We're not here to have a go. The main thing is that you learn and avoid the mistake next time round.
It is VERY unusual for whitespot to kill fish. Not that it can't kill fish -- it can, quite easily -- but usually it is easy to see the whitespot starting, and then treat the aquarium. Once treated, the fish generally get better quickly, and are none the worse for wear. So you have to ask yourself two questions: was it the whitespot, and if it was, did you treat it early enough.
Now, my first question is based on this: whitespot is usually *caused* by another problem. Sometimes, the explanation is simple enough, you introduced a new fish without quarantining it first. Don't worry, we all do that, and when you see the first signs of whitespot, you have to treat at once. But other times, the whitespot is caused by stress, typically poor water quality, wrong water temperature, poor diet, etc.
None of your fish is especially picky about water chemistry, so anything around pH 6.5-7.5 and not too hard or soft should be fine. All are tropical fish are should be happy around the 25C mark. As for water quality, that's something else entirely, and many of those species are very intolerant of poor water quality. Were the ammonium and nitrite at zero and the nitrates relatively low (ideally, 40 ppt or less).
Raising the temperature can be helpful because it speeds up the parasite's lifecycle, making it more quickly dealt with by the medication (which works on the larvae, not the white "spots"). BUT, if the tank is overstocked or poorly filtered or inadequately aerated, then the warmer water will lose oxygen and stress the fish. Adding salt was, I'm sure, not helpful. While the rainbowfish and the Hoplosternum are both salt-tolerant, tetras and loaches tend not to be.
Further complicating things is that catfish and loaches are intolerant to certain medications, clown loaches especially. You need to use treatments safe for catfish. This has something to do with the way copper reacts with their gill membranes, if I recall correctly.
Also, when treating a tank, you MUST ALWAYS remove any carbon in the filter. Carbon removes medications. Many times people have said some medication didn't work, it turns out it failed because they have carbon in the filter. Frankly, I consider carbon to be COMPLETELY USELESS and have no idea why people still buy the stuff. It serves no useful purpose in a modern freshwater aquarium.
Cheers, Neale
I know it was my fault for buying the 5 Silver Dollars (only 1 of them died btw) but I hate seeing animal/fish suffer and couldnt help myself. I ended up losing 4 Rainbows, 3 Clown Loaches 1 Hoplo and 1 Network Synodontis. No need to have a go either I feel bad enough.
