new fish owner needing help w/ mollies

[laboul]

I just bought a 10 gallon tank and am totally new to tropical fish keeping. After setting up I added stress coat, water conditioner, statazyme, and waited a few days before adding fish. I got 2 white/silver mollies and a snail and didn't realize that the mollies require somewhat special conditions (salt, high temp, spirulina). After just a day!!!! they developed white spots on the fins. I did a 25% water change, removed the snail, and have been treating them with CureIck for 2 days now, but with no real change in those symptoms. After doing some reading on mollies, I corrected the salt (slowly added 3T total) and temperature to 80F.

Today they are a bit more active - yesterday they were totally still - but they still tend to sit right at the top near either the filter or the heater. I'm worried that the ick medication isn't doing its job since the white spots are still there. How long do I keep treating? The bottle says only 3 days. Also, I don't know what any of my parameters are (nitrate, ammonia, etc.) because I don't have a test kit... could something else be bothering them since the tank is new? How long can I wait to add the snail back in?

Just checked on the mollies - the white spots seem to be SPREADING on the tail fin of the larger, less active one.

 

[snowyangel]

Most ich medecines say to treat up to 2 weeks after no signs because even though your fish may show no signs, most likely the parasite is still in the water. If you only treat it till it goes away on the fish, most likely it will return. Just keep using the reccomend dosage, increase your temp to about 82-83F and keep your water clean (do no more than 15% water change). I'm guessing since you said your tank is new that you did not CYCLE your tank first? Doing this may have prevented this outbreak of disease.

 

[newfishies]

the tank sounds like it is not cycled , which will stress the fish and make them more susceptible to ich and other diseases.

does your filter have carbon it it? if so, you may need to take it out...it may remove the medication for the water as it passess through the filter.

there are some good pinned topice in the beginners forum to explain cycling, or you could do a search on the site for cycling and read some other member's posts about it!

hope this helps and your mollies continue to improve!!

 

[salty]

Do the spots look like grains of salt on their bodies?
Mollies are usually quite hardy fish, so I hope they pull through this.

I've read VERY mixed reports on using salt in a tank....and I'd steer clear of using salt at all....majority of people and pet shops don't recommend you use it unless you're a specialist and know exactly what you're doing, especially if you have other fish in the tank too.

Speak to your pet shop about "white spot"/ich. Maybe it's that...I had a dose of it about a year ago, but they well may have a combination of diseases...so best to get some professional advice.

Good luck

 

[laboul]

The white spots do look like grains of salt.

Nope, you're right, I didn't cycle without fish first. I knew next to nothing about fish, and the people at Petsmart (ug!) made it sound easy, but I learned the hard way. I'm just going to have to cycle now with the fish that I have and hope for the best. They do seem more active today, so that's good.

I'm treating WITHOUT carbon in the filter, keeping the temp up, and the light off. Also doing a water change every other day.

Thanks for your advice, everyone!