Sick cats

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Captain Jim

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May 12, 2012
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I bought 4 hoplo catfish from chain store couple days ago..yesterday I posted in another section, but symptoms have changed. I now have one cat with serious fin rot, and two that have pretty serious ich. Fairly sure I might lose the guy with rot, but the two with ick dots are behaving fairly good otherwise. I have Coppersafe that has worked for bettas in the past, but worried about dosage. Would they be okay with say, 3/4 dose? Or would that aggravate disease to be non respondant? What about the fin rot guy? I have melafix?
 

Rbishop

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Dec 30, 2005
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Mr. Normal
First, never buy from that source again.

Second, at best, I would shoot for 1/3 dose...no real experience with hoplo, and I hate copper.

Third...hit up Planet Catfish dot com.
 

Captain Jim

AC Members
May 12, 2012
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Well, my fin-rot guy did die. Right before I got your message I had put about 1/2 strength coppersafe in tank,..had to do something, was going to work for 12 hours. Raised temp up to what I thought was 85, but I think its more like 83. Need to put another heater in if I raise temp. I think I probably should. But they have slowly improved to the point where there is only a few spots. Still, I think it should be gone..its almost time for disease to go "new generation" and I'm worried. I have metro crystal, Quichcure, and more coppersafe. I understand your distrust of the copper..it is a heavy metal, but so is salt a "heavy mineral". I'm not sure I trust salt any better, though easier to overdose with copper. Happy they made it so far, but I have to move to stop this and not sure what direction to go. Thinking, raise temp, add more coppersafe. Not sure.
 

excuzzzeme

Stroke Survivor '05
You're pretty close on what you think. Copper is not only a heavy metal but also long term poison. Like mercury, it doesn't just disappear overnight. Salt, can also be toxic on scaleless fish such as most species of catfish. Quick Cure is also a very strong medicine if not used wisely. General Cure is a bit safer.

Temp being off by 2 degrees is nothing to stress over. I wouldn't be overly concerned by such a minor variance. Still, I would just keep a casual eye on it. Fish usually don't stress when temp change is gradual. Sudden changes by more than 5F starts stressing them. However, I have had greater changes during waterchanges when I wasn't paying attention and they seemed to survive it well enough.
 
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