I treated my tank with copper for parasites. How do I tell if I still have them.?

Question

I have a 29gl. tank.
I change the water bi-weekly normally.
I completely cleaned the tank 2 months ago.
I continue to lose fish here and there.
I have been able to keep fish for at least a year during the past.
All my water tests are fine execept I have very hard water a can't keep my ph normal, I have tried everything on the market.
The fish are showing signs of stress again but no bloating.
I love having fish but I feel like giving up.
My ex-husband does everything wrong and his fish survive.

Answer 1

You need to stop putting everything on the market in there. Get your own test kits. Change out all of that water with the copper in it. These pet stores just slay me. What they want to happen is for your fish to get sick, then you come to them, then they sell you some mystery meds and you toss them into the water blindly. The meds kill your bio system and the tank has to recycle. Or much worse the meds go toxic in the water and the fish are once again stressed. You go back and they sell you some other mystery meds and you go off and drop that into the tank. It mixes with whatever is left of the last stuff, further destroying your system. There is no way to get a balanced aquarium with all that crap in it. Then all your fish die. You break the tank down and start all over. The fish get stressed due to the cycling process and get sick and you rush back to the pet store where the cycle begins again. Am I right? Does this sound familiar? Ask your self who's benefitting? Your right the pet store has just made a lot of money off of you. That is what they are in the business to do. They know you probably won't read anything to find out what you really need to know so they just preying on your ignorence. I'm not trying to insult you, just trying to let you know pet stores are not really into pets they are into selling stuff to customers. You will have to learn totally on your own. Now I will help you with a good rule of thumb. DO NOT ever put ANYTHING into your tank water!! You don't have a microscope so how can you tell if its parasites or bacteria? How on earth would the high school kid at petco know either? They don't know DINK SQUAT! The key to keeping fish is WATER, first and foremost its water quality. If you have a problem then stop feeding and start changing water. Don't use zeolite and salt together. Zeolite (white carbon) is completely unnecessary. Frist of all Ph of the water should remain constant. Temperature should also remain constant. Ammonia = zero Nitrites = zerp Nitrates < 20ppm at all times. If not change water. If the water changes are not enough to keep the system you either need to make bigger ones (50-75%) or you may need to reduce the number of fish. You may have too many in a small space. Your hubby probably leaves the tank alone that's why he has more success. He is not dropping toxic chemicals in randomly like you. IF you have ANY ailment use non iodized rock salt at 3 teaspoons per gallon. That gives a 3% salt solution and will kill 80% of fish disease. Add in heat it up to 83 degrees and most anything that harms your fish will parish. Leave them in that for 2 weeks. When you do a water change replace with 3% salt water. When the treatments done lower the temp by 2 degrees per day until you get to 77. Change the water and replace with water that has no salt in it. Don't use salt all the time in a fresh water aquarium, only to get rid of disease. The pet store won't tell you to use salt from the grocery store they'd go out of business. If you don't believe me let me tell you this... how on earth do you think people have kept fish for hundreds of years before there was a petsmart?
You are simply killing your fish with meds. So get your own test kits and research your pet. It would also help if you did a little research on water as well.
Call someone in your area that cleans other people's tanks for a living. They usually know what they are doing and will be glad to give you advice. Question them about my advice and see just how right or wrong I am. Simply because taking some strange persons advice on the internet is not always wise either. You will have to learn on your own, just like I did.

Answer 2

I'm going to agree with the other two posts, don't use chemicals in the tank usless you really, really have to. The best cure for hard water is mixing in some distilled water untill it's the hardness you need. This will also really help you control the pH. BUT... unless your pH is abouve about 8.5 or so you don't need to control the pH usually. Most fish will readily adjust to even quite high pH values. Even is a book or website says the fish prefers soft acidic water, usually they will live just fine in hard, alkanie water. Not what the species comes from, but it is still acceptable. That's for most fish, expensive, delicae fish are another story.

My suggestion to you is try keeping fish that prefer the water you do have. Hard high alkaline waer begs for african cichlids for example. That's only one, many oher like that water too. Don't fight the water, use it to your advantage. I would also say do a 25% water change each week and use a gravel vacuum to keep the gravel clean. Doing this will provide a much more stable environment for the fish.

As for the parasites, if you treated with copper, odds are extremely high you got them all. Copper is generally the last resort big gun treatment for a tank as it is so harsh on the fish.

Best of luck with your tank

MM

Answer 3

hard water solution = bottled water, or a good water filter on the sink you use for your tank.

STOP ADDING ALL THE CHEMICAL CRAP TO YOUR WATER. You are causing most of the stress to your fish by using this stuff. Fish get used to the water they live in and every time you add something your making them re-adjust.

Your husband seems to have learned that Hands Off is the best thing for an aquarium. 9 times out of 10 you do more damage trying to fix a "problem" that really isn't a problem.

Also what did you mean by Completely cleaning a tank???

Once a tank is cycled and running with fish in it, it should NEVER be torn down or "cleaned to much" . Every time you do this you are destroying the Biological Filter and causing your fish way to much stress.

As for your parasite problem, just keep an eye out for them, and if you see them again just use a little Aquarium salt to get rid of them. (1 teaspoon disolved per 2 gallons of water).

P.S. Sorry did'nt mean to sound so snarky. lol