[WestHaven]

I noticed yesterday that one of my neon tetras appears to have ich. He has white-colored growths on his tail fin, dorsal fine and anal fin. He swims somewhat erraticaly. The other neons swim smoothly through the water, this guy swims in a very "twitching" way. It's like he's having trouble maintaining his position. He has been eating normally. The other neons and all of the other fish in the tank are not affected.

What should I do? What will treating for ich due to my other tank inhabitants (fish and snails, see my signature).

 

[CatSoup]

That's a lot of fish for a 29 gallon. How often do you water change? I recommend 25% weekly. A bigger tank if possible. If it's ick you'll have to treat the whole tank. Raise the temp to 80-82 degrees and add aquarium salt. Since you have catfish, use half of what the box says. Do daily water changes for one week, then wait a few days, repeat process. Ick is caused by poor water quality. Probably from being overstocked in this case.

 

[CatSoup]

In fact I would remove the affected fish to a quarantine tank and give them full salt doses along with higher temps as well. That way you main tank can be treated, and your affected fish can be cured quicker.

 

[WestHaven]

Ok thanks. I'll have to pickup a quarantine tank, filter and heater and put the fish in there. I do 25% water changes each week. I'll have to start making it like 50%.

Would getting some Purigen help cut down the ammonia/nitrite/nitrates? Would that help?

 

[WestHaven]

Update: I am doing a 50% water change and cleanec my filter. It was disgusting! The filter pads were completely covered with black crud so I threw them out. I figure that was making the water unclean. I added two new filter pads. I kept the rest of the filter media (ceramic bio-beads).

 

[CatSoup]

Ah, I bet that's what caused it! You should probably check your local Craigslist for tanks too. I know it's irritating to be told you're over stalked. I found out I was this same way. Now I have a 55, 46, 20 gallon, and a 10 gallon quarantine tank. lol
This site's fish profiles is the most accurate I've seen as far as letting you know how much space your fish will need by species.
http://www.tropicalfishkeeping.com/profiles/
Once a couple of mine reach max size, I'll probably have to just re-home them.

 

[WestHaven]

Thank you. The fish died today. I learned my lesson. I talked to a guy at the LFS (I got all of my fish there) and he said that the fish mostly died of a bacterial infection since all of the other fish were unaffected. I brought in a water sample, and he said it was perfect. I think I will setup a smaller backup tank and keep it in my bedroom. I could remove some of the other neons and keep them in a species-only tank.