how much salt to add?

[Delapool]

Hello guys!! I am personally using a different salt other then aquarium salt. Its epsom salt. You can find it at walmart and its only like $4 and you get double if not more then that of aquarium salt. So far she is on day 6 and since day 3 at night there has been 71 tsp salt in the 10g tank. She said she hasn't seen much change.. if anything the white dots are getting worse. They have been treated with both api ich and api fungus over the last month. I don't know how to help my sister.. she also didn't feed for 3 days and has only been feeding them peas for the last few days. There is a Molly with swimmers bladder or something.

Got a bit lost sorry, are you using Epsom salt or sea salt or both for the ich or/and swim bladder? I've never heard of Epsom salt helping for ich?

From what I've seen, it does tend to get worse before better. What is the tank temp? Are you using meds and salt to treat?

 

[Matt68005]

From what i know, fish farms use brackish water to ward off disease on livebearers that can take it like guppies, mollies, ect. Some people claim salt and cool water alone will kill columnaris. I would think not..... definately go with one of the antibiotics. But hell i got confused myself are we talking about columnaris or fungus?
I always had good sucess with using salt along with meds for treating my guppies. One time me and me wife dropped a ten gallon full of juvinile females all over the floor in the basement. We picked them up one by one and put them back in. I used methylene blue and sea salt at slightly below brackish, and terramycin food (oxytetracycline) and i raised the temp, because some of them had wounds and torn tails i was mostly concerned about fungus. Treated for about a week to ten days.
Didnt loose a single guppy to that mess. Columnaris is of course harder because it is flesh eating bacteria that is contaigious not free floating fungus. methylene blue wont do **** to columnaris, even with the best meds on the market today, Kanamycin, Minocycline, Oxytetracycline, Triple Sulfa....... your fish got a 50/50 chance

 

[Matt68005]

Re salt

Epsom salt is sodium magnesium. Don't use that on fish.
Table Salt will work better than that
"Aquarium salt" is just basic Sodium cloride.
I prefer Tabe/packin salt or marine salt
I mean table salt is just sea salt, and theres no proof
that iodine hurts fish, but you can buy idodine free table
packing salt nowadays, i imagine it is the same stuff.

 

[Delapool]

From what i know, fish farms use brackish water to ward off disease on livebearers that can take it like guppies, mollies, ect. Some people claim salt and cool water alone will kill columnaris. I would think not..... definately go with one of the antibiotics. But hell i got confused myself are we talking about columnaris or fungus?
I always had good sucess with using salt along with meds for treating my guppies. One time me and me wife dropped a ten gallon full of juvinile females all over the floor in the basement. We picked them up one by one and put them back in. I used methylene blue and sea salt at slightly below brackish, and terramycin food (oxytetracycline) and i raised the temp, because some of them had wounds and torn tails i was mostly concerned about fungus. Treated for about a week to ten days.
Didnt loose a single guppy to that mess. Columnaris is of course harder because it is flesh eating bacteria that is contaigious not free floating fungus. methylene blue wont do **** to columnaris, even with the best meds on the market today, Kanamycin, Minocycline, Oxytetracycline, Triple Sulfa....... your fish got a 50/50 chance

Thanks for the info, much appreciated. I can't understand that with fish sometimes, I had a rasbora somehow make it's way 2m (um, 7ft I think) out of the tank and across carpet. Found it still wet and put back in and was fine.

 

[mariah]

First off what's columnarus? I don't know what my sisters fish have... all i know is it looks like ich. They have been treated for ich.. the white came back.. they were treated for fungus and it came back...
Again, i have no idea what to do for her fish other then treat them with epsom salt for 10 days. I have been told multiple times that epsom salt is safe. I use it in my cichlid tank and my guppy/molly tank currently. I need advice as to what it is?? What will help them??

