Invert Safe Fin Rot Treatments?

[DarthRevan]

Hey everyone, recently I’ve noticed my betta’s fins looking a little ragged. At first I thought maybe one of the platies had been nipping him (they’ve been really aggressive, one is pregnant and the males fight a lot because I don’t have a good male to female ratio: fixing that ASAP) but now I think it’s fin rot. I did a fish-in cycle so I think he may just have a weakened immune system and that’s what started it. 
 

The tank is fully cycled as of last week, but I can’t tell if his fins are healing or not. Should I give it time before I start treatment? Also, I’m having a hard time finding info online about treatments. I have rams horn snails and I’m getting some amano shrimp in a couple of weeks, and I want to make sure if I do have to treat it that the treatment is safe for inverts. I see BettaFix pop up a lot as a recommendation, and on the API website it says it may harm snails but it doesn’t say anything about shrimp (I assume anything that’ll harm snails will harm shrimp but I’m not sure) or if it’s like copper where if you use it once it’ll basically ruin your tank for inverts forever. 
 

I don’t have money right now to set up a quarantine tank for the betta, hopefully here in the future I can. 
 

Water Parameters (measured with API test kit):

Ammonia- slightly above 0ppm

Nitirite- 0ppm

Nitrate- 20-25ppm

Ph- about 7.6

Hardness- between 200-300 on the Aquarium Coop test strips (we have very hard water in Phoenix AZ)

Tank is heavily planted and has floating plants 

[Zenzo]

On 9/15/2021 at 11:52 AM, DarthRevan said:

Hey everyone, recently I’ve noticed my betta’s fins looking a little ragged. At first I thought maybe one of the platies had been nipping him (they’ve been really aggressive, one is pregnant and the males fight a lot because I don’t have a good male to female ratio: fixing that ASAP) but now I think it’s fin rot. I did a fish-in cycle so I think he may just have a weakened immune system and that’s what started it. 
 

The tank is fully cycled as of last week, but I can’t tell if his fins are healing or not. Should I give it time before I start treatment? Also, I’m having a hard time finding info online about treatments. I have rams horn snails and I’m getting some amano shrimp in a couple of weeks, and I want to make sure if I do have to treat it that the treatment is safe for inverts. I see BettaFix pop up a lot as a recommendation, and on the API website it says it may harm snails but it doesn’t say anything about shrimp (I assume anything that’ll harm snails will harm shrimp but I’m not sure) or if it’s like copper where if you use it once it’ll basically ruin your tank for inverts forever. 
 

I don’t have money right now to set up a quarantine tank for the betta, hopefully here in the future I can. 
 

Water Parameters (measured with API test kit):

Ammonia- slightly above 0ppm

Nitirite- 0ppm

Nitrate- 20-25ppm

Ph- about 7.6

Hardness- between 200-300 on the Aquarium Coop test strips (we have very hard water in Phoenix AZ)

Tank is heavily planted and has floating plants 

Maracyn is safe for inverts, and helps with bacterial infections that cause fin rot. Many of the people on the forum use Maracyn. I have used it on all of my fish, and it has been safe for my snails an Amanos as well. 

Here is the link: https://www.aquariumcoop.com/products/mardel-maracyn?_pos=1&_psq=maracyn&_ss=e&_v=1.0

[DarthRevan]

On 9/15/2021 at 12:40 PM, Zenzo said:

Maracyn is safe for inverts, and helps with bacterial infections that cause fin rot. Many of the people on the forum use Maracyn. I have used it on all of my fish, and it has been safe for my snails an Amanos as well. 

Here is the link: https://www.aquariumcoop.com/products/mardel-maracyn?_pos=1&_psq=maracyn&_ss=e&_v=1.0

Thank you so much I will check it out! 🙌

[DarthRevan]

So update, I got Maracyn Oxy on accident instead of the packets but it still was doing ok for a while. 
 

It says on the bottle not to use it for more than 5 days. After day 1, the cottony growth on my bettas fins went away. I dosed it the full 5 days to be sure, but now the growth is coming back on the backside of the fin and he’s still losing his dorsal fin pretty fast. Should I switch to a different treatment, or do a massive water change and continue dosing Oxy?

 

The bottle I’m using is pictured below, and I’ll try to grab a photo of my betta (he never sits still so it’s hard lol)

 

 

[HH Morant]

From Aquariumscience.org:

Fin rot should be treated with broad spectrum antibiotics (Thomas Labs Fish Mox, Midland Vet Service Aqua-Mox, VetDepot Amoxicillin, Fishbiotic Ampicillin, Mardel Maracyn 2, SeaChem KanaPlex, Thomas Labs Fish Min, API Fin And Body Cure and Thomas Labs Fish Doxy). These antibiotics ONLY work when mixed into the food. They do NOT work when put into the water of the aquarium.

[Colu]

On 9/21/2021 at 7:16 PM, HH Morant said:

These antibiotics ONLY work when mixed into the food. They do NOT work when put into the water of the aquarium.

Kanaplex and maracyn2 are absorbed thought the skin and gills 

[DarthRevan]

Will Maracyn 2 crash my beneficial bacteria? 
 

I just tested the water today and there’s .50ppm ammonia and .25ppm Nitrite, I did just add 4 baby platies on Thursday last week so I think that’s why, but if I use an antibiotic I want to make sure it won’t kill the biofilter. 
 

First thing I’m going to do before treating anything else is do a 50% water change though to deal with the ammonia/nitrite spike. 

Edited September 21, 2021 by DarthRevan

[Cory]

I use and recommend maracyn for fin rot. This is the problem, theres a million different products with a million different results. Use a different product, get a different result. Listen to someone else, get different advice. Our company advice is maracyn, Other things may work, but we don't have the testing of years with thousands of fish and wide varieties of scenarios.

I've tested a lot of meds, especially from brands we carry, if we don't carry it, it's because we couldn't get it to do what it says properly.

[DarthRevan]

On 9/21/2021 at 1:22 PM, Cory said:

I use and recommend maracyn for fin rot. This is the problem, theres a million different products with a million different results. Use a different product, get a different result. Listen to someone else, get different advice. Our company advice is maracyn, Other things may work, but we don't have the testing of years with thousands of fish and wide varieties of scenarios.

I've tested a lot of meds, especially from brands we carry, if we don't carry it, it's because we couldn't get it to do what it says properly.

Wow, the man himself! Thank you for taking the time to respond to my post! I will do a 50% water change today and another one in a couple of days to remove everything out of the water, and I’ll try dosing regular Maracyn instead of this Maracyn Oxy stuff I got. 
 

Hopefully that in combo with the bacteria catching up to the new bio load will stop the issue 😁