Nightmare 2.5g Tank....

[IrieJar]

Ok, here is the story...

For my daughter's 4th birthday, my mother bought her a 2.5g Minibow kit. I replaced the filter with a Red Sea Nano, added a mini heater and set it up with gravel, 3 fake plants and a little "bridge" my 4yo picked out. I used Tetra water conditioner. We went to a local pet store that (I thought) had a good aquatics area. Unfortunatley, we left the store with 4 neon tetras. This was last Tues. They were fine until Thurs. AM, when 2 died and the water was cloudy. I have been checking levels every morning and doing about a 25% water change daily since. The last 2 fish were fine until yesterday, when I noticed...Ich. I went to another pet store and told the girl there everything, and she said that at this point with Neons, there isn't a lot of hope. She said the meds for Ich in an uncycled or cycling tank are prob going to be harder on the fish than the disease. She recommended a lot, and I ended up buying Prime to use as a water cond., and carbon to add to the filter (not necessarily to "cure" the fish). She said that if (when) the neons die, I do not have to start all over, as the bacterial is already becoming established, but do need to wait until the levels are down to add more fish. I asked about Ich, and she said that it is always there, but stress causes suseptability, so it should not be a concern to new fish (thinking Zebra Danios). So, today, the fish are ok and eating. One fish has been bullying the other. My questions are...Is there anything I can do? Is the info I have received correct? If the fish do not make it, can I just add more fish if the levels are down, even with the Ich?? Why is the one fish being such a butthead?
Please help!

 

[chicklette]

A 2.5 gallon tank should only be meant for bettas. That just my opinion. Other fish need heat and proper filtration. Ick is not a death sentence if you use the right products. I find Rid Ick+ to be the best and has always worked for me. Since I started using that I have never lost a fish to ick so I would not give up on him.

For an uncycled tank you should do lots of water changes. And you need a test kit. Liquid is better then dip sticks. What are your water parameters specficaly? Is your pH stable?

When you medicate you always always take the carbon out as it removes all the medication.

My questions are...Is there anything I can do? Is the info I have received correct? If the fish do not make it, can I just add more fish if the levels are down, even with the Ich?? Why is the one fish being such a butthead?
Please help!

You can do lots of water changes, medicate for the ick and add a bit of sea salt from the LSF. It’s 1 TBS per 10 gallons of water so you will just be adding a pinch.

I would not add another fish if they die. This will transfer the sickness on to the other one and your tank is not cycled.

So it’s look like you have a lot of problems here. The first goal is to get that water under control and cycled and get that fish better with the ick. If once things calm down I think you should only add a betta for that tank. But that’s just me.

 

[Colin_T]

Most of the info the girl told you is pretty accurate. There are arguments both ways regarding the whitespot always being in the water. Some people think it is, and other think once it's dead it's dead. I'm of the latter category but it doesn't make much diff now.

The cloudy water was brought about by fish food and waste breaking down in the water. Anything that breaks down in the water produces ammonia. After a couple of weeks you get a colony of good bacteria that eat this ammonia and convert it to nitrite. A couple of weeks later and you get another colony of good bacteria that eats the nitrite and converts it to nitrate.

Once this has happened the filters are said to be "Cycled". Basically there is enough good bacteria living in the filter to break down the fish food and waste in the water.

During this phase the fish are under a lot of stress from the ammonia and nitrite. In high levels they will both kill any fish in the tank. The more food going into the tank and the more fish in the tank, the higher the levels get and the more chance of fish losses.

The best thing to do during this stage is keep the feeding down to a minimum. Only feed a very small amount each day and do a partial (40-50%) water change every day using dechlorinated water that has a similar temperature & PH to the tank water.

It would be best to treat the fish for whitespot but as you were told it can be more stressful on the fish at this stage. It might be cheaper just to replace the fish than it is to treat them. But the choice is yours.

I wouldn't put carbon into the filter unless you have to. If you do want to use the carbon then make sure it is taken out of the tank whenever you treat for disease as the carbon will remove chemicals and medications from the water.

The fish being a butthead is stressed. When things settle down and if they live, add some more of the same fish and he should calm down. Neons are a schooling fish that naturally occur in groups of thousands. Having two fish in a tank by themselves is pretty stressful to them.

If the Neons do die then take them out and leave the tank running. Add a small piece of fish food each day and leave the tank to run. Stop doing water changes and monitor the ammonia levels. If the levels get above 5ppm then do a 50% water change to bring it back down. The ammonia levels should go down within a couple of weeks and the nitrites should be gone a couple of weeks after that. When ammonia and nitrite levels are at 0, do a 75% water change and go get some more fish.

The whitespot parasite will die after a few days without a host fish to live on.

 

[IrieJar]

Thank you for your responses. Not sure yet what to do. Maybe I should have gotten a dog...lol! I understood the process and work this would entail...but at this point I don't really see the "light" at the end of the tunnel, so not sure it is worth the trouble. I feel bad for the fish, and am angry with the first shop for not recommending more appropriate fish.

Thank you again, I am sure I will be back! (Or maybe I will be selling everything on ebay soon.)

 

[Colin_T]

Hang onto the tank and let it cycle. If worst comes to worse then when it has finished cycling get a male Siamese Fighter or a few white cloud mountain minnows.
Just about everyone loses fish when they first set up a tank. In fact most fish loses are within the first month of a tanks life. If people didn't lose their first fish I would have nothing to do on here
Cheer up, things will work out

 

[IrieJar]

Thank you, I appreciate the support!!