Is My Molly Sick?

[sweetp544]

I dont know much about diseases of fish at all because usaully my fish are not sick. One of my mollies has almost like a white looking beard on the gill under his mouth. Now she is fairly young maybe 3 months old or so, but she doesnt have anything anywhere else and is acting fine. Any ideas, looks a little strange to me.

 

[GuppyDude]

it sounds like a fungus infection of some sort, id buy melafix and treat the entire tank, that userally takes care of most fungus and bacterial infections. if u cant find melafix look for some kind of fungus specific medication. how big is your tank?

 

[sweetp544]

I was kinda thinking fungus, my mom had a swordtail that had it but it looked more fuzzy and it spread fast. The tank i have her in right now is a 3 gal. She is only about 2 inches at most.

 

[Annastasia]

This is off topic (I know, bad mod!) but are you keeping her in salt? If not, that may be why this happened. Take a look at Neale's (nmonks) pinned topic here for more info on that. Also, do you have a plan to upgrade her soon? It seems like you might start risking stunting her soon....

*dodges flying bricks for going off topic*

Edit ~ I've never had much luck with MelaFix for fungus, or anything other then ripped/torn fins, really. I'd go for a fungus medicine, or the good old fashioned cure of nice, clean water and some salt. Of course, make sure it actually is fungus first. Columnaris is often mistaken for fungus, and you might want to follow a different course of treatment, if it is columanis. Good luck!

 

[sweetp544]

Thanks for the link. Yes I do always keep my mollies in salt. I do plan on moving her soon, im working on getting a new tank set for my tiger barb and at the moment the tank she is going in is being treated for ich. So by the end of next week everyone should be set where they are staying.

Im pretty sure it is fungus and not the other thing you mentioned. I did already remove the carbon, vacume the gravel and changed the water with normal salt added. I also used a fungus medication too. Hopefully i will see results in a few days.

 

[nmonks]

You don't mean table (cooking) salt or aquarium "tonic" salt do you? The former isn't very healthy for the fish, and the latter is expensive snake-oil. Be sure and use marine mix salt. In the quantities you need for mollies (about 5 grammes per litre of water) even a small box will go a long way.

Cheers,

Neale

PS. I'm glad you removed the carbon before treating the tank. You'd be surprised how many people don't remove the carbon, and then wonder why their fish don't get any better. Personally, I never use carbon. In a properly run tank, I can't see any real need for it.

changed the water with normal salt added.

 

[sweetp544]

OH heavens no i didnt mean table salt!! I always use aquarium salt made for the type of fish i keep. i meant that i put the normal amount of salt in that i should have. I use doc wellfish salt.