HELP!!!!

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Serpae tetras (the red tetra with the black spot on the body) are renown fin nippers so watch them.
 
Aquarium salt is rock salt and is fine. If you find rock salt or sea salt crystals at the supermarket, you can use them too.
 
Serpae tetras (the red tetra with the black spot on the body) are renown fin nippers so watch them.

omg I haven’t seen them do it yet and I hope they don’t either. They hangout together in a group and do their own thing around the tank
 
So to make sure I’m doing it correctly in my 29 Gallon tank that’s 6 heaped tablespoons of aquarium salt correct? I just want to make sure I do it correctly
 
I didnt get the notification I was tagged for some reason. I agree with everything said above:)
 
Serpae tetras (the red tetra with the black spot on the body) are renown fin nippers so watch them.
Recently we had a thread on what fish you would never keep again. Mine was serpae tetra because when I bought some they ripped through my entire tank and made everyone's fins look that way. I took mine back for credit and many others on the site can tell the same story. When I looked at yor pics I saw ripped fins, not fin rot and I would not expect fin rot to develop on all the fish in your tank in such a short space. By all means treat for fin rot. If it was my tank I would remove the serpaes and do a big water change with no further treatment. your fish will recover as long as the water is clean and fresh.

But unless you remove the source it will be a never ending cycle. Its a shame because they are beautiful fish which is why i bought them in the first place.
 
Recently we had a thread on what fish you would never keep again. Mine was serpae tetra because when I bought some they ripped through my entire tank and made everyone's fins look that way. I took mine back for credit and many others on the site can tell the same story. When I looked at yor pics I saw ripped fins, not fin rot and I would not expect fin rot to develop on all the fish in your tank in such a short space. By all means treat for fin rot. If it was my tank I would remove the serpaes and do a big water change with no further treatment. your fish will recover as long as the water is clean and fresh.

But unless you remove the source it will be a never ending cycle. Its a shame because they are beautiful fish which is why i bought them in the first place.
I agree with @seangee I looked into adding serpae tetras to my tetra tank and all I heard was that they are fin nippers and not a good community fish. I would return them. There are plenty of other tetras that are much more peaceful.
 
I moved the tetras to a 10 gallon tank by themselves. I watched them very close along with my husband and noticed they were nipping at the other fish you were right @seangee and as soon as I removed them my Gourami came out from hiding and is swimming around now looking happy. I can’t believe I’ve never noticed them doing that anytime I seen them they were together just hanging out but I watched them for about a good hour and 15 minutes and seen them nip at every single one of my fish and I was completely dumb founded. Now that they are removed I will keep an extra eye on the rest to see how they are doing the next few days then go far there
 
Definitely fin rot:

Do a 75% water change and gravel clean the substrate every day for 1-2 weeks.


Make sure any new water is free of chlorine/ chloramine before it's added to the tank.

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Add some salt.


You can add rock salt (often sold as aquarium salt), sea salt or swimming pool salt to the aquarium at the dose rate of 2 heaped tablespoon per 20 litres of water.

If you only have livebearers (guppies, platies, swordtails, mollies), goldfish or rainbowfish in the tank you can double that dose rate, so you would add 4 heaped tablespoons per 20 litres.

Keep the salt level like this for at least 2 weeks but no longer than 4 weeks otherwise kidney damage can occur. Kidney damage is more likely to occur in fish from soft water (tetras, Corydoras, angelfish, gouramis, loaches) that are exposed to high levels of salt for an extended period of time, and is not an issue with livebearers, rainbowfish or other salt tolerant species.

The salt will not affect the beneficial filter bacteria but the higher dose rate will affect some plants. The lower dose rate will not affect plants.

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.

Sorry to sort of copy what you always say @Colin_T, but the OP needed help...
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.
 
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