 

[Delapool]

First off what's columnarus? I don't know what my sisters fish have... all i know is it looks like ich. They have been treated for ich.. the white came back.. they were treated for fungus and it came back...
Again, i have no idea what to do for her fish other then treat them with epsom salt for 10 days. I have been told multiple times that epsom salt is safe. I use it in my cichlid tank and my guppy/molly tank currently. I need advice as to what it is?? What will help them??

Columnaris is a bacterial infection also known as cotton-mouth or saddleback disease. It can be mistaken for fungus.

The Epsom salts are for helping with swim bladder or dropsy or bloating. While not unsafe, it isn't useful for ich or fungal treatments. For ich or fungus, sea salt (NaCl) is used. So IMO the treatment needs to change.

Is the ich on the fish like fine white salt grains? Can you describe what the white looks like, where it is on the fish, how many fish have it and how the fish are behaving. I'm guessing that maybe your fish had/have ich with secondary fungal infection but any more details will help.

For ich, the treatment is high temp (86F or 30C) with sea salt (to help and if you don't have plants as they don't like the salt). Second way is a small increase in heat to speed up the ich cycle and treatment with ich specific meds.

Edit - just reading back. How long did you do the API ich and fungus treatments for? IME ich can take several weeks to be out of a tank as last visible sign and then you need a week or so treatment after to confirm all gone and not just hiding in the gills.

 

[mariah]

Columnaris is a bacterial infection also known as cotton-mouth or saddleback disease. It can be mistaken for fungus.

The Epsom salts are for helping with swim bladder or dropsy or bloating. While not unsafe, it isn't useful for ich or fungal treatments. For ich or fungus, sea salt (NaCl) is used. So IMO the treatment needs to change.

Is the ich on the fish like fine white salt grains? Can you describe what the white looks like, where it is on the fish, how many fish have it and how the fish are behaving. I'm guessing that maybe your fish had/have ich with secondary fungal infection but any more details will help.

For ich, the treatment is high temp (86F or 30C) with sea salt (to help and if you don't have plants as they don't like the salt). Second way is a small increase in heat to speed up the ich cycle and treatment with ich specific meds.

Edit - just reading back. How long did you do the API ich and fungus treatments for? IME ich can take several weeks to be out of a tank as last visible sign and then you need a week or so treatment after to confirm all gone and not just hiding in the gills.

Since i don't see the fish everyday i don't know exactly what and where it is. My sister works for another 3 1/2 hours then she will tell me. I believe its by the butt on the lips and maybe a top fin? Possible just on the two adults and not the babies. Again, ill have to clarify later. When i went there two weeks ago ish they were all happy but one adult was sitting on the bottom. So is epsom salt still okay to have in my.guppy/molly tank? Its just that it won't cure diseases which is fine. My sisters fish have been sitting without treatment for two weeks then... :/ i treated exactly like the api tests said to. Also, the white went away after the ich and then the fungus treatment. After the second treatment (the fungus one) my sister said they weren't acting normal. Not moving a lot or happy looking. Within days the white came back.

Also, i don't know if this helps but not all of them have ever had white on them at a time... there were at least 4 babies that had no Glasgow dots. It seems to be the same ones

Edit:also the one female molly does have swimmers bladder or somthing. So the salt is doing something for them then. She said she isn't fully better but she is swimmer more up right and not looking down like she has a heavy head. Ave has been feeding peas for the last little while also

 

[Matt68005]

Its never 100% hun. Meds don't always work on humans, nor do they with fish or any animal or plant. bacteria develop resistance, ect ect. Im assuming you treated with API "Fungus Cure" which is Nitrofurazone. Its a hit and miss type of medicine, it kills gram positive bacteria and fungus, sometimes.
"Columnaris" is a gram negative contagious oppturnistic bacteria that is very serious.
Fungus is just mold that infects tails and open sores on fish.
Often they go hand in hand.
If your fish has columnaris, it will have Greyish/Brownish lesions on its skin, if its fungus it will have a more "puffy fuzzy" appearance.
See if you can get a good decription of whats happening, possibly a pic of a fish that is not moving or something. Both are serious, but i don't want to waste your time or money on meds that won't/don't work unless we know exactly whats going on. Even then its a 75%-85% chance of curing it using the CORRECT meds.

