Please help me save my fish!

[Jolene85]

Alright I have a 55 gal. 1 rubber lip Pleco 1 stander Pleco 1 albino chocolate Pleco and a albino bushy nose Pleco ( I have a thing for the Pleco idk why haha..) a clown loach and 7 angels. Not full grown yet. I do plan on getting another tank after a few pair off. My issue is did a water change about 2 weeks ago with one of the things you hook up to the sink (I don't remember what it's called) I checked the water to make sure it was as close to the tank temp as I could.. after I started to fill the tank I felt the water and it was a little cold coming out so I warmed it up to temp. Last Thursday I noticed one of my angles had a spot on his gill that looked like someone had nipped him and I could see a little of his gill. I did some reading and it sounded like it was gill flukes. I went to pet smart and got parasite guard from Tera. Knowing I stressed the fish out I also got something for fungus. I treated once for the fungus and then did for the parasites. I fallowed the instructions exactly how it said. Well now almost all my fish except my plecos loach and one angel are having problems. My big angel had a cloudy eye. now he has a big line that looks as if someone cut him down his side and it healed up almost like a scar and I just seen today he's got a growth on his body. another one had a cloudy body. My white angel had red on his dorsal fin and side fins and the others are shaking and rubbing and at the top of the water. non of this was going on until after I treated the tank. I only treated everyone to catch anything before it got out of hand. The meds said to treat the tank and in 2 days do a 20% water change and then I could treat again after I did the water change. I did that but everyone looked as if it's just moving faster. The past two days I've done 60-75% water change took the temp upto 82 and added epson salt. I though I was doing the right thing by catching anything before progressed into my other fish but now I'm thinking I just signed my fishs death certificate. I'm so sad and idk what to do to save them!! Anyone have any suggestions on what I could do to save my fish??

Also the tank has been set up over a year so it's not the cycle and everything tested fine when I tested the water.

 

[Aquaenthused]

Qt sick fish, do salt dips and change 75% of your water daily. When you add new fish or disrupt and stress your fish out the more chance you take of having a mini cycle. If you keep up on dips and water changes you should notice a world of difference within a few days. Try to keep your ph as STABLE as possible your fish are better off with a stable ph of 6 than one that fluctuates throughout the day (anything you are using to treat your fish will alter the ph, even if they swear it doesn't.) the best thing you can do for your stock is to work on making your water and substrate parameters level by consistent large water changes and less chemical treatments- angels and discus are known for being sensitive to medications and having different parameter requirements than most community tanks, I don't own any angels.... Yet, but from testimonies and second hand experiences I am pretty sure your angels are scaring themselves to death with the commotion ( keeping 3 to 5 angels in a 75g is considered cramped if you have more than just the angels for your stock..)

 

[Jolene85]

Thank you for the reply. I didn't know angels were sensitive to medication. I know I went a little angel crazy but I've got a few more tanks to be set up and all but one of the angels are still small and I keep an eye out for fighting. That hasn't been a problem YET. I know it will be beings angels like to have a bubble around them. I QT the first one that looked sick but when everyone got sick I put him back in so I could just treat all of them. Someone else I asked said something about salt dips but I know nothing about that. How long, how much salt, and how offend should I do it? I've been doing big water changes after I treated and put epson salt in the tank. I planed on doing water changes every day. Even thought about doing one in the am and one in the pm but I don't want to over kill.. Thanks again!

 

[Mebbid]

What is the fungus medication you used? It's possible that the combination of medications overdosed on something as a lot of meds are a blend of different ingredients.

Generally the only indication of gill flukes in your aquarium is the fish gasping at the surface but this is also true of a low oxygen level in the tank. The increased temperature also allows less oxygen to be in the water for your fish. For now you should either run an air stone in the tank or drop the water level a little lower to increase surface agitation.

The salt dips are good for a lot of fish but in general plecos don't tolerate salt so I would avoid doing any sort of salt dip for them.

What are your nitrate and pH levels at?
Why add the epsom salt?

I will suggest that in the future don't treat fish without seeing obvious signs of health problems. The proactive fungus treatment is likely what caused the ballooning of issues.

We really need some pictures to be able to help you out more. It's difficult to diagnose properly through text.

 

[Jolene85]

Yeah I'm finding out now that I shouldn't have treated them until they got sick. my poor fish! Okay I do have an air stone in and the water level was lowered. I've been told by the guy that has THE ONLY FISH STORE NEAR ME and of course my mother that epson salt would help and them fungus med I used was melafix for bacterial infections. It says it rapidly repairs damage Ben's an open wounds. Is what the first angelfish had to begin with. The pH was zero. Nitrates nitrites were low. And the ammonia wasn't at zero but it wasn't at .025. I'm not sure how to post pictures yet Cus I just got on this site and still trying to figure it out. Oh and most aren't eating much at all. If they do they spit it out. I'll try to do pictures of them now.

 

[Jolene85]

This is the scar looking part on him that he didn't have before. It has gotten better then it was!







This is the one who I noticed having some gill missing.

 

[Mebbid]

Epsom salt is really only useful in relieving some internal digestive issues because it acts as a laxative. I don't really see any reason to use it as it seems that your fish are having bacterial issues.

You might want to get your readings rechecked.. A pH of 0 would be pure acid

So you are getting readings above 0 for Ammonia, Nitrite, AND Nitrate? If that's true then you have a bit of an issue because a cycled tank should never have a positive reading for ammonia and nitrite. Do you ever change out your filter media?

I like melafix but I wouldn't ever use it to treat full blown infections on fish as it's just not powerful enough. People still debate on whether it does anything at all which the jury is still out on. At the very least it makes your tank smell nice.

 

[Jolene85]

Oh the white one and the Orange one are blushing.

 

[Jolene85]

You can see it better in this one. Starts on his gills and them moving up to his dorsal fin.

 

[Jolene85]

Lol.. No I'm sorry I'm not good at reading them things and it was a test kit I borrowed from a friend. the liquid test kit. Everything was in good rage I don't remember the numbers but I do know the ammonia was a little past the first color but not close enough to the next color. Iim going to have to get a test kit of my own. Lmao. I'm sorry I feel like an idiot and probably sound like one too.. I know you can't use salt with iodine in it. The weird thing is the Plecos and clown loach are fine. Not acting funny still eating. Man I though I was doing ok with this tank thing and something like this happens and I feel like I don't know crap.. That's why in coming to you guys!!

 

[Jolene85]

Also the white blushing ( ghost is when I call him) had a lot more red on his fins but has been going away with the water changes. Yes I named some of my fish. Big one is king the orange one is pumpkin the white one is ghost and I have a black and white one who is cookie. Cookie don't seem to have anything wrong with him either.

 

[Jolene85]

And yes I do change out the filter I took out The carbon input just the filter pad back in when I treated the tank with the parasite guard.

 

[Mebbid]

You never want to change out the actual filter media as that's what's holding all your bacteria. The only time you really need to change it is when its literally falling apart. That is likely why you are having ammonia issues.

The big white spot on your fish looks like either a bacterial or fungal infection but It's hard to tell at this point. if you can find it try a methylene blue dip of the fish. I'll have to look at the other pics when I get back to my pc.w

 

[Jolene85]

I have a bio wheel and a sponge filter.. I though the bio wheel would hold that bacteria. Would the melafix help with that at all or should I try and stay away from medication? Are you supposed to clean the filter media at all? How dose it catch anything if it's clogged up and dirty? I've heard you aren't supposed to rinse it with your tapwater because that kills everything but with a bio wheel I though that would put back what the tank needs to stop the spike.

 

[Aquaenthused]

I have a bio wheel and a sponge filter.. I though the bio wheel would hold that bacteria. Would the melafix help with that at all or should I try and stay away from medication? Are you supposed to clean the filter media at all? How dose it catch anything if it's clogged up and dirty? I've heard you aren't supposed to rinse it with your tapwater because that kills everything but with a bio wheel I though that would put back what the tank needs to stop the spike.

If I were treating your fish right now I would qt the suffering angels, invest a little bit of money and get precycled water, actual freshwater aquarium salt, if you can find the keptang/ kepata/ Indian almond/ betta (black water) leaf use a single leaf to start, if not maybe you can find black water or amazon extract, if that is a no perhaps new world or American cichlid salt or, last on my list because it's messy, a small media bag of peat moss or coir brick rinsed through with 'fresh' change out water from previous tank. Leave the methylene blue alone. Leave the melafix alone. Leave all of it alone for a little while, keep doing water changes frequently using your normal water conditioner and apply the above recommendations to NEW WATER not 'top off' water, raise the temperature to about 82F (gradually, no more than +2F per 24 hours) supply with ample oxygen and very low lighting in a quiet area, and salt dip the angels for between 10 and 20 minutes using water from their qt tanks. The missing gill cover will not heal, sorry, but on the flip side it's not lethal either, just means to keep an eye on them. Feed them small amounts several times a day.

In your main tank remove filter media and soak in new water and aquarium salts per directions and replace with bio floss, bio fiber or poly fiber, one section at a time giving enough time in between sections to build up BB. Use waste water from daily change outs to replace water that the original filter medium is soaking in using salt mixture. Once all media has been swapped out do a large change out. Thoroughly rinse media using changeout water, discard poly/ bio filter. Use purigen or similar chemical removing filter medium while cycling in original medium. Keeping up on changes and using just changeover water to soak media. Drip acclimate treated angels to original tank and you should be all set- the ones that die will die... Sad truth, but angels don't adjust well....