Ich And Pop-eye?!

[A5HLEY]

Hi all. I have three balloon-belly mollies in a 6 gallon tank with a carbon filter and an air stone. I've had them for around 1 1/2 months, and they've been doing great.

This past week, I went out of town on a Wednesday and came back home on a Sunday, and I left one of those gel food feeders in there while I was gone. When I got back, I noticed that all three fish had crystal-like spots all over them. So I went out and bought some of those Jungle fizzing Ich tablets, and I've been treating them for three consecutive nights (this being the third), doing a 25% water change each day.

So I woke up today, and one of the mollie's right eye is all swollen... you guessed it; Pop-eye! Luckily, I had some Maracyn-TC on hand, and I'm treating that too.

What in the world is going on in my tank to cause all of these diseases to attack my fish?

 

[Kaylee]

Do you have a heater? if so raise the heat to 78 degrees fehrenheit, add 2 tablespoons of aqaurium salt. Ich which is a parasite and it doesn't strive in warm salty conditions. Do this till you notice that the ich is cleared and to be on the safe side even a couple days after the fish are better. Beings that the ich can live in the gravel. Then do a water change and clean gravel. Then after the ich is cleared try the melafix and read the instructions on the bottle.

For the Popeye, I used melafix in the past with success. Melafix will help spead the healing process of the ich as well.

I hope this helps you out. I had this problem several months ago starting a new tank I did loose a couple of my fish from it, but some did recooperate and are still living

If I were you I wouldn't use those gel food pak again, fish can survive not being fed for up to 3-4 days. What problem happened is that the food pak made ur water quality bad and weakened ur fishes immune system, there are always parasites in ur water and it only attacks when ur fish is weakened. Back to the old saying only feed what ur fish can eat within 5 minutes, with food sitting in the tank for that long stagmented ur water.