When treating fishes for disease there are several things to do before you put any medication in the tank.
1: You should check the water quality as most diseases are stress related and if fish are put into an aquarium with unsuitable or dirty water, they are more likely to come down with a disease. You should check the PH, Ammonia, Nitrite & Nitrate. You can buy test kits for this or take a glass full of tank water to your local fish shop (LFS) and get them to test the water sample. Most shops charge a small fee for the water testing.
2: Make sure the temperature is correct for the fish being kept. If the temperature is incorrect for the species the fish will be stressed out and more inclined to come down with a disease.
3: You should do a partial (30-50%) water change (using water that is free of chlorine or chloramine), and gravel clean the aquarium substrate if you haven't done it in the last week. This will remove some of the rotting organic matter in the tank and allow the medication to work more effectively. The cleaner the tank the better the medications work.
4: Remove carbon from any filter/s running on the tank. Carbon will remove the medication and the disease will not be treated. Throw the carbon away and replace it with some new carbon after you have finished treating the aquarium and the fishes are well.
5: Identify the disease and use the appropriate medication to treat it. Take the sick fish into your LFS and get them to identify the problem, or take a photograph of the diseased fish and take the picture into the LFS for diagnosis.
Articles
In this section you will find articles relating to various aspects of fish keeping.
