Fungus/Tail Rot or Neon Tetra Disease

[Mike L]

 

10 Gallon planted "quarantine" tank with 3 amano shrimp, 3 painted platies, various snails, and 3 small neon tetras that I was planning on adding to a 15 gallon tank with 6 other neons.  After about 2 weeks I started to notice one of the neons started to get a white bump on  the side of it's mouth and another looked to have some white on the top part of its tail.  I then dosed the tank with API melafix and pimafix according to instructions (daily for 7 days, then 25% water change).  During treatment, it looked like the growth on the mouth had been slowly growing, to the point I could definitely tell it had gotten bigger by the end of the treatment.  I proceeded to treat the tank with API E.M. erythromycin according to the directions (one packet, wait 24 hours, add another packet, wait 24 hours, 25% water change, repeat, then add carbon).  It's only been a day since end of treatment, and I have not seen any decrease in the growth or the fin getting better.  I'm just worried that if it is Neon Tetra Disease, that it could affect the third neon.  Any recommendations would be great.  I've been thinking about setting up a true 10 gallon quarantine tank with just a seasoned sponge filter and no live plants, then trying aquarium salt.  Thanks in advance!

pH - 7 to 7.2

Nitrates - 40 ppm

Hardness - gh 150 ppm

Nitrite - 0

Ammonia - 0

KH/Buffer - 40 ppm

Water Temperature - 75 F

[Yanni]

It looks like a fungus and N.T.D. You could try to does with aquarium salt and lower the nitrates. 40 PPM seems a little high. Try doing some regular water changes to just make sure that they have good water conditions

[siniardem]

I always water change after medication to add clean water, get rid of anything that came from fish, and let fish be able to breathe better because it seems to be that the medicine would thicken the water (that's just my thinking). 40ppm is higher so it would need some water changes. I would try salt. I would keep an eye out, because this might have been a neon who was sickly anyways, came into your aquarium stressed with moving, and now has just decided to show it. It might can recover or might not. I wouldn't jump to tetra disease before salt and water change. Immediate action and close watch!

[PoisonMoon88]

My tetra looked exactly the same. I tryed salt treatment stage one with frequent water changes replacing