well its been a while but the tank is under control.
i cant recall exactly how the tank was where i left off in the story, but heres the scoop:
unemployment checks stopped coming in, so my average fish expenses for the week dropped drastically, couldnt get another heater, i was break-banking when i bought more salt.
because i was doing massive water changes and cleaning the filters often, i felt i needed to add some bacteria. my levels in the tank were perfect (ph stable, no nitrates/trites or amonia) the tank was being dosed daily, water changes every 2 or 3 days, roughly 40 percent changes. the tank got cloudy, then cloudier, and cloudier.. im not sure what was going on, i determined it an algae bloom, but i heard someone at the LFS mention that it may be a bacteria bloom, though i havnt ehard of that before, it reminded me of how i was adding all the extra amounts of bacteria (Nite-out, some liquid stuff) . you couldnt see more than 3 or 4 inches into the tank, decorations were completely shrouded, u couldnt tell in any way shape or form what the design was, let alone if there was a backdrop or anything. i looked through it sideways, and saw only inches thru.
i continued quick cure dosage, my water levels were fine and i think that because the water was so thick, the fish wernt noticing eachother as much, they seemed alot calmer (less stress? mite help?) upped my salt to one tsp per gallon, i can tell tweezy is enjoying it, hes alot more active lately. or maybe the heavy water changing he made him spruce up a bit.
finally, all signs of ich were gone, i continued dosage for another 3 days, ran out of meds, and left it at that, lately ive been doing alot of water changes, and decreasing my light (i think that my combination of bad light timeing habbits (leaving on too long) and 2 big lights (more than i need for sure) is causing phases of algae blooms, it seems to keep happening, but as well i was feeding my tank with alot of plant food as well, trying to keep my plants alive, the last 4 water changes have been without meds and without plant food, so the tank is certainly clear of those, im going to start doing plant food again once the tank clears perfectly, its almost there, another 2 water changes and ill be **** near crystal clear. ill buy some more organic absorption resin and rechage the bag i already have, get rid of the last 70 gall aqua clear and get another 110 (that will be three) but i gotta wait till money comes back around. in the meantime, fish are looking healthy, eatting well, and no sings of ich!
i think the reason for the outbreak was because the synos were getting used to extremely different pH. i think the stress may ahve weakened them and left them succeptable to any parasites they had tagging along with them from the store. though i can never see if i actually still have 6 synos, i drop algae wafers in the water at nite for the plecos and to see how many of the synos come out, they always move in and out, so sometimes i see 1, sometimes i see 5, never seen a full 6. maybe one is long gone, who knows.. found my butterfly pleco dead wedged between rocks in my caves, pleasant surprise in a thorough cleaning...
tank its going well, still have several things i want/need and ill do them a day at at time, thanks for the help all
