Fin Rot Treatments That Work!?

[Katie_C]

I have been struggling with a moderate case of fin rot in my tank for the past few months. I believe it to be caused by nipping/aggressive behaviour from other tankmates, as parameters are all in check, and have been since set up. 
Tank Info: 145l, moderately planted, 1x Aquael fan 3 plus internal filter, 1x fluval u4 internal filter, 2x smal air stones, just under 26 degrees centigrade, as mentioned above all parameters in check (ammonia 0ppm, nitrites 0ppm)
Stock Info: 5x Danio (various: zebra, leopard and albino leopard), 3x WCMM, 8x Platy, 2x Guppy, 2x Endler, 2x Kribensis, 2x Rainbow, 2x Blue Dwarf Gourami, 1x Horseface loach (had 2 but we haven't seen one in months, and can't find her) 1x other sucky type loach (he was given to us and old owner couldn't remember what he was) and finally 2x Bristlenose plecos + babies (no idea how many as they're young and we have only seen one out in the open, and only once, they are hiding behind filters). 
Background 
First noticed the fin rot in very early stages in 5 fish (the 2 guppies, the 2 BN plecos, and one platy), and decided to treat individually using a methylene blue dip/bath with a high concentration of MB to tank water in a jug, dip each fish for 10 seconds, each day for 7 days, could not include the plecos in this treatment due to inability to catch them. This did not seem to be healing the fin rot, however it did not seem to be getting worse, which was something I suppose. 
After this period, I left the treatments and watched for deterioration. The fin rot gradually got worse in the 5 fish listed above, and also spread to other fish, including another few platies (was difficult to distinguish indefinitely between early fin rot and the general colour of their tails) and possibly one of the Kribs. 
This is when I decided to treat the entire tank with methylene blue. I did a 30% water change before, dosed the tank at the reccomended dose on the bottle, then dosed the same amount again 4 days later (so if I did the first dose on Monday, the second was on Friday, and so on). I carried on with this for 2 weeks, with one 20% water change somewhere in the middle. Still not better, so I have decided to ditch the methylene blue, clearly I need something specific for fin rot.
 
 
Most fish are still behaving fine, good appetites and movements, however one of my poor guppies is on death row. He is lurking at the top of the tank, fins getting very short, and he is getting skinny and pale, really worried about him and need to act fast to save the little guy. Have decided I will dip just him tonight and until I have aquired a new treatment, to try and prevent further deterioration)
 
With a quick look around, I have decided to get some Waterlife Myxazin for Fin rot and Ulcers from an online aquatics shop (don't have time to got to the local aquatics centre and be bullied into paying 20 quid for a collection of treatments even I know, I do not need). 
 
My questions are: Can I use this safely to treat my entire aquarium without causing harm to my baby BNs? 
Does anyone else have experience with using it/success stories etc? 
Should I get the 100ml bottle or opt for a bigger one? 
 
 
Many thanks for reading, hope you can help! 
 
 
 

 

[betta fish]

Hi, that sounds like a lot of fish for a 145L, the aggression might be down to this, do you know who the aggressors are? also methylene blue directly in a display tank will kill the beneficial bacteria in your filter, it needs to be dosed in a separate container, really the best course of action here would be to thin out the fish by selling/giving them away or moving them to another tank that is if you know who is doing the fin nipping, are the kribs a pair? I had a pair and when they bred they went all out on the other tank inhabitants so it may be them as they will want to protect their fry and most of all plenty of fresh water changes is the best to clear fin rot providing the root cause is taken out of the equation which appears to be other fish here.

 

[NickAu]

How often are you changing water? I would be doing at least 50% weekly.
 
Finrot is the direct result of poor tank conditions, instead of reaching for medication I would do more maintenance.

 

[StevenF]

 
 
as mentioned above all parameters in check (ammonia 0ppm, nitrites 0ppm)

2 parameters are not enough to say your parameters are in check.   You should test PH, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, Kh, and GH,   And even with that we will not know if you have a mineral defficiency affecting the fish.  Or in some cases you might have excess minerals.  Knowing the GH would help determine if your water is hard or soft or if your water cycling is sufficient.  At a minimum you need to cycle out of the tank 30% of the water once a week to keep mineral levels in check.  
 

