Resistant to meds???

[captmicha]

Long story short, a family member is the worst fish keeper ever. Or if not, is still pretty bad.

He keeps cramming his nasty, under-maintained 29 gallon with too many, too large fish from Pet/co/smart. Just drops them right in, no QT.

This most recent time, a bunch of fish have already died. More are in the process. They are as follows:

His lone, surviving platy has off-white spots which I'm thinking are probably ich. Some are stringy on the underside of the fish. I have no idea what that is. Maybe "fungus".

His last surviving gourami looks to have dropsy and is gasping at the surface. I know this is ammonia or nitrite (or is it nitrate, I can never remember) poisoning.

His bala shark is missing scales and is swimming very erratically.

Every fish has fin and tail rot in degrees. I think these are all the fish he has left. From a whole bunch.

I keep putting my Seachem Polyguard in there but nothing is changing. ??? No, I haven't put carbon back in to remove the medicine. I don't know what's happening. And these are the medications I would use alone to treat individual problems.

Ugh. I feel like I should save the fish some time and just humanely euthanize them but then the family member will just go and get more fish to slowly kill off.

In fact, he thinks I'm to blame for pulling the carbon from his filter when I got permission from him to medicate his fish (yes, I know, the sickness happened before the carbon pulling but this is the kind of logic I'm facing).

While we're on the topic, any advice to stop this fish serial killer? I've offered to plan a tank with him but he says yes one day and no the next. I don't know how he'd take it if I just did an overhaul one day when he's at work. Although, kind of hard when you need time for acclimation, cycling and all that.

 

[Star_Rider]

test the water parameters, if you feel the need.

the Sx you listed could all be from the tank being out of whack.
as for teaching.. you could tek the time but every once in awhile you will run into those who really don't care enought o learn.. eventually they willl get tired of losing money and either 1) learn or 2) quit..at which point you may find yourself owner of e 29 G tank

 

[captmicha]

Worst ammonia reading I've ever seen. It was the second to highest on the chart. I had a bucket of dirty aquarium water sitting for over a week now that I tested my ammonia test on also. His tank was much worse.

I did a 50% WC with gravel cleaning. I know I shouldn't have done everywhere at once bc of gas escape, but I couldn't help myself. Then I stuck an old Whispee HOB rated for like a 70 gallon tank. I replaced his heater too as his seems to have stopped working, the water was cold on top of all of this. Then I touched up their meds since I medicated not knowing I'd be cleaning their tank.

I think he's just going to do it again. He's been keeping fish for almost 30 years. Incorrectly keeping them...

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[Byron Amazonas]

This individual should not be keeping fish. There is a responsibility to owning any live animal, whether a dog, bird, fish or whatever. Proper care is required, and those not prepared to provide it should not be in the hobby. Tell him that.

To your initial question, as another member pointed out, it is the poor conditions that is causing the various health problems and ich. Fish are severely stressed by many factors, like the wrong environment, wrong tankmates, too little space, poor water parameters and conditions, etc. This weakens them and they get sick. Adding any medication will only worsen things, as the fish is then having to cope with even more stress, and almost all medications are stressful in themselves. The solution is to fix the real problem.

Byron.

 

[excuzzzeme]

If he has been keeping fish for 30 years, he is not likely to change his care habits. On that note, you would do well to extricate yourself from the massacre. As much as it sucks to do so, it is not your place to attend to his fish without his permission. It also might be to your advantage to put it in writing as people like this generally refuse to accept any responsibility finding it easier to blame you. When things are this bad, Polyguard is too little too late. It would require a stronger med with the very real possibility that it would actually kill the remaining fish. Polyguard is great for a QT with new fish. 50% water changes need to be done weekly for a couple of times and then vacuum and do 75%. I would expect a minicycle given your comments.

Tea tree oil (not the stuff of Pimafix/melafix which is too diluted), sometimes found on ebay, is a good natural parricide/fungicide that could be strengthened over time (if the fish live that long). Quik-cure (not to be confused with General-cure) contains high levels of malachite green and works wonders but can be lethal to sickly fish. It will likely reset the cycle by killing off much of the biomedia and is removable with carbon. Beyond that the last alternative would be copper, rendering the tank useless for any inverts.

Whatever you do, Good luck and I'm glad that you at least tried.

 

[captmicha]

I found another live fish in there! There's four left. Two are the kind of pleco that will get huge... Sigh. Fish still look like crap but are alive. I think they all, except for the plecos, have dropsy to some degree. I'll be surprised if they can come back from it.

I don't know what's going on... Every 150 watt heater I put on that tank is over heating it. I'm on to the third one now. I'll have to see if I can find a 100 around here and try it. But a 150 watt shouldn't be over heating 29 gallons!


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[Byron Amazonas]

I found another live fish in there! There's four left. Two are the kind of pleco that will get huge... Sigh. Fish still look like crap but are alive. I think they all, except for the plecos, have dropsy to some degree. I'll be surprised if they can come back from it.

I don't know what's going on... Every 150 watt heater I put on that tank is over heating it. I'm on to the third one now. I'll have to see if I can find a 100 around here and try it. But a 150 watt shouldn't be over heating 29 gallons!


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What temperature setting are you using? Heaters that have specific degrees for the setting may operate above or below the number. For example, if it is set to 76F, it may heat the water to 80F, or 74F, but still be consistent. If you can turn the setting down, I would, until it operates to heat the water at the desired temperature. I use a 150w or 200w heater on my 29g tank.

Use a good thermometer too, as some are inaccurate. The floating ones that you can attach to the glass with a suction cup seem to be OK, or of course the more expensive digital ones. The stick-on ones I find are not accurate many times.

The ambient room temperature also factors in. If the room temperature is above the intended water temp, the water temp obviously will rise to that of the room. If the room is too cool, the heater may have to overwork; most heaters seem to be calibrated to function when the room temp is no more than about 10 degrees below the intended tank temperature.

Byron.

 

[captmicha]

I tried two different brand/makes. I've only used the very lowest setting. They're the dial type with low to high, no actual degree setting. I'm using the floating type thermometer. His stick on doesn't even work anymore. The room temp is about 72 most of the time. I guess it could just be bad luck twice in a row. Or thrice in a row if you count the first heater that stopped working. I'll try for a fourth! Lol. It's like whatever can go wrong with this tank WILL.

 

[Byron Amazonas]

I tried two different brand/makes. I've only used the very lowest setting. They're the dial type with low to high, no actual degree setting. I'm using the floating type thermometer. His stick on doesn't even work anymore. The room temp is about 72 most of the time. I guess it could just be bad luck twice in a row. Or thrice in a row if you count the first heater that stopped working. I'll try for a fourth! Lol. It's like whatever can go wrong with this tank WILL.

I never skimp when it comes to a heater, as this is the single most important piece of equipment in an aquarium. By sad experience when a heater overheated a tank overnight killing all fish, I learned my error in trying to save money on the heater. And you are correct that higher-rated heaters (higher wattage) do tend to be more efficient and durable.

I have had good luck with Eheim Jager heaters, and now only buy these. I have older heaters that have been operating efficiently since the mid 1990's, but no longer seem to be available here, so I went with Eheim Jager.

Byron.

 

[captmicha]

I'm cheap but you're right it's not a good area to skimp in. I've been collecting used and cheap heaters but will start buying new quality ones. Good idea.