Is this fin rot?

[FishFriend0]

Hello,
Earlier today I noticed one of my platys with something that seems like fin rot ( pictures attached). She seems to be acting the same as usual and is eating fine. A few months ago I also noticed brown where the white is and injured looking fins. I assumed it was just her colour. I am not experienced with fin rot so if anybody knows what this could be it would greatly appreciated. I have some eSHa 2000 which says it will help with fin rot among other things.

 

[Colin_T]

It looks like the start of fin rot. Do the following.

--------------------

Test the water for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and pH. Post the results in numbers here before adding salt or medication. If the ammonia and nitrite are 0ppm and the nitrate is less than 20ppm, and the pH is around 7.0, then add some salt (see directions below) after doing a water change, gravel clean and filter clean.

Wipe the inside of the glass down with a clean fish sponge. This removes the biofilm on the glass and the biofilm will contain lots of harmful bacteria, fungus, protozoans and various other microscopic life forms.

Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate. The water change and gravel cleaning will reduce the number of disease organisms in the water and provide a cleaner environment for the fish to recover in. It also removes a lot of the gunk and this means any medication can work on treating the fish instead of being wasted killing the pathogens in the gunk.
Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it is added to the tank.

Clean the filter if it hasn't been done in the last 2 weeks. However, if the filter is less than 6 weeks old, do not clean it. Wash the filter materials/ media in a bucket of tank water and re-use the media. Tip the bucket of dirty water on the garden/ lawn. Cleaning the filter means less gunk and cleaner water with fewer pathogens so any medication (if needed) will work more effectively on the fish.

Increase surface turbulence/ aeration to maximise the dissolved oxygen in the water.

--------------------

SALT
You can add rock salt (often sold as aquarium salt), swimming pool salt, or any non iodised salt (sodium chloride) to the aquarium at the dose rate of 1 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres (5 gallons) of water. If there is no improvement after 48 hours you can double that dose rate so there is 2 heaped tablespoons of salt per 20 litres.

Keep the salt level like this for 1 to 2 weeks. If there's no improvement after a week with salt, you will need a broad spectrum medication.

The salt will not affect the beneficial filter bacteria, fish, plants, shrimp or snails.

After you use salt and the fish have recovered, you do a 10% water change each day for a week using only fresh water that has been dechlorinated. Then do a 20% water change each day for a week. Then you can do bigger water changes after that. This dilutes the salt out of the tank slowly so it doesn't harm the fish.

If you do water changes while using salt, you need to treat the new water with salt before adding it to the tank. This will keep the salt level stable in the tank and minimise stress on the fish.

When you first add salt, add the salt to a small bucket of tank water (2 litres or 1/2 gallon) and dissolve the salt. Then slowly pour the salt water into the tank near the filter outlet. Add the salt over a couple of minutes.

 

[FishFriend0]

Ammonia: 0ppm
Nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrate: 40ppm

 

[GaryE]

Before suggesting starting salt, I'd want to know about any other fish in the tank, to be sure they wouldn't be harmed by it. Also, it may give a clue as to cause, if that caudal fin has been nipped.

I'd also ask how often you have been doing partial water changes. I would increase the amount removed every 7 days and watch that to see if it develops. Most of the time, discolouration around a nipped fin is tied to declining water quality - not enough water changing, or long periods between maintenance. We all live our lives and sometimes fall behind, but I try to change at least 30% every 7 days, sometimes slip to 10 days but never go past 2 weeks. I haven't seen fin rot here in 25 years.

Before I was as diligent about maintenance, I used to treat it all the time.

If you have a nippy species in there - a lone tetra, or the like, it will just re-occur. Nipped fins are part of life in some fish communities, and have to be taken into account in a situation like this. A nip can lead to fin rot, but fin rot is one you generally try for a prevention approach with. That doesn't look to have taken hold in your photo.

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

I agree that I'd like to know the complete stocking of the tank before adding salt or other medications.

I see at least one tetra, and some species can be very nippy. No point treating the tank with expensive meds, if they're only going to continue to be nipped! So please can you list what species you have, and how many of each?

eSHa 2000 is good for things like this - along with deep cleaning the tank and upping water changes - so I do recommend it in general once the underlying issues have been resolved... I also used it in tanks with shrimp and snails without losing any. However a word of caution that since it's anti-bacterial, it did knock back my beneficial bacterial colony a fair bit, enough to put the tank into a mini cycle. Not a huge issue, especially if you have a lot of live plants like I did, but it did mean doing daily water changes and using Seachem Prime as the water conditioner (binds ammonia and nitites for 24-48 hours) for about a week, until the beneficial bacterial colonies caught up again.


