, just laying at the bottom of tank, and they seem to be breathing heavily. The dots are slowly disappearing and they are "shedding" (which they do when they are stressed, I read.) I've kept it covered.

 

[syderin23]

I read up on oodinium. It says that in this stage, he is almost definitely going to die. I'm hoping and praying that doesn't happen as I've grown quite attached to this fish.

 

[Autumnsky]

Not sure if it is the O disease but if it is Ich you might get some help in reading this article.

Freshwater Ich? Yuck! - Aquarium Advice

 

[syderin23]

So, as of 4:00 am, it has taken one of the loaches. All other tank mates are completely unaffected, but the other loach is still stiff and doesn't want to move unless prodded, and it takes a lot of prodding, I had to move him all the way up to the top to get him to swim on his own, and he continued to go stiff and float back to the bottom and turn upside down. He is still breathing heavily however the spots seem to be going away gradually, there are very few left. I'm still hoping and praying that he doesn't die. It took one of the tetras last night but I'm not too worried about them, they have no personality.