Help!!!

[H2OPawesome]

OK, well, I have a either 20 or 30 gallon freshwater (not sure, i think its 20 though) that I had 2 mollies, 3 platies, 1 beta, 1 guppy (all female) and a handful of her guppy fry.
I was gone for appx 2 weeks. I left one of those tetra brand vacation blocks, which they picked at and such. I found that my newest platy had died, though. As I looked closer, I noticed that my other fish have developed Ich I think. I see it for sure on 3 of them, not sure about the others.
Anyways, I treated the water yesterday, right after a much needed water change (probly close to 50%, it hadnt been done in a long time). Now I notice that my adults are all in the bottom corner, with clamped fins. The female beta is laying on the ground or hiding under rocks or in plants. The others are all just in that corner staying very still. My babies are all up at the top and seem to be ok. Not sure how old they are, they are just starting to get color. for some reason i want to say 3 months, but that seems odd.
Anyways, the fish still have ich spots on them, but the bottle said to do 3 treatments every 3 days. I just wonder if theres something else wrong or if theres something I can do to help them.

 

[pinkertd]

Did you test the ph, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate before and after your water change? Did you add water conditioner when you did the partial water change? And lastly, how long had it been since you did a water change on the tank?

 

[H2OPawesome]

not sure how long it was since i did my last change, but it was a good while ago, as i broke my gravel vac.
i dont have a test kit, but i did condition the water. I think i might go buy some stresscoat or something. The bigger molly is sort of swimming on her side a bit and is really clamped, and my smaller platy isnt looking very good. shes reeeeeally clamped up.

 

[msjinkzd]

can you give us an estimate on how long? months? You probably had old tank syndrome and now the fish are stressed from not being used to clean water. It would be advised to get a aquarium pharmaceuticals freshwater master test kit to test for ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates as this information would be invaluable for us to help you. What are you using to treat the ich? salt and heat method works really well, there is a sticky here somewhere and tons of posts about it if you do a search.

 

[H2OPawesome]

I think i changed it like a month, month and a half ago. I did like a 25% change. I'm using Ick Away by wardley essentials.
I'll look for a testing kit, I plan on going to Aquarium Concepts pretty soon, maybe Mr Scott will have something.

 

[silentskream]

if your tank is not used to large/frequent water changes, they can go into shock when you do a large water change. that might be what's going on.

there's not really a way to fix this unfortunately. you could add some stress coat.. but there's no telling if it will work. hopefully they'll pull through alright.

 

[Lupin]

if your tank is not used to large/frequent water changes, they can go into shock when you do a large water change. that might be what's going on.

there's not really a way to fix this unfortunately. you could add some stress coat.. but there's no telling if it will work. hopefully they'll pull through alright.

I agree. Next time, I would do small water changes first and increase the volume replaced as days progress if I were you. And an even better advice is to keep up with your water change schedule albeit being very conscious in doing water changes more frequently.

 

[StereoKills]

:iagree: Rapid changes one way or the other can stress the fish to death sometimes.

 

[Cory Keeper]

ok, question. is changing medium quality water (what I mean is zero across the board but something is in the water) in large quantities harmful? I know you have to be careful with OTS tanks, but what about perfectly fine tanks?