Running Carbon to Remove Medicine

[An t-iasg]

I put some medicine in my tank yesterday. The medicine is clear; it's not like the fishies are swimming in green water this time! My next doses will be Monday and Wednesday. Then on Friday, I will change 2 gallons of water (5 1/2 gallon tank). I would usually run a carbon filter for about 24 hours to pull out the medicine. I don't have a carbon filter in all the time, just a sponge filter. But we're leaving for the weekend, and won't be home till Tuesday evening. Should I let the carbon run from Friday evening until Tuesday evening, or just do the water change before we leave, and wait to run the carbon when we get back?

 

[e-cat]

what type of medicine are you useing?

 

[An t-iasg]

I'm using Kanacyn, Aquatronics brand. It's a white powder in a capsule. I only used half. 1 capsule is for 10 gallons, so I divided it in half. It's an antibiotic, and I'm using it for fin and tail rot.

 

[e-cat]

iv never had too treat for tail or fin rot before, hopefully some one who has wil come along and give you some info.

 

[TankGirl]

I have treated fin rot beautifully with Melafix, which is tee tree oil and does not really need to be removed per se. As far as answering your question, I would just run the carbon until the next time you do maintenance on your filter.

 

[e-cat]

iv had great results useing melafix too regrow the fins on an arowana the got atacked my an asian red tailed catfish and they where growing back the next day.

 

[tkos]

You should be fine running the carbon in the filter until you get back home. Mostly since you will not be adding anything to the water while you are away there won't be much worry about the medicine getting out of the carbon and back into the tank.

 

[An t-iasg]

Thanks, tkos! My mom is coming over to feed the bettas (she wants to make sure that they eat on their normal schedule!), but I didn't want to bother her with disconnecting and removing the filter. I did wonder if the carbon would release the medicine, but now I won't worry! I'll start the carbon filter before we go and take it out when I get home.

 

[Alivymar]

Yeah, tkos is absolutely correct. If you're using it to remove meds, and leave it in for a few extras days (or weeks!) its not a prob. Lots of people run carbon in their filters regularly anyway. Shouldn't be an issue.

Melafix is great for finrot if its a mild case. Severe cases usually need stronger meds just as you are using. It also has no negative effect on your bacterial colonies. I'm guessing you are keeping the regular filter somewhere other then the treated tank to keep the bacteria alive and so the meds don't affect it?

Also, you can leave the fish and not feed them for a few days (for future reference) They won't starve. I would suggest you make daily food packets for your mom so she doesn't overfeed by accident.

 

[An t-iasg]

Hi Alivymar,
Actually my ammonia reading was .25 today. I checked before I gave them their second dose of medicine tonight. I do have some Bio-Spira in the frig unopened. I got it two weeks ago, but I think my tank cycled ok without it. I just forgot all about buying the Bio-Spira on the day I bought all my tank stuff (about 3 weeks ago). I wanted to get out of there as fast as possible because of all the other animals in there and my allergies. So I went back a week later for the Bio-Spira.

I was confused because it seemed like the ammonia spiked in two days, the nitrites spiked in one day, and the ammonia and nitrites were 0 all last week, with the nitrates at 20 ppm. So I guess the tank cycled, and I didn't use the Bio-Spira. I didn't think it would go that fast, but it looks like it did, so I didn't worry anymore about it.

The one fish has had fin rot for quite some time, and it just started again a little bit. He swam around like he was trying to catch his tail. I knew when I saw that, that his tail would start looking stringy, and it did, so I put the Kanacyn in. I really don't think Bettamax helps with the fin rot all that much, because he just gets it back a month or so later, and the other betta is fine.

The sponge filter is still in the tank. Should I take it out, since the Kanacyn may be killing the good bacteria? The package said it wouldn't harm the biological filter, but the ammonia rose some. If I took it out of the tank, wouldn't the bacteria die anyway without the ammonia from the fish? Where would I keep it -- in dechlorinated water with some Bio-Spira, or should I just add some Bio-Spira to the sponge on Friday when I do the partial water change and add the carbon before we go?

I do use 10 drops of Amquel per gallon when I make up their water. This is ok, right? You just shouldn't put more in if the ammonia spikes--just do a water change?

I told my mom that the fish would be ok without food for three days, but she wants to feed them! She's fed them before. She likes to take care of them! I told her she should get a betta of her own!

 

[Alivymar]

*grin* Sounds like you know what to get mom for xmas/Channukah.

Ahhh, you've Bio-Spira right in the house. Excellent. No matter what the med package says, antibiotics WILL muck up the bacterial colonies; they aren't fussy about what bacteria they kill (there is an issue about gram positive and negative bacteria tho; won't get into that here). I keep extra filter media available in case I need to medicate a tank (I have 4 tanks running atm, so its easy). I'd suggest adding the Bio-Spira once your finished medicating and have removed all the medication from the tank. While its not made to play catch up with established ammonia/nitrite levels, it will help the bacterial colonies rebuild quickly. So don't worry bout keeping the filter elsewhere.