I say that because it is effective, and being pre-warned about the mini cycle it may cause means you can prepare for it and be ready to do that extra work on the tank while it recovers.

 

[FishFriend0]

I have 9 platys (4 babies), 6 boesemani rainbowfish, 8 lemon tetras and 6 guppies. I do a 50 percent water change every 2 weeks so I will start doing these more regularly.

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

I'm sure I remember a friend here who had lemon tetras had a problem with them being nippy- but I don't know the species well, @GaryE would know a lot more than I do about them.

Have you seen any nipped, ripped or damaged looking fins on any of the others? When I've had nippier fish, they went after the long tails on male guppies, but left the short finned fish alone.

Definitely would do at least a 50% W/C weekly since your nitrates are at 40ppm and you're currently doing fortnightly. 40ppm isn't super, super high, but it's higher than fish would like, and ideally you want to aim to have nitrates as low as possible, and be doing a water change once they reach about 20ppm, so it's great you're willing to adapt your maintenance schedule.

Sometimes, especially with livebearers popping out babies, it's easy for the bioload to increase rapidly, and then we need to up maintenance to manage the increased load.

Do you gravel vac/clean the substrate at the same time? May I ask what size the tank is?

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Oh, and do you have any live plants in there? Adding some fast growing stem plants will help improve water quality, as well as making the fish happy Would be worth adding some fast growing stem plants like elodea, guppy grass, water sprite, limnophilia sessiflora... not difficult plants, but will help suck up ammonia before it gets converted into nitrites and then nitrates, and that'll only help the plant grow.

I suggest it because especially if you're going to use eSHa-2000 (which is a good med! And could help if this fish develops a secondary infection of some kind) then adding some stem plants beforehand could help to manage the mini-cycle if the medication does knock back your beneficial bacteria. It's amazing the growth they can put out in just a week or two!

As an example, I planted this tank up with trimmings and small plants I got at a local fish club sale and took this pic on August 3rd:

Then took this next photo two weeks later. I was shocked at how much they'd grown in just two weeks! Sometimes you don't see it when you see the tank daily, but comparing the photos brings it home:

That's just a cheap Nicrew light, no ferts added, planted in Argos play sand, or left to float. There are a few plecos in there, so they've been growing mainly from the pleco poop waste!

 

[Colin_T]

Check the tap water for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. You might have nitrates in the tap water and that will be as low as you can get it in the tank without using live plants or special filters to remove nitrates.

 

[FishFriend0]

No I haven't seen anything in any other fish and have never seen the tetras nip any fish other than the occasional chasing of another lemon tetra. When I noticed the 40ppm nitrate I did a large water change. The tank is 230l and the entire back of the tank is covered in stem plants (bacopa caroliniana and hygrophila). I do vacuum and clean substrate at the same time as water change.

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

No I haven't seen anything in any other fish and have never seen the tetras nip any fish other than the occasional chasing of another lemon tetra. When I noticed the 40ppm nitrate I did a large water change. The tank is 230l and the entire back of the tank is covered in stem plants (bacopa caroliniana and hygrophila). I do vacuum and clean substrate at the same time as water change.

That all sounds great!
Since she's the only one showing signs, would be worth putting her in a hospital/QT tank set up and medicating just her in there. Save you money on medication rather than treating the whole tank, won't knock back your BB cycle in your main tank, and gives her a good chance at recovery.

Don't need to buy an actual aquarium for it, although you can pick up a 5-10g second hand tank for this purpose pretty cheaply on Gumtree, FB or the BAND app. Or can use a food grade, uncontaminated plastic tote or even bucket, with a sponge filter and some live plants added, in a pinch.

 

[FishFriend0]

Do you think the lemon tetras will be ok with the salt as I already added it or should i do a water changes to get it out. I added 13tbsp.

 

[Naughts]

Aquarium salt for a couple of weeks is fine, I keep tetras and I’ve never had any fish seem effected by it.

 

[FishFriend0]

Ahh thanks, good to know

 

[FishFriend0]

Hello again, it has been about a week since I added eSha 200o into the aquarium. The platys doesn't seem to have improved but also hasn't got any worse. She still isn't behaving abnormally and is still eating. Since then one of my rainbowfish seems to be developing finrot aswell but also doesn't seem to affected. I am doing a 50 percent water change today so I will replace the eSHa 2000 that I remove. If anybody has any ideas for what else I could try or if there is something I am doing wrong it would be appreciated.