Some Advice Please

Sorry about a post that probably has been asked several times in the past, but I have to hurry and have no time to research as my lfs closes in half an hour and I need to get down there a.s.a.p

I have a few questions that are concerning me, and I'd be truely grateful if anyone could help me out.

About a week ago, our large albino cory developed 3 (what we thought we ulcers) wart type things under her right pectoral fin. We have treated this for going on a week now, and although 2 have reduced, the meds haven't done much. She's acting fine, very active and still eating.

A new problem has emerged today- it seems we have whitespot/itch on a few of our neons and one of our black widow tetras.
My main concern is can we mix treatments? I'm about to pop out and go get treatment for the itch, but I'm weary of adding it in, as I've heard that mixing meds is dangerous.

I'll post more details once I get back, but in the tank we have:

7 neon tetra (showing signs of white spot)
6 ember tetra (showing signs)
5 Black widow tetra (showing signs)
3 albino corys (not showing)
2 Adolfi (not sure, can't see them clearly)
and 2 red honey gourami (not showing)

I've heard that increasing the temperature of your tank to 80 can help get rid of the itch, but I wanted to be sure that raising the temp this high wouldn't damage our fish any more.

I've got to dash now, I'll update with more details once I get back.

Many, many thanks in advance for any replies recieved.

What med have you been using?
The lump does it look like a cauliflower.
Wart like lumps can be lymthocystis.
Is the lump hard or soft looking filled with fluid.
Is is possible to load a pic up of the lump onto the site.

Only raise temp once you have gotten the whitespot med.
Increase aeration with the high temp and med.
Remove black carbon from the filter if you use it.
Check instructions that you can use the full dose with the fish you keep.

The med that we have used so far is King Brittish Bacteria control, as we originally thought it could be an infection of some sort. She has perked up quite a bit, but they're still there.
I'm not so hopeful of getting a pic up unfortunatly. a.) she's hiding at the back in the cave system, b.) they're so small that I dont think the camera could pick them up, and c.) the camera is bad quality.
Makes things pretty awkward I'm afraid.

I can describe them in more detail though- the lumps look soft and fleshy, no discolouration, there are two smaller ones at the top, and a larger beneath it. The two top ones have reduced, but the bottom one hasn't. She also developed very sore looking barbles but those cleared up within a day. That was about 5 days ago. Treatment is every four days, last dose was on tuesday, last waterchange was a 40-50% on saturday (they're due tomorrow).
If this is lymthocystis, is it treatable? I've just read up on it, and so far it was pretty grim: "To decrease spreading this disease to other fishes, infected fish should be buried or burned, and not thrown back into the water. "
Found here It also says that growths will fall off in 4-5 weeks and infect the rest of the fish. She's had it for exacrtly 1 week now.


Made it to the lfs in time with 5 minutes to spare.
Bought King British White Spot Control. Was advised in the lfs to do 10-20% water change before applying the meds because of the bacteria meds we used on tuesday. Does this sound right?
We have an air pump already to increase airation.

Thanks very much for the help so far Wilder. Its much appreciated.

i would do a larger water change than that before adding the meds hun
i would do 40-50% between meds

i expect you already have the temp turned up if so then just increase the aeration

Will do Pippooddle :3 thanks very much.
I had already turn the temp up slightly (wanted to do it gradually), so I'll keep the air pump going from now on, especially once we've put the new meds in.

Thanks for the replies once more guys, it's calmed me down quite a bit I'm very attached to these fish and don't want anything to happen to them!

Forgot to add earlier- on the bottle it says not to use full dose with loaches, sharks and other sensative or light scaled fish. I'm right in thinking that the corydora might come under this?

Am currently doing a 50% water change now- we've vaccummed the sand, and are just waiting for the water to cure.
It seems to be a very small investation of white spot- but I want to get this early to stop it from spreading in future. At the moment, the infected fish only have 4-5 spots each on them.

Corys you have to use half dose.

Abit worried about being 3 lumps on the fish. Get you some info.

Lymphocystis



Symptoms:

Fish infected with Lymphocystis will present with clusters of whitish, berry-like growths on the skin and fins. These "clusters" may resemble small clutches of eggs or cauliflower (hence, it is sometimes called Cauliflower Disease). They will be clearly visible and may even become extremely large. This disease often affects the fins first.



Cause:

Viral infection. The virus will eventually kill the fish if it is unable to mount a strong enough immune response as the virus rampages through the fish’s tissues, destroying its cells.



