Cardinal Tetras - White Spot

[NeonTetra97]

Hi everyone,
 
Looks like I have just encountered by first disease, from what I have seen so far it looks like white spot. Here is all the info:
 
Tank size: 125 litres
pH: 6.8
ammonia: 0
nitrite: 0
nitrate: 20ppm
tank temp: 26c

The tank has 7 male Guppies, 7 male Cardinal Tetras and 3 Peppered Corys (soon to be 6) all the fish are behaving normally and are eating. Only the tetras have a visible sign of illness all the others look healthy and normal. They have small white spots all over their bodes, some only have one tiny spot whereas some have around 15-20. Should I quarantine or just treat the whole tank? Im so worried, I have never had a disease with my tropicals yet, only cold water. Any help would be great! Thank you! 

I do weekly 25-30% water changes.

I have recently added the Corys and 4 of the Guppies, also some rocks that I boiled and some plants. 

I am trying to get a picture and as soon as I get one I will post it

 

[Chaydell]

Without a picture, it sounds like ich. If that is the case I've read about several remedies. Some suggest adding shalt, some suggest medicine and some suggest just cranking up the heater on your aquarium. While quarantining may prevent the others from getting it I believe you will have to treat the whole tank. Someone with more experience may say differently tho. I've had ich before and raised my heat to 86 F until all of the white spots were gone. From what I have read it speeds the hatching process up and larvae can't survive T the higher temp. However I caught my case very early on. If your fish are already too weak from being sick you may look into the other approaches. I know they all have advantages and disadvantages but remember them all. Pew could also be getting ahead of ourselves tho. Get some pics so we can get a positive id of the problem before we just start throwing remedies at it.

 

[bigcheed]

if its confirmed ich. definatly turn your heater up. get yourself a good recomened treatment and treat the tank. about ten days should do the trick. tacled it a few times and this always worked for me. i can recomend ws3 formula by king british. not sure if you can get it in the states though. its potent stuff. highly consentrated. in fact you may only want to do half the recomended dose. good luck.

 

[Chaydell]

I've read good things about QuICK Cure and I know that is available in the states.  He will want to use the half dose as he has tetras and cory's.  I guess that their scales allow for more absorption fro the water, but don't know all of the science behind it.

 

[NeonTetra97]

Thanks so much everyone, I am rasing the temperature slowly, at the moment it is a shade over 27c. Im in the UK by the way so I will look for all the meds you have recommended. I have checked the water params again after a 30% w change and all is good there. I still haven't got a picture but this is one on google and it look exactly like what I am seeing: image. There are very few spots on each fish, there is one guy that has a few more than the others but even so they look really healthy and colourful so Im hopeful this is the early stages of infection. Im very observant of them and it has definitely not been like this for long. What are their chances, is this quite curable? Thank you all again! 

 

[Chaydell]

Looks like ich to me.  I've personally never lost a fish to it.  Very curable especially if you caught it early.  Get your temp up and follow the directions on whatever meds you get.  Be sure to note if there is a dosing recommendation for tetras/cats and follow that.  If not I would definitely do a half dose of the normal recommended amount.  Do you run carbon in your filters?  If so make sure to follow the directions there too.  I actually had to remove my carbon for the medicine I ran.  Otherwise the carbon absorbs it and your fish don't get the full benefit. 

 

[NeonTetra97]

Okay, sounds good. Im glad it is curable as I have had the cardinals for a while and don't want to loose them! The temp is up and tommorow I will begin dosing meds. Fingers crossed 

Oh, I forgot to ask, do the medications kill the nitrifying bacteria in the filter? 

 

[Chaydell]

Not to my knowledge.  You may have to run carbon in your filters after you have gotten rid of the infection to absorb any left over meds.  Or do a series of large water changes.  But basically once the medicine has done it's job you will probably want to get rid of it.

 

[NeonTetra97]

Okay, thank you

 

[NeonTetra97]

Hi everyone!
 
I have finally managed to get some pictures of my Cardinals, they are pretty awful pics and you can only just make out the spots as there isn't many. I have cropped some of the pics to show the fish close up, so apologies for the quality of some of them! Thank you all so much for the help it has been great! I would be totally lost without it! lol They are all stil eating and are behaving normally, not scratching agains anything. In one of the pics you can see the fin is damaged, is this another problem or a side effect of whitespot/ick?
 
The medication contains copper and malachite green, is that safe for the corys, guppies and cardinals? Anyway here are the pics:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[DoubleDutch]

The big lump on it's lip isn't Ich, but the others defo have Ich.
Don't know the med I am afraid.

 

[Chaydell]

I agree with doible dutch.  The fish have ich but the one with the big white thing on its mouth may have something.

 

[DoubleDutch]

Have been some threads about that disease. I do suspect it's a virus that infects cardinals, neons and sometimes black widdows. Seems to be species specific (not contagious to other species), untreatable and not directly lethal. It can dissapear after sometimes. 
But it's a suspicion and I've no proof !!!

 

[Meeresstille]

You can gravel vac the substrate to reduce the chances of the parasite in its free swimming form to attach to a host (fish). Meds and salt are only effective while the parasite is in its free swimming stage but some can still find a host before the treatment can kill it.
 
The heat will speed up the cycle, so the cysts will fall off the fish sooner, and the treatment will be quicker. Sometimes meds don't seem to be working, there is talk about med resistant ich strains. The heat-salt method may then be the better choice. 
 
The spot on the mouth could also be cotton mouth disease, it is quite common and treatable with antibiotic. 

 

[NeonTetra97]

Thanks everyone! This is the second day of treatment. Im seeing a little bit of improvement in the tetras, some of the parasites seem to have dropped off, also they are all still eating really well. Unfortunately the guppies seem to have gotten it pretty bad, could ick cause the guppies fins to be a bit ragged? I have checked ammonia and thats 0 but the guppies fins are looking a bit damaged. DoubleDutch, are you looking at the second pic? If you are then it is thats just food not a growth, I uploaded it to show they were still eating well . Meeresstille, if the med hasn't worked by then end of the treatment (6 days) at 28.5c then I will use the salt and heat method, I have heard up to 30c to kill ick! Apparently some strains can take up to 32c! 

 Anyway thank you all again! I will post updates soon.