Description

Symptoms: disintegrating fins that may be reduced to stumps, exposed fin rays, blood on edges of fins, reddened areas at base of fins, skin ulcers with gray or red margins, cloudy eyes.

As a result of this disease, body parts of the fish start fraying, lose color, rot and then disappear altogether. Tail and fin rot appears to be a bacterial infection of the tail and/or fins and may be caused by generally poor conditions, bully, or fin nipping tankmates. The bacteria belong to the genera aeromonas and pseudomonas and multiply at a terrifying rate in the aquarium when the water quality is poor. This disease can only be combated permanently by using the right remedy and improving the water parameters at the same time. Regular water changes comprise the most important measure. Tuberculosis can also lead to tail and fin rot.

Treatment

Please remove any activated carbon from the filter for the duration of the medication use. UV-C appliances and CO₂ fertilizing appliances also need to be switched off. Please also ensure that skimmers and ozonisers in saltwater are switched off. Change 50 % of the water prior to application of any medication. Aerate the aquarium using a diaphragm pump with airstone during the treatment. Since many pathogenic germs can survive in the filter media, we recommend cleaning the filter thoroughly, or, better yet, replacing the filter media. The aquarium must be aerated well whenever there is no filter. Feed as sparingly as possible during the treatment.

Attempt to ascertain the cause. Then treat accordingly. Also, treat the water or fish with antibiotics. If added to the water, use 20 - 30 mg per liter. If the fish is to be treated add an antibiotic to the food. With flake food, use about 1% of antibiotic and carefully mix it in. If you keep the fish hungry they should eagerly eat the mixture before the antibiotic dissipates. Antibiotics usually come in 250 mg capsules. If added to 25 grams of flake food, one capsule should be enough to treat dozens of fish. A good antibiotic is chloromycetin (chloramphenicol) or tetracycline. If you feed your fish frozen foods or chopped foods, try to use the same ratio with mixing. As a last resort add at most 10 mg per liter of water. Also, if unkempt conditions are the suspected cause, correct it. The most important water values to be monitored and if necessary optimized: carbonate hardness (KH), pH, ammonium (NH4)/ammonia (NH3).

The use of a UV-C clarifier likewise helps to decrease the density of bacteria in the aquarium and to improve the living conditions of the fish. In order to help the fish develop sufficient energy reserves, we recommend giving the fish 2x weekly doses of a vitamin product.

After treatment

After the treatment, please filter the aquarium water for 24 hours using activated carbon to remove the residues of medication. Afterwards the activated carbon should be duly discarded. The addition of a bacterial starter to the aquarium water helps to replace any purifying bacteria which may have been affected. Please check during the treatment and daily in the first days after the treatment the ammonium/ ammonia and nitrite values. With nitrite values of over 0.5 mg/l an immediate water change of 50% should be carried out and a bacterial starter added.