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Hospital
Tank :
This is definitely a must. It can serve
three different tasks. A hospital tank, a breeding tank and a
quarantine tank. It should be equipped with a sponge filter, a
submersible heater, light and some gravel (not much). Glass tanks
are highly recommended because they are not easily scratched.
Hospital
tank : To
be used whenever a fish is ill and needs special treatment. You can
then isolate the fish and treat it alone instead of exposing your
main tank to the side effects of the medication. This is also a way
to save money. Fish medications cost very much and in order to
achieve the right concentration in a 490 liter tank you will need 10
times more medication as compared to a modest 50 liter hospital
tank. Remember to clean the tank every time the treatment is over.
You must remove all water, clean it dry, clean the sponge with lots
of water. This is called precaution measures. Every medication has
some active or inactive metabolites which may remain in the sponge
for months and be dissolved once water is added again, thus harming
(even killing) the next fish which will enter your hospital
aquarium. Water changes in hospital tanks must be preformed much
more often than normal tanks because a biological filter is not
present and all ammonia and fish waste, along with medication
byproducts are still in the tank. I recommend at least two
50% changes every week. Another point is to
feed carefully and never
overfeed. In
a hospital tank this may kill your fish much more effectively then
the infection you are treating them for.
Breeding
tank : Some
prefer to use a separate tank for breeding or simply keeping their
female mouthbrooding cichlids till the fry is big enough to survive
alone. This tank should have some hiding places and gravel on the
bottom.
Quarantine
Tank :
I could give you hundreds of first class
quotations on this one. I will just give you our logo
"Prevention is better than Treatment" as told by
Hippocrates 2.500 years ago. I believe the modern equivalent is
"a gram of prevention worth a ton of treatment". Whenever
buying new fish please use the quarantine tank. You will save
yourself a lot of troubles and your fish of many health problems.
Never trust a fish which you have not been observing closely for at
least two weeks, no matter how active it looks.
More related articles :
When the
going gets tough... ,
An ill Fossie
- Aka: when
things go wrong!
,
A "true" quarantine tank
Medications
: Being a pharmacist
myself, I was really astonished by the ignorance of both petshop
owners and aquarists. Most medications required for the treatment of
aquatic diseases are 10 times more
expensive than the same (normal) drugs available for humans. This
site will have served its purpose if you just understand this simple
truth. All Health Systems try to keep the cost of human drugs down
(for budget reasons of course) but none cares about your hobby and
how much you spend on it. Therefore companies produce drugs for fish
and other pets at 10 fold increased prices. Don't
let them take advantage of you. Check
your books or the internet, find what is the active substance you
need and then go to your pharmacist and get the human equivalent.
Since you are perhaps not a pharmacist yourself, be sure to get exactly
the same active ingredient. For example, erythromycin stearate and
erythromycin sulphate are not the same as erythromycin. The term
"hydrochloride" next to an active ingredient means it is a
salt, therefore soluble in water (hence it can be used for your
fish) while the term alone (the base) is most often not. I have had
excellent results in treating even cichlid bloating with drugs meant
for human use (minocycline by Lederle for those interested).
Remember
to check if the medication calls for removal
of the active carbon from your filter
(most of them require you to do so). Active carbon simply removes
the medicine from the water as it does with all chemicals. Another
point is the compatibility with tap
water conditioners. Most of these
preparations tend to chelate and inactivate most medications. Since
you can't know which medications will be chelated it is safer not to
add the conditioner. Most medications require heavy
aeration while the treatment is going
on. It is a good idea to aerate heavily even if the medication
doesn't tell you to. Feeding your fish a compatible medicated food
is an excellent idea.
Sometimes,
no matter how hard you try, your fish doesn't seem to respond to
normal medication levels. If the problem is not life threatening you
should just wait or repeat the therapy. However, if the problem is
serious you do not have that luxury. In such a case you should
simply overdose.
I have had success with metronidazole
added at 10 times the dosage recommended. The recommended dosage
usually supposes that your fish will accept some food and that most
organs function at some degree. In severe situations this is not the
case. In order to cure your fish, the medication must reach the
affected organ (e.g. kidney) at the correct concentration, which may
require 10 times more medication in the water. For external
infections, usually the recommended dosage is sufficient. Under-dosing
and premature discontinuation of the medicine may lead to resistant
strains of microorganisms which will prove lethal next time (the
same medication ~ and all similar medications ~ will not harm these
strains).
More related articles :
Diseases
in the aquarium ,
A
disease list in alphabetical order (A-C)
(C-F)
(G-I)
(I-N)
(N-S)
(S-Y),
Diseases
in the Aquarium - List of Active Ingredients in alphabetical order
(A-S)
(T-V),
Over-dosing
is better than under-dosing ,
When the
going gets tough... ,
Sedation - Anesthesia
- Euthanasia ,
Only you can save your fish
,
List of medication products by leading
manufacturers ,
Activated Carbon ,
A "true" quarantine tank
,
A case of Pseudotropheus demasoni
inexplicable deaths
Fish
load : General
rule of thumb : Three
cm of fish length per 4 liters of water.
If rocks and other decorations are added,
you have to apply this rule for the actual water volume. This rule
applies to fish up to 4 cm in length. Bigger fish require much more
volume per cm of body length (you should count 1 cm of fish per 3
liters for fishes bigger than 20 cm). This calculation is for
community fish only. Territorial and aggressive fish require
disproportional high volumes per cm of body length. A 500 liter
aquarium can't house more than 15 Melanochromis though the fish is
relatively small. It can't even house two males !
More related articles :
Which
tank size will fit my fish ? ,
Compatible
Fish - a complicated issue
Gravel
& Rocks.
Wash them before adding them in your tank to remove dust. If you
collect the rocks yourself, make sure metals are not leaking (by
placing them in a bucket of water and measuring GH and pH or by
dropping some vinegar on the rocks and see if any bubbles are
formed), let them for 2 days in strong household chlorine solution,
wash them till you no longer smell chlorine, add dechlorinator
(water conditioner) in the last washing and let them dry. If making
rockscapes, you should glue rocks together with aquarium silicon to
avoid collapsing of the formation. Let the silicon dry very well
before adding the rockwork in your tank - allow at least 72 hours. More related articles :
Aquarium on the Rocks
,
Aquarium on
the Rocks - One Step Further ,
Big
Rocks ,
Sand |