 

[mariah]

Its never 100% hun. Meds don't always work on humans, nor do they with fish or any animal or plant. bacteria develop resistance, ect ect. Im assuming you treated with API "Fungus Cure" which is Nitrofurazone. Its a hit and miss type of medicine, it kills gram positive bacteria and fungus, sometimes.
"Columnaris" is a gram negative contagious oppturnistic bacteria that is very serious.
Fungus is just mold that infects tails and open sores on fish.
Often they go hand in hand.
If your fish has columnaris, it will have Greyish/Brownish lesions on its skin, if its fungus it will have a more "puffy fuzzy" appearance.
See if you can get a good decription of whats happening, possibly a pic of a fish that is not moving or something. Both are serious, but i don't want to waste your time or money on meds that won't/don't work unless we know exactly whats going on. Even then its a 75%-85% chance of curing it using the CORRECT meds.

I will try and get a better description of it for you!!! and yes i did treat it with fungus cure. Its not on the tail and soars i don't think. It being a black fish is hard to see brown... and before they were treated with that, i treated them with super ick cure. I'm assuming there is only Columnairs or whatever left if it appears that way.. what's a treatment for that? Its been going on for over a month and you are actually the most help possibly

 

[Matt68005]

unplug the heater.....keep upping the salt levels to brackish strength with tabe salt of you have to
Find a good antibioic that you can
Maracyn-2 (minocycline)
Kanamycin
Terramycin (oxytetracycline)
all should work, but nothings ever 100% especially with columnaris.
I have battled this disease over and over with my guppies for years
Cold water and salt along with a early diagnosis and powerful Gram-negative antibiotic seem to be the only way to slow it down.

 

[mariah]

Its never 100% hun. Meds don't always work on humans, nor do they with fish or any animal or plant. bacteria develop resistance, ect ect. Im assuming you treated with API "Fungus Cure" which is Nitrofurazone. Its a hit and miss type of medicine, it kills gram positive bacteria and fungus, sometimes.
"Columnaris" is a gram negative contagious oppturnistic bacteria that is very serious.
Fungus is just mold that infects tails and open sores on fish.
Often they go hand in hand.
If your fish has columnaris, it will have Greyish/Brownish lesions on its skin, if its fungus it will have a more "puffy fuzzy" appearance.
See if you can get a good decription of whats happening, possibly a pic of a fish that is not moving or something. Both are serious, but i don't want to waste your time or money on meds that won't/don't work unless we know exactly whats going on. Even then its a 75%-85% chance of curing it using the CORRECT meds.

So... uhmm.. my sister just returned my text from last night. She said "there is no white! They look great!"... how? I got her to increase the heat that's all.

Edit:
She said there is a patch that's white ish grey where there was a big white dot on the fishes head. It was a puffy ball sticking out before. Her temp is at 80 and she is going to leave all the salt in for two more days then do a water change to bring it down. She said her molly that had swimmers bladder is all better now and they all look happy and go to her when she stands there now. Do you think maybe the temp was to low and that's why they kept getting sick? Her temp these two months was at 74 apparently... that's low :/ do you think they are healed now and she can sell them?

 

[Matt68005]

Yes it could have been, or just needs to change the filter and keep the gravel cleaner. Fungus thrive on decaying organic and cool temps.mmmm think of a cold moldy basement, it's actually "mold" on her fish then. Mollies love salt and warmth and a good variety of food. Glad to hear it worked.

 

[mariah]

Yes it could have been, or just needs to change the filter and keep the gravel cleaner. Fungus thrive on decaying organic and cool temps.mmmm think of a cold moldy basement, it's actually "mold" on her fish then. Mollies love salt and warmth and a good variety of food. Glad to hear it worked.

Huhh... interesting. I have never had this problem.. ever.. weird! Thank you all!! She is going to re home the two bigger ones right away