Hope someone can help me!
So I'd been away for a couple of days and my dad had been looking after my fish. I come back to disaster!
So, I'd added a few female guppies to my tank and they had been doing great. Yet I'd been told while I was away that one had died which was very surprising to me as it had been in great health. I came back today to find my betta with a big, swollen white mouth and the same on one of the other guppies. I also found that my female killifish was dead. Gutted!
So, I'm pretty convinced it's cotton mouth. I'd added the guppies only about a week ago so I reckon they were the "stressed" ones who brought it into the tank. I also reckon my betta was stressed with the new arrivals though he seemed alright. Also, the killifish came in with them so I reckon they might have been stressed also. They settled in fine but now this has came up.
I heard you can treat it with copper based medicines and aquarium salt? However, I have the following dilemmas, I hope someone can advise me on the right thing to do!
1. I have platy fry only about 3 days old. They're in a breeding net in the aquarium. I don't have another tank to move them to... could adding copper medication kill them?
2. I have three-line corys, so I don't want to add the aquarium salt in case I kill them (all my corys are currently fine, though I heard they are susceptible to cotton mouth?
3. I have 5 amano shrimp which would be killed by any copper based medication I believe, as well as an assassin snail (the only benefit would be it would get rid of my pest snail population.
4. Finally, my tank is pretty much fully stocked now; I wasn't planning on adding any more fish. So, would medication wipe-out the good bacteria in the tank? This would be a total disaster for me as I don't want to cure my fish of cotton mouth only to kill them with nitrite poisoning! I've only just recently managed to get the water to a good quality.
Hope you guys can help!!
So I'd been away for a couple of days and my dad had been looking after my fish. I come back to disaster!
So, I'd added a few female guppies to my tank and they had been doing great. Yet I'd been told while I was away that one had died which was very surprising to me as it had been in great health. I came back today to find my betta with a big, swollen white mouth and the same on one of the other guppies. I also found that my female killifish was dead. Gutted!
So, I'm pretty convinced it's cotton mouth. I'd added the guppies only about a week ago so I reckon they were the "stressed" ones who brought it into the tank. I also reckon my betta was stressed with the new arrivals though he seemed alright. Also, the killifish came in with them so I reckon they might have been stressed also. They settled in fine but now this has came up.
I heard you can treat it with copper based medicines and aquarium salt? However, I have the following dilemmas, I hope someone can advise me on the right thing to do!
1. I have platy fry only about 3 days old. They're in a breeding net in the aquarium. I don't have another tank to move them to... could adding copper medication kill them?
2. I have three-line corys, so I don't want to add the aquarium salt in case I kill them (all my corys are currently fine, though I heard they are susceptible to cotton mouth?
3. I have 5 amano shrimp which would be killed by any copper based medication I believe, as well as an assassin snail (the only benefit would be it would get rid of my pest snail population.
4. Finally, my tank is pretty much fully stocked now; I wasn't planning on adding any more fish. So, would medication wipe-out the good bacteria in the tank? This would be a total disaster for me as I don't want to cure my fish of cotton mouth only to kill them with nitrite poisoning! I've only just recently managed to get the water to a good quality.
Hope you guys can help!!