 
 
 5x Danio (various: zebra, leopard and albino leopard), 3x WCMM, 8x Platy, 2x Guppy, 2x Endler

 I know from personal experience that leopard danios do not get allong with other Danios.  That is most likely the source of some of your aggression which is stressing your fish.  Also Danios are soft water fish while the guppies and Endlers prefer harder water.  If you have soft water your guppies and endlers and Platy may be stressed.  High stress levels inhibit the immune system and make the fish more prone to disease.  Having one tank for hard and soft water fish is generally not a good idea.

 

[Katie_C]

Hi all, thanks for taking the time to reply.
First off, I understand you need all the parameters to help me out more, did not have the chance to check all of them last night as boyfriend was asleep and was trying to sort them out without too much noise and faffing, so only checked the ammonia and nitrites. I will check the rest after this reply, and get back to you. 
Also, yes we have quite a few fish, but they were given to us by a neighbour closing down his tank, and he's not as soft as me and basically said 
" do you want my fish? If not I'll just kill them I guess" so of course we took them immediately. These were the leopard danios, the unknown loach, our male BN pleco, and also a goldfish (way too big to even think about adding to our tank, we set him up a temporary tank and then moved him to a friends pond) and a 'rare breed' angel fish, which has also been rehomed. 
 

Hi, that sounds like a lot of fish for a 145L, the aggression might be down to this, do you know who the aggressors are? also methylene blue directly in a display tank will kill the beneficial bacteria in your filter, it needs to be dosed in a separate container, really the best course of action here would be to thin out the fish by selling/giving them away or moving them to another tank that is if you know who is doing the fin nipping, are the kribs a pair? I had a pair and when they bred they went all out on the other tank inhabitants so it may be them as they will want to protect their fry and most of all plenty of fresh water changes is the best to clear fin rot providing the root cause is taken out of the equation which appears to be other fish here.

The kribs are not a breeding pair (god we wouldn't have room for that) but are very boisterous, and are the possible aggressors, however we haven't seen them nipping at anyone. I have seen a gourami go for a platy once but never since... I took out the carbon from the fluval u4 during the treatment, this was the only cause of action needed to prevent killing bacteria as per instructions on forums regarding MB dosing and usage. 
Getting rid of fish is really not an option for us, I don't drive and it's unrealistic that anybody would drive to pick up some second hand fish with exposure to finrot problems, and besides I'm attatched to them and wouldn't want to see them go. 
 

How often are you changing water? I would be doing at least 50% weekly.
 
Finrot is the direct result of poor tank conditions, instead of reaching for medication I would do more maintenance.

I change 20-40% of the water per week, plus vaccuming every 3 weeks ( I know I should vaccume more but we have really fine sand which is in parts very densly planted and there are lots of very small fish and babies and therefore it really is very unpractical/unsafe for me, everytime I do it I have to sit scooping the sand out of the bucket / bath and back into the tank (wish we'd stuck to gravel) 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 I know from personal experience that leopard danios do not get allong with other Danios.  

Leopard danios were given to me, zebra danios we already had, and not seen any signs of them being aggressive towards each other, they just don't really go near each other. 

 

[Katie_C]

Ammonia: 0ppm
Nitrites: 0ppm
pH: 7.5 
KH: 125.3-143.2 ppm 
GH: ? My test says to add 1 drop at a time until solution turns from orange to green, after 30 drops, inverting after each drop the solution is still orange, the table of conversions for results only goes up to 12 drops, so I may have done something wrong here, will try again in a sec 

 

[Katie_C]

Hm, same problem again. Test kit is quite old (over a year) do they go out of date? 

 

[StevenF]

 
 
Hm, same problem again. Test kit is quite old (over a year) do they go out of date? 

Some do.  Check for a date on the bottle.  IF it is out of date you might have to replace it.  

 

[Katie_C]

 

 
 
Hm, same problem again. Test kit is quite old (over a year) do they go out of date? 

Some do.  Check for a date on the bottle.  IF it is out of date you might have to replace it.  
 

No dates on the box, the bottle or the inclosed leaflet. Will test again this evening when I do a water change and go from there. 
 
UPDATE: Unfortunately I found Mr. Guppy floating this morning, so now really need to try and eliminate the symptoms on the other fish before they deteriorate too. If it's any help, one of the gouramis was making a snack of his tail when I found him this morning, however boyfriend says he's seen various other fish nibbling on other dead fish in the past. 

 

[Katie_C]

50% water change done tonight, tried taking the GH reading again and had the same problem. Found some of the dip test strips, which are so unclear it's strange, from what I can see the colour matches somewhere between 4odGH and 8odGH which puts the GH at anywhere between 107.4 ppm and 143.2 ppm, if this is of any use at all