I'm rather amazed your tank cycled so quickly, especially since you didn't use Bio-Spira! Did you use a mature filter or gravel from a mature tank or something? Incredible.

I don't use Amquel or any of those products that "remove" ammonia. They actually only convert it to a non-toxic form, and its still in the tank. If you use Nessler tests for ammonia, it can't tell the diff between good and bad ammonia, and just tells you theres ammonia in the water. Can be confusing; I also make sure to use a salicyte test which can tell the difference. In your case, the ammonia levels may actually be the non-toxic form!

Its tough to water change when one is treating with medication. You want the medication to remain at the correct levels, and thats difficult when your changing water. At the same time, you don't want to poison the fish with ammonia/nitrites. Its a PITA.

I noticed you mentioned the betta starts swimming in circles prior to fin rot showin up. I'm kinda wondering if there is something more serious going on then just fin rot. Bettas WILL chase their own tails LOL they aren't the brightest cookies in the jar, but since its followed by physical symptoms I do wonder. Treating them with stronger meds such as the Kanacyn you are using is a good idea.

Btw, I checked the WWM Q&A faqs to see if anything came up there...funny enough, the first post I saw in the disease thread was yours LOL Sabrina, Ananda and Anthony are awesome and are really knowledgeable about fish Glad to see, like me, you are using all sorts of resources to get as much info as possible.

*edit*
Btw, are you keeping the tank temps at a steady 82f?

 

[silvi-p]

hello,
I don't actually know lots about bettas, but from what I've learnt in other discussions, there are some points that might help you or rather your fish with the fin rot...
- do you keep them as a pair only? is it the female getting fin rot? might be a sign of stress maybe... since one male might be too much for a lonely female.
- the tank sizes that are recommended by pro fish folks for bettas are bigger than 6gals, rather 13gal. if the tank is too small, the betta cannot hide in case of stress, which causes more stress...

I wouldn't look so much to all the technical stuff, rather get info about sources of stress for bettas, since that might be the original cause of the fin rot. medicating with antibiotics might be a cause for the disturbed cycle. which makes the stress even worse...

hope your betta will get better
s.

 

[Terry]

Silvia
I read an article a while back about betta's and it said about putting more than one female in with the male, this cut's down on the stress of one female because the male has more females to show off to. I did also read that the female can be just as aggressive towards the male. This article was a while back so somebody else has probably written something completely differant by now.

 

[An t-iasg]

Hi Alivymar,
Yes, it's hard when the ammonia level is .25 and you have till Friday to leave the medicine in. Like you said, changing the water will dilute the medicine. I just hope the ammonia levels don't go up.

I have no idea why the tank cycled so fast! But it really does seem to have cycled though. I did put 2 silk plants in the tank that were in their bowls. But I didn't transfer them directly from bowl to tank -- the plants were removed from the bowl for 4 days while I put a dose of Jungle Fungus Eliminator in each bowl, in preparation for the bettas going in the same tank. I do feel like I over medicate, but I just can't ignore his stringy tail either. (and btw, the other betta is totally fine.) The one with constant fin and tail rot -- he gets it every few months. I medicate, it goes away, then it comes back. When I medicate, I can see his tail healing. But it is nowhere near its original length anymore. The pet store that I went to for all my tank stuff is a good one, mostly fish, but they do have dogs, cats, birds...all the stuff I'm allergic to!! Actually my mom ran back in that next week for the Bio-Spira. So I'm glad I have it. The guy at that store said that maybe that betta has a genetic defect or something. Of course, he was my first betta, so I felt like a fishy mom failure!

My ammonia test kit is a salicyclate (sp?) test, so it's the right one, but it's a little over a year old, so I got another one. But in my haste to get out of there quickly, I picked up a Nessler test. I got the same brand, and the box looks the same as my old one, so how was I to know? But now I have to go back to the store and return it -- yuck. Will the ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate tests give a false reading due to the medication?

I never really read too much on the WWM site -- just clicked "ask the crew a question". (I'll have to go back to it!) I read that Anthony is from Pittsburgh too, so I asked him for a fish-only shop, and I went to the one he suggested. It was so great! What a joy to look at the nice fish and not worry about reaching for my inhaler every 5 minutes! But unfortunately, that shop closed. It was too good to be true!

My heater is set for 80 degrees, but actually the thermometer reads 82. When I set it for 82, the thermometer said 84, which is too warm. I think the thermometer is ok becuase the water felt too warm when it said 84.

