Need help preventing disease - is Paraguard the answer?

[milknhoney]

Bought my daughter a 10gal tank for her birthday last May. Tried a fish-in cycle with two platys; they were dead within two weeks (white fuzz). Then tried again with four danios. They were dead in less than a week (white fuzz). I assumed then that their deaths were my fault for putting them in an uncycled tank.

Cleaned the entire tank and then attempted fishless cycle. Took a very long time to figure out how to get that going, but finally on Thanksgiving we achieved 0-ammonia and 0-nitrite. Went and got four fish a week ago Saturday: black molly, mickey mouse platy, guppy, purple glowfish tetra. They were all sick within days. Treated the tank with Ick Guard, and happily the molly got better. The others continued to get worse. So we switched to Tetra Lifeguard. Put the first dose in yesterday, the tetra died within the hour. The platy died this morning. Guppy is still hanging in the balance, but I'm expecting him to go too. I don't know how fast acting Lifeguard is, but for now I'm giving the benefit of the doubt that I just tried it too late to save the fish that didn't have ick. Daughter is quite anxious to restock her tank, but I need to get some stuff figured out.

I'm hopping mad, because since I had a cycled tank this go-round, I'm blaming the pet store for giving me diseased fish. I think every fish we've bought has been infected with something or other. I'd love to go with another store, but all we've got in my small city are the two big box pet stores.

1. Is going to a special aquarium shop in the nearest big city an option, or would the 1.5 hr drive be too stressful on the fish?

2. Do any of the online fish stores have a reputation for having healthy fish that would be worth the expense?

3. I totally see the wisdom in having a quarantine tank for new fish, but we just can't manage the expense, nor do we have a suitable location for an additional tank setup. Also, I'm worried about losing my cycle if we don't get more fish in there soon. What alternatives are there to putting the fish in quarantine?

4. I have read that some people just automatically medicate their new fish, assuming they're sick with something. I am in that camp now, as long as we keep buying fish from the same retailers. I'm worried about overmedicating my current molly. He just went through two days of ick guard, and today is day two of Lifeguard. I am planning to dose the full five days even if the guppy dies, just to make sure the tank is rid of any lingering whatever-they-were-infected-with. So I'm worried about bringing in new fish and starting a whole new course of medication. Will this adversely effect the molly?

5. I read about Seachem Paraguard, and that new fish can be "dipped". This looks like the best solution to me: let the new fish swim around in a bucket of Paraguard for an hour or two, then add to the tank. Wondering if anyone has experienced success with this method. Or is it better to just go ahead and treat the whole tank with this stuff so they can get continued exposure? Would this hurt the molly?

Whew, didn't think this was going to take me so long. Thanks for sticking it out to the end! All advice greatly appreciated!

 

[Delapool]

Hi, ime it's better to buy from a very reputable store or person if you can't QT. Even these stores you still carry some risk.


Using paraguard like that is not ideal for fish and won't cover all diseases unfortunately.


It's a hard one as the existing 10gal is pretty small else I would suggest a large plastic breeder box in that tank. Might still be ok for a week. Infections/parasites could still travel through the water column but as least new fish are isolated. Some thoughts anyways.