7 Dead Cardinals in 12 hours... why?

Too much medication? I've heard that ick can't be killed on the fish, it needs to be caught once it falls off. maybe you shouldn't have dosed it a second time and just waited for awhile longer to see if the one fish cleared up. I suggest putting the carbon filter back in and do a 50% water change to prevent the loss of anthing else.

cardinals are very sensitive fish, like all tetras you should have put a half of whats recommended




http://ashleywhippet.tripod.com/

I'm so sorry to hear about your loss of so many fish all at once.

Cardinals CAN be a little bit picky, and some meds state they are specifically NOT for tetras. Maybe the fish store employee was more interested in selling high priced medicine than actually caring that it was medicine for cardinal tetras. My best guess is that the medicine is the culprit, though.

Ich isn't that hard to cure in my experience, and I've never lost fish like what you've described just from medicating. Maybe this ultra-strong (and expensive) medicine knocked your biological cycle out of whack, too, by killing all the beneficial bacteria.

Good luck to you. The best advice I can give is to cycle the water, do lots of water changes, and keep the filter fresh to remove the "medicine" that did so much more harm than good.

I have 15 cardinals and they appeared with ich a short time after coming home with me. I treated them with Rid Ich and did all the suggested water changes. treated for two weeks to be sure all ich was gone and all fish are fine..... you just need to do all the water changes etc. I did full dose tho.... Sorry you lost you neat guys I wish you better luck next time....

I would almost definately say it was the medication.

I realize it's too late now, but medication should usually only be used as a last resort IMO. Getting your tank temperature up to 85-86F (I think that's around 30C) and adding one tablespoon of table salt per 10g of water will usually clear up ich nicely.

Sorry to hear about your cardinals, good luck with the others.

Since the cardnials had ich I would probably continue treating the tank for the next couple of weeks before adding any new fish. There is probably some ich still in the tank and it needs to be killed.

The heated water will speed up the life cycle of the ich and the salt will kill it when it reaches the free swimming stage of its life cycle. Water changes are also important.

Also, if you decide to get Cardinals again, get ones that have been at the LFS for awhile. I got mine and they had been in that tank for about a month or two. They had already acclimated from all the travelling and stress. There was a tank of cardinals next to them and they looked horrible BC they had just arrived at the LFS!

I don't know if he still posts here, but WetmanNY has a great website for reference on a multitude of aqauria related topics. This is his site:


http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/

I have tried the salt and heat method for curing ich outlined in this next link with great success, and silicon that isn't died blue from the ich medication.

http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/docs/health/ich.shtml

This is a lengthy but informative article, and I believe accurate article that should help you in the future.

Good Luck.