The Bio-Spira package says that you can use it at each water change, but if the readings are ok, you wouldn't need to? I'll use it on Friday, though. In the future, if I medicate (and I'm sure I will), should I remove the sponge filter? The med. would kill the bacteria in the gravel bed, but the remaining bacteria in the sponge would resume the cycle again, right?

Thanks so much! (and btw, what happened to your other account and all your kudos??)

 

[An t-iasg]

Hi Silvi,
My bettas are two males. The lfs did recommend a ten gallon tank with a divider, instead of the 5 1/2 gallon that I got. The ten gallon was just too big for where I wanted to put it. I did put lots of silk plants along the divider to minimize their chances of seeing each other. They used to hang out at the divider and flare, but they don't too much anymore. I hope the one betta gets better too! The antibiotics are also killing my biological filter. My ammonia reading was .25 last night. Tonight it's somewhere between .25 and .50. I added 1 teaspoon of Bio-Spira, so I'll do my testing again tomorrow night, and I'll see if the Bio-Spira helped lower the ammonia. I hope some of the Bio-Spira stays active to lower the ammonia, although I didn't remove the medicine yet.

 

[silvi-p]

hi antiasg,
do you have any live plant in there? they might as well help to lower ammonium, and offer more substrate for bacteria. I think as long as you medicate, you'll probably have to keep adding bio-spira as antibiotics kill the present population.

I think fin rot has its causes more in stress and bad water conditions than really in bacteria or fungus-type of things. proved by the fact that it comes back again and again. if it were a fungus or bacteria, it should be finished after the first time, by medicating (if need be) and then keeping water conditions stable.
I wouldn't put bettas in a tank like that, but that's your choice...

hm, what to do.... water changes, bio-spira, and getting a bigger tank.... as always, it seems!
nb, don't forget, when removing the med, you will want to take out the carbon like 3 days after putting it in. otherwise, the carbon will release the med (or the rests of it) again.

-s.

 

[tkos]

I would agree with live plants as well. Add some nice java fern in there and mix it with the silk plants. It is dead easy to grow and will help with the ammonia levels a little bit.

 

[Allivymar]

Heh, I messed up my account trying to change my email addy (typoed it in and wound up locking up my acc't when the confirmation got sent to the wrong email addy LOL duh! However, the fine admins here fixed it all up for me n I'm back to my original nick).

Coupla thoughts.

This may be too much of a pain, but what about doing a water change prior to each medication addition, and adding enough additional meds to keep the levels the same? This way your diluting the ammonia but keeping the med levels up.

Dunno if the Bio-Spira will help atm. You still have the meds in there; they may kill the nitrifying bacteria...keep watching your ammonia levels just in case. You may have to continue with the ammonia converters for now out of necessity, then deal with things properly when you get back (with water changes,Bio-Spira etc). Especially since I've discovered the bacteria doesn't really feed on the converted ammonia.

Live plants are great for helping reduce nitrifying waste, but obviously you need to deal with it now LOL Something to think about in the near future tho.

Also, if you need to medicate again, maybe keeping the sponge in a zip lock with some tank water might help? Would depend on what your treating for of course (don't want to reinfect the tank). Not sure how helpful that would be, but is a thought.

 

[An t-iasg]

Thanks everyone,
I added the Bio-Spira last night, and just checked the ammonia levels. It's about .25. It didn't go up, and it may have come down a little. Tonight is my last dose of Kanacyn, and I'll change a gallon of water first, and then add a little additional medicine to make up for what I'm removing. I'll add more Bio-Spira when I'm done with the med too. I set up this tank in the first place because I thought it would help control the fin & tail rot in the one betta. I thought having a heater would help a lot. The other betta, who has the exact same water and everything, even when they were in their bowls, is fine. It's puzzling.

It is a pain to do medicines! I believed that package when it said that it wouldn't harm the biological filter! If I have to medicate again, and take the sponge filter out and put it in a bag with tank water (good idea, actually! 8) ) but wouldn't the good bacteria die anyway, without the ammonia from the fish to feed on? Should I put the filter in a bag and get some ammonia to drop into the bag? Allivymar, is there a website that you can post that talks about the gram positive and negative bacteria?

I do want some live plants. I think I'll get two. I'll order from LiveAquaria.com when I get back, so I can be here to monitor things. I didn't want to order last week or so, and have the plants come right before I left. Do the bettas like java ferns? The ferns are pretty, but would the bettas sit on them? They sit on the silk plants sometimes, but not too much. This morning I found them sleeping beside each other, on the gravel (on opposite sides of the divider, of course! )

 

[tkos]

Java ferns are the perfect choice. Hardy, grow in high and low light really well, don't nee dspecial substrate. And I have found that bettas like large leafy plants a lot. Just tie the fern to a rock or piece of wood or even a decoration and eventually the roots will wrap around whatever they are tied to and grow happily. I just use some cotton thread and eventually it will disintigrate over time.