Treatment:

As with all viral infections, there is no suitable cure or efficacious treatment; however Quick Cure claims to be helpful. I have also heard of people who trim the fish's fins, followed by several baths in Malachite Green. Fortunately, this disease is uncommon and in some cases, infected fish are able to recover quickly without treatment.

Lymphocystis is highly infectious. When infected cells from the fish’s skin or fins burst the virus is spread throughout the aquarium and can remain contagious for periods of up to two months. Fish not showing symptoms should be removed from the aquarium and placed in quarantine, away from other fish, for at least 60 days. Note, remove uninfected fish, not the other way around because the aquarium has become contaminated. The infected aquarium should be emptied and thoroughly disinfected before returning any fish to it. Do not use soap to clean the aquarium

Oh god. I had no idea that it could be this bad.

We've also got another problem here; We're students (the tank also belongs to my boyfriend, zombryn), and haven't been able to afford to buy a quarantine tank as of yet. I see now that this has proven to be a big mistake and we should have considered this before setting up the aquarium

Totally confused and don't know what to do. Pretty down about it now too, and I've got to admit that it's really put me off keeping fish in the future. I can't deal with animals dying on me

Would bagging the fish and completly cleaning the tank out whilst they're in bags be acceptable? We had to do that about 3 weeks ago due to moving home again, and they managed fine in bags for about 4 hours (with heat of course).

Even then after all that, if the other fish are infected too, what am I to do? There would be no point in putting them back in the tank incase they re-infect it. Then again, none of the others are showing symptoms, so would it just be the cory that we'd have to quarantine?


Thanks for the information Wilder. Hopefully I can stop this spreading any further until its too late.

:edit: Found some more information on it: The fish starts growing small white pin-prick like growths on their fins or skin and this is often mistaken for Ich/Ick (Ichthyophthirius multifiliis) in the early stages. It soon clumps together to form a cauliflower-like growth on the skin, fins, and occasional gills. .
The other fish could be infected now as well, if this is true.

Update:

We're going in search of a quarantine tank today. I'll upload basic pictures and what not once we have it up and going.

So far, the only fish that deffinatly aren't showing signs are the two honey gourami. I don't know about the Adolfi because they are sneaky little things and never come out to the front of the tank. Looks like I'll have to some how make them.

Thanks again guys.

Get the isolation tank and move the two fish. Match ph and temp. Add a bacterial med just to make sure the lumps are not bacterial.
Do some water changes on main tank.
I have a pic of lymthocystis. Will load it up for you.

Got the new tank set up and running. Waiting for the temp to increase a little and then we'll add the gourami.
Checked the Adolfi, they have no symptoms either, so they will be going in too. At least 1 of every other species has symptoms, so we're not going to risk anything else.

Will it be safe to use mature media from the main tank? I can't really imagine it being infected too? Or am I wrong? If so then I'll have to do a fish in cycle with the gourami and corys- something I'm not looking forward to.

I checked out some pics as well, lots of them don't fit what the cory has, but the one you posted is the closest, only they're a fair bit smaller on our cory.

Would the bacterial meds be priority over the whitespot meds- I'm not entirely sure it is even whitespot affecting the other tank- the spots are few and far between, and no more have developed (but are deffintly there). So should we switch back to using the bacterial meds?

Sorry for all the confusion, I really do appreciate all the help though. Things would have probably become out of hand if you hadn't of pointed us in the direction of Lymphocystis. Still keeping our fingers crossed that it isn't this, but still.......better to be safe than sorry, right?

Filter sponges can carry desease. Use a mature filter sponge but after use never place in back in main tank filter without steralising it in the microwave, or even better throw it away after use.

Whitespot looks like the fish has been sprinkled in salt. Or spots will be the size of a grain of salt.
The whitespot needs treating first, as whitespot a fast killer once is affects the gills.

I haven't forgotten about this thread, and just wanted to give a quick update.

I have the 2 gourami and 2 adolfi in the smaller tank, whitespot started to appear on them too, I have been treating it, and the spots have dropped off, so hopefully after the treatment is finished, that'll be it ^^
Same situation in the larger tank- I've been treating that too and everyone seems to be recovering.

The large albino still has her lumps, they've not changed at all. Once the whitespot meds is finished, I'll treat the tank with bacterial to see if that can clear it up for her.

Thanks again Wilder and Pippooddle, very much appreciated ^^

Good Luck.