Level 1 Treatment
1 Tbsp Salt per 3 Gallons of Water
Add 1 tablespoon (Tbsp) of salt per 3 gallons of water. You can pour the salt directly into the aquarium or hospital tank, but some people like to dissolve the salt in a small cup of water first. This level of salt is like using Neosporin topical ointment for a small cut (in other words, it’s not very strong). It’s used to fight mild cases of bacterial and fungal infection. Plus, it gently irritates the fish’s slime coat, causing the fish to make more beneficial mucus that can block some parasites and microorganisms from reaching its body.
We’ve kept and sold thousands of fish at our fish store, and this level of salt is safe for virtually all fish – except anchor catfish. Keep the fish in the salt solution for 4 to 5 days, and then increase the concentration if there’s no improvement.
Level 2 Treatment
1 Tbsp Salt per 2 Gallons of Water
Use a concentration of 1 Tbsp of salt per 2 gallons of water for the next level of treatment. Level 2 treatment is capable of combating a wider range of illnesses. For example, you can use this recipe to treat ich (a common ailment also known as white spot disease) for a period of 10 days. However, if the symptoms are only getting worse after 5 days, try increasing the concentration again.
Level 3 Treatment
1 Tbsp Salt per 1 Gallon of Water
When medications and the lower salt levels have no effect, it’s time to bring out the big guns. Raise the concentration to 1 Tbsp of salt per gallon of water, and this potent solution will knock out nearly everything. Level 3 treatment is very hard on scaleless fish and other sensitive species, so please do some research beforehand. We personally have found rasboras, danios, tetras, silver dollars, livebearers, and most cichlids (as well as their fry) to be fairly salt tolerant. Even Neocaridina cherry shrimp are quite hardy in salt, but we haven’t done much testing on Caridina crystal shrimp yet.
Note: aquarium salt does not evaporate or get filtered out. As water evaporates, the salt is left behind. Therefore, only add salt (in the proportionate amount) when doing water changes. For instance, if you’re treating 100 gallons of water at level 2 for ich, you need 50 Tbsp of salt initially. Then, if you have to do a 20% water change (or change out 20 gallons of water), add back in 20% of the salt (or 10 Tbsp of salt) to the new water to maintain the same concentration. Be careful when measuring the salt because it’s easy to overdose the amount, and unlike most medications, salt does not breakdown over time.