Rummy Nose Tetra Struggling in Quarentine

[FaintingGoats]

Hi All,

I got 10 Rummy Nose Tetras last night and placed them in my quarantine tank (6 galleon tub) with the Med Trio, some fake plants, a heater and a sponge filter with air stone.

This morning when I took a look at them, I had one that was upside down in a plant breathing hard and another that was hanging out at the surface breathing hard.  I removed the one from the plant and he alternates between just drifting around looking mostly dead or swimming in kind of a twisting fashion. 

I know that acclimation can be hard on Rummy Noses and people often loose several in the process.  Is there anything I can do for these to help them?

Water parameters look fine as well as water temperature .  PH does look a little bit low at 6.5 (my main tank is more around 7.5).

[Odd Duck]

First thing always is to try more aeration for sick fish, not necessarily a lot more current.  Can you add another air stone even if you don’t have another sponge filter?

[FaintingGoats]

I do have another sponge filter but I don’t think two sponge filters will fit in my QT tank. I will just take the air stone out of it and use it that way!  Thank you for the advice!!!

[Odd Duck]

Hope it helps!  Keep us posted.

[FaintingGoats]

Sorry it took so long for an update but I wanted to have all the news. One of the Rummies that was sick died the next morning but the other one looked like it was getting better over the past couple of days. However, it passed tonight as well. 
 

The rest of the school is looking good though. I don’t see any other fish having issues. I am going to leave them in QT for a couple extra days (they were suppose to be released on Friday) just in case it’s a disease issue and not an acclimation problem. 
 

Thank you again for your suggestion to add more air!  I do think it helped. 

[FaintingGoats]

Hi again!

 

I have a follow up question!  After the first initial two died (from what I am thinking was stress from acclimation), I had one more pass away as well a couple days later. 
 

I know that rummy’s are hard to quarantine so I think his death might have been from acclimation as well. Should I extend my quarantine length? Today has been a week that they have been QT-ing. 
 

thank you for your help!

[a tired fish keeper]

From what I’ve heard longer is better. You should probably wait another week and re-evaluate at the end just to be certain  that the fish are disease free.

Edited February 11, 2022 by a tired fish keeper