Mild Fin Rot

[Kyle E.]

Hello all!

I have a 29gal tank with a dwarf gourami, cherry barbs, guppies, a male betta (gets along fine), amano shrimp and a nerite snail.

About a week ago I noticed symptoms of mild fin rot in my tank. It started with the betta (go figure) getting some "notches" in its tail and now its fins are a tad ragged.

About half a week before that I noticed that one of the cherry barbs was suddenly missing half of its tail. Because it was so sudden I just thought it had gotten ripped off in an injury or fight but once the other fish showed symptoms it was obvious it was from fin rot. The betta has only been in the tank for about a month now so I am guessing it already had it from the small cup it was in and now basically everyone has it.

None of the fish have it very badly so it should be pretty easy to take care of. I already added salt to the aquarium at the dosage of about 1.3 teaspoons per gallon. This was last Sunday.

So far nothing has noticeably improved, but it has not gotten worse either. The tips of the betta's fins are still a little black but I think they are probably(?) less black than they were.

I have not been doing daily water changes when I probably should. For the next little bit I will try to do those more often.

I was just wondering is my dosage of salt good? And how long can I leave it in there for without causing organ damage? How long should it be until I start seeing real results?

 

[Barry Tetra]

I was just wondering is my dosage of salt good? And how long can I leave it in there for without causing organ damage? How long should it be until I start seeing real results?

1 table spoon per 20 liters of water for 2 weeks if there are loaches in there, 1 table spoon per 40 liters.

 

[Colin_T]

All freshwater fishes including Corydoras and loaches can tolerate 1 or 2 heaped tablespoons of rock salt for every 20 litres (5 gallons) of tank water.

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Fin rot is caused by a dirty tank or poor water quality.
Make sure there is 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite and less than 20ppm of nitrate.

Make sure the filter is cleaned regularly (once a month is good).

Make sure you gravel clean the substrate every time you do a water change.

Do big water changes (75%) every day for a couple of weeks and then reduce it to once a week. Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.

 

[Kyle E.]

I am quite sure the betta came with it so I am not worried about my water parameters. How long can I leave the salt in there?

 

[Kyle E.]

@Colin_T How long can I leave the salt in there? There are no loaches or corydoras. They are looking a lot better so it is working but I want to leave it in there as long as possible, but I don't want to cause organ damage.

 

[Barry Tetra]

@Colin_T How long can I leave the salt in there? There are no loaches or corydoras. They are looking a lot better so it is working but I want to leave it in there as long as possible, but I don't want to cause organ damage.

You can read this thread by Colin https://www.fishforums.net/threads/what-to-do-if-your-fish-gets-sick.450268/ post #2

 

[Colin_T]

Thanks for posting that link Barry

@Colin_T How long can I leave the salt in there?

At least 2 weeks but no longer than 4 weeks.

 

[Kyle E.]

Errm so it has been about 3 1/2 weeks of having around 1.5tsp per gallon and the betta still has slightly black edges on it's fins. The other fish haven't really changed much. The only other 3 that showed symptoms never really had colored edges. The dwarf gourami got a few notches in its fins and some clear patches. These haven't changed. A cherry barb had half of its tail disappear in one day. It hasn't gotten worse and maaaaybe has grown back a little. The male guppy got a ragged tail edge and it hasn't really changed. None of the fish have gotten worse but none have really gotten better.

What do I do now as I am going to have to remove the salt in a few days as to not cause kidney damage?

 

[Colin_T]

have you got before pictures and current pictures to compare?
are you using a teaspoon or tablespoon?

if it hasn't healed after a couple of weeks with salt then you will need a broad spectrum fish medication

 

[Kyle E.]

So I am using 1.5 teaspoons of salt per gallon.

Something I just wondered. My betta likes to lay on my gravel substrate a lot. I swear he is the laziest fish ever. He is healthy, and he does swim around sometimes and always comes out to say hi when I go over to the tank but he does frequently lay on the gravel.

Could this be somehow damaging the edges of his fins and causing the rot to stick around? Again I am not entirely sure if it IS still there or not, we will see what happens when I start taking the salt out but is this a possibility?

I once found wedged vertically in between the Amazon sword stems. His head was at the base of the amazon sword and it looked like a tight fit. I thought he was dead or at the very least stuck but nope. He swam right out and corrected himself when I came over to check on him. Scared me though lol. Didn't look like a comfortable position though...