Need To Set Up Hospital Tank

[This Old Spouse]

My corydoras are infected with mouth fungus. I'm going to transfer all of them to a 10g hospital tank with a play sand bottom and start treating with Fish Cycline (tetracycline) but I need to know about a filter setup. I have extra mature media in other filters, but won't the medication kill off all the bacteria? How do I do this?? Will daily water changes do it??

Please help!! I don't want to lose all my sweet cories.

Thanks.

EDIT: Water test shows 0 Ammonia and 0 Nitrites.

 

[This Old Spouse]

Sorry to bump this already, but I'm panicking.

Please help.

 

[Blubble37]

dont worry, the fish get diseases from time to time! does the packaging say it will kill the bacteria, if it doesnt then you are safe to put it in. alternatively you could use zeolite media to remove the ammonia as this wont soak up the med.

what about your nitrate levels?

why dont you treat your main tank?

 

[This Old Spouse]

Thanks, Blubble. It is an antibacterial med, so I think it will kill all bacteria. It says on the label: "exerts a bactericidal action on gram positive and some gram negative bacteria." I was reading about a "box filter" on another forum. Silly me, I don't even know what that is! I live in the middle of nowhere so anything special I have to order online, like zeolite, and it takes days to get here unless I pay exorbitant overnight shipping fees that I can't really afford. I was trying to find out how to build a DIY box filter but couldn't really find out enough.

Gad, I feel completely helpless right now. I have to go paint a house and will be gone the rest of the day, but I'm hoping there will be great suggestions on here when I get back!

I have a 10g ready to put anything in it now .... I'd have to rinse play sand to put it in but I have a bag ready to do that. I also have a couple of HOB filters that I can use but if I can't use the mature media I have in other tanks, what do I use?? I'm so confused ...

 

[KittyKat]

That probably would kill off filter bacteria. I would recommend not feeding during treatment, add lots of plants and let the plants deal with the ammonia which the fish produce. Do test, do be ready for water changes. If you do have a spare filter, do seed it as not absolutely all medications kill the filter.

 

[Blubble37]

use the hob's and seed them. whats to lose if it doesnt work because you can always stick them back in one of your many main tanks to re populate!

Gad, I feel completely helpless right now. I have to go paint a house and will be gone the rest of the day, but I'm hoping there will be great suggestions on here when I get back!

dont worry, there might not be a lot of suggestions but i offered a few at least, and thats all i can do really.

 

[This Old Spouse]

dont worry, the fish get diseases from time to time! does the packaging say it will kill the bacteria, if it doesnt then you are safe to put it in. alternatively you could use zeolite media to remove the ammonia as this wont soak up the med.

what about your nitrate levels?

why dont you treat your main tank?

I'm not worried about my nitrate levels right now. They're always consistently low.

I don't want to treat the main tank because it's 29g, and the 10g will be easier. Also, I have shrimp in the main tank and guppies, and I don't want to medicate them. I think it will hurt the shrimp.

If someone knows differently, I'll go ahead and treat that tank.

That probably would kill off filter bacteria. I would recommend not feeding during treatment, add lots of plants and let the plants deal with the ammonia which the fish produce. Do test, do be ready for water changes. If you do have a spare filter, do seed it as not absolutely all medications kill the filter.

The medication bottle suggests a water change before each dose, which is daily, so would I be in a fish-in cycle of sorts?

use the hob's and seed them. whats to lose if it doesnt work because you can always stick them back in one of your many main tanks to re populate!

I wouldn't stick the media back into a healthy tank after being in the infected tank.

 

[KittyKat]

That probably would kill off filter bacteria. I would recommend not feeding during treatment, add lots of plants and let the plants deal with the ammonia which the fish produce. Do test, do be ready for water changes. If you do have a spare filter, do seed it as not absolutely all medications kill the filter.

The medication bottle suggests a water change before each dose, which is daily, so would I be in a fish-in cycle of sorts?

Well.. yes and no.. yes because you potentially might not have a filter (by the way, still run at least something for surface movement), no because plants can act as a filter. If you are able to, you should definitely set up a filter with mature media in there.

 

[This Old Spouse]

I decided to just dose the whole 29g tank after removing the assassin snails. It now has a nice amber glow.

Now my question is, do I dose the whole amount every day? I plan to do about a 60% water change every day. I think the answer is a whole dose, but thought I'd check first.

Thanks so much for all this help!

 

[KittyKat]

I imagine whole dose is the right thing to do, but it would depend on what was in the medication and how long it takes to dissipate. Ideally, I would be following the instructions to the last letter.

 

[This Old Spouse]

Yep, that's what I'm doing. I so want to see this work and my cories make a full recovery. I thnk it's a good sign that they all survived the first dose, but I'm still anxious about the whole thing.