Sick Fish on and off for over a month now, need help

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Bluetech

Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Joined
Oct 13, 2018
Messages
23
So I've had these balloon mollies for almost 2 months now, and one of them got what I thought to be Ich. So I treated the tank for it, I forget the 1st med I used. He looked good after that and I thought, problem solved, then a few days later big white spots appeared on his tail, looked kinda like fungus to me so I treated the tank with Jungle Fungus Guard, again after treatment, water change etc, he looked good.

Maybe a week goes by, and the spots appear again, by this time, hes also lost color for some reason, his color is somewhat faded and the top of his head looks almost dry and scaly (Will be in the pics). I get Tetra Life Guard, cause at this point I'm scratching my head and it says it takes care of a lot of stuff. Same thing happens and I end up going through 2 rounds of this.

This time I try Melafix and Pimafix together, at first I don't see much improving then by the end of the 7 days, things look good. I'm hopeful this is it. It is not, today I look in the tank (been about a week again) and these spots are back... So I'm at a loss at this time, I'm out about 70 bucks in meds, I've lost one of the balloon mollies and my butterfly loach, probably due to the stress of all these meds and water changes.

A little info about the tank: Its 20 gallons long, its been set up for years now and I keep a close eye on the water balance. The PH is 6.8 - 7.0, no ammonia, no problems with nitrates or nitrites and I do regular water changes. I have a few neon tetras, two corey cats, a pleco, and these mollies.

One last bit of info, I pulled an undergravel filter out weeks before getting these mollies, it kicked up a lot of crap in the tank, but I had since then done a couple water changes vacuuming the gravel to clean things up and things seemed fine. The Molly in question also acts normal, swims around like the others, is very curious when I sit by the tank, he behaves as if nothing is wrong.

The first pic is of the top of his head, I don't know what that stuff is, the other 2 are from what he has on his tail now. Any help is greatly appreciated as I just do not know what to do anymore. :(
 

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Got no replies, but some views, maybe no one knows what this stuff looks like =(. So I made a quarantine tank today and put the fish in it. I'm a little unhappy about this since I took him away from the bigger tank and the fish he likes to school with, ugh. I started tetra lifeguard again cause I don't know what this is.

If anyone has advice or opinions I would greatly appreciate them.
 
A few things but do not know what it is.

QT is a good idea for the other fish, but maybe stressful for the little guy.

That is a huge amount of meds. I would do a whole bunch of water changes to freshen up the water and get the meds out...or can try using activated carbon for a few days and then maybe even another bag of it for another few days.

How often and how much water are you changing?
 
After each round of meds I would change about 25% of the water roughly, following the instructions. The last one I changed about 50% when I thought I was in the clear. As far as the carbon goes I would remove it during treatment and put it back after each water change.
 
Carbon will only work actively for 4-7 days then it loses its magical absorbing abilities.

And would need to be replaced after each medicine treatment.

Maybe a combination of Carbon and pwc's. I would still freshen up the water with a number of pwc.

All the meds have likely killed off BB and time will be needed to get back a thriving colony. So increased pwc and water testing would be advised to make sure water parameters stay in the safe zone.
 
Carbon will only work actively for 4-7 days then it loses its magical absorbing abilities.

And would need to be replaced after each medicine treatment.

Maybe a combination of Carbon and pwc's. I would still freshen up the water with a number of pwc.

All the meds have likely killed off BB and time will be needed to get back a thriving colony. So increased pwc and water testing would be advised to make sure water parameters stay in the safe zone.

How many pwc's should I do and how often to clear the meds? I can get new carbon for it also
 
Try 50% water changes twice a day for three days. Allow several hours between water changes. This along with the new carbon should clear it up.

If you've killed the BB then you're gonna probably need to do daily to every other day water changes. Essentially you will be re-cycling the tank and doing a fish in cycle. Test the water daily to see how it's doing and perform the water changes accordingly.
 
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