terry100 Posted March 19, 2015 Report Share Posted March 19, 2015 Hi, hopefully someone can help me. I have a 215 litre tank that has been running for 12 weeks now. I have a suspected outbreak of whitespot going on. In the tank I have: 2 platys 20 platy fry of assorted ages 10 neon tetras 2 bristlenose plecos The tank is planted and also has an additional air stone and a UV purifier. The air stone is turned off at night due to the extra noise. The lights are on 8 hours a day. We added 5 of the tetras about a week ago along with the bristlenose plecos. Since the new tetras were added I have noticed a bit of aggression going on amongst them, (our original tetras have always been peaceful), also some of the older platy fry have been chasing each other which they never used to do. Now I have seen one of the older platys flashing and some of the smaller fry doing the same thing. They also have visible white spots appearing on their fins if you look closely. I have added 5 tablespoons of tonic salt (I only did half the recommended dose due to the bristlenoses and tetras being sensitive) and raised the temperature to 27 degrees. I also treated the tank yesterday with Wunder Tonic at half dose (once again due to the bristlenoses and also the fry). Did I do the right thing by only dosing at half the rate, or could I just be making the whitespot resistant? (I did remove the carbon cartridge). I checked my water using the API freshwater master test kit and the results were: ammonia 0 nitrite 0 nitrate 20 I do 25% weekly water changes and always add Nutrafin Cycle and Aqua Plus when changing the water. At the last change a few days ago I actually forgot I had unplugged the heater prior to doing the change so it was off for about 2-3 hours before I remembered. In that time the temperature had dropped to 23 degrees. Could this have contributed to the whitespot outbreak? Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrienne Posted March 20, 2015 Report Share Posted March 20, 2015 The temperature drop may have contributed to it but more likely just the stress of adding new fish could have done it. Whitespot is always present, it just appears when the opportunity arises. Neons will handle full strength salt and I have never had problems with bn at full strength either. I'm not sure how experienced you are so bear with me please Whitespot (cysts) are only treatable when you can not see them. Whitespot has a 21day cycle at cooler temps - 25 and under. When you can see them on the fish they have burrowed under the skin. Once they hatch they fall to the bottom of the tank (while falling they can be treated) where they land on the substrate and multiply by the 1000's. They they go up and reattach to the fish. I would increase my temperature further - up to 28 or if you are willing to leave the bubbler on all the time up to 30. This will speed the cycle of white spot up to around 7 days instead of the 21. Keep treating with salt. Remember that salt does not evaporate so when water changing only add the new salt for the amount of water you have removed, not the amount of water that takes you up to the level the tank is normally at. So if you syphon out 20 litres of water, add replacement salt for 20 litres of water, not the 30 litres of water that it might take to get the water level up to where it normally is. Tonic at half dose is probably just wasting your money. Better to just stick to the salt for now and see if the white spot disappears. Syphon the gravel well at water changes to pull out any cysts in the gravel. Once there have been no spots visible for 7-10 days it should not reappear. If the white spot does not go you might need to look at a full dose treatment of tonic. The UV purifier will assist by nuking the free floating cysts that pass through it. Is it new? Apart from the whitespot, what you are doing appears pretty good Try and keep your nitrates down through water changes, try to not let them go above 20. Bigger water changes will help if necessary. Fish chasing is either you have male & female or they feel more comfortable in a larger school. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
terry100 Posted March 20, 2015 Author Report Share Posted March 20, 2015 Thanks for getting back to me. I am new at this so all info is greatly appreciated! The UV purifier has been in the tank for two months now as we purchased it when we had algae problems in the first month. I will increase the temperature and salt and see how I get on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Adrienne Posted March 20, 2015 Report Share Posted March 20, 2015 Let us know how you get on UV purifiers, the bulb has a lifetime of around 9 months max before it loses it's effectiveness. To keep the costs down, if you don't need it i.e. no green water, no whitest then turn it off and save yourself some dollars. People do run them all the time but they only work when bacteria, algae etc pass through the uv sleeve. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexyay Posted March 22, 2015 Report Share Posted March 22, 2015 Do you have any pictures? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
terry100 Posted March 23, 2015 Author Report Share Posted March 23, 2015 Hi, sorry to hard to see in a photo. Thanks anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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