I really need help

How much salt have you added to your tank?

If it is ich, you know that you have to treat for 14 days, no matter what quick cure says. The lifespan of ich in a freshwater system is 14 days. I myself have had good luck with quick cure, treating for 14 days.

read the articles on ICH and other diseases in the articles section, they are VERY helpful

also if you do end up buying more fish, search this site or google for the tank setup that you want and figure out what type of care that will mean. also you knew about tank cycleing, right?

kelly24 said:

I put 1 tbl. per 5 gallon and raised the temp. to 82

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1 tbl per 5 gallons is not even close enough to kill ich. That's only 18 teaspoons of salt. There are 3 teaspoons in a tablespoon, so you dosed 6 tablespoons or 18 teaspoons.

You need to dose 1 tsp per gallon, 29 teaspoons or 10 tablespoons, of salt to kill ich and some strains are resistant and will need double the dose or 20 tablespoons.

Remove all the meds and do a very large waterchange. Raise the temp to 82* and start mixing salt with large volumes of tank water. Make sure it is fully dissolved, don't even try doing 29 teaspoons all at once. You'll have salt crystals on the bottom of the tank and that's dangerous to your fish.

Do a little at a time and slowly add it over the course of a day or two.

Once you've dosed, do not add any more salt. Treat for at *least* 1 week. You should see the spots fall off by day 3 or 4. Leave the salt in so that you make sure you kill whatever's in your substrate ready to hatch.

After one week, if your fish are not flashing anymore and no spots are showing, you should be fine. If you still see spots and flashing, do a 50% water change and add in half the first dose, plus another full dose. That will put you at 2 teaspoons per gallon. Don't go higher than that. Leave that for another week. The ich should be totally gone by then.

Roan

I had a ich problem with my mollies a while back. I slowly raised the temp and added salt for three days until I got to 1 tablespoon/gallon and 85 degrees. Did a 50% water change after three more days, keeping the salt and temp the same. After another three days the symptoms where gone. I did another 50% change, reducing the total salt to 1 tablespoons/2 gallons and temp to 80. Kept it that way for another week and had no more problems. I still keep my temp around 78-80 and salt levels at 2 tablespoons/5 gallons to prevent future outbreaks.

One way to add salt is to put the measured amount in a plastic cup, then cover the salt with gravel. It will slowly desolve and seep into the tank with no risk to the fish.

I do not recommend using meds to treat ich on mollies. They handle heat and salt very well.

DirkW,

Do you think the swordtail can handle 1.003 SG? That's quite a bit, even for a livebearer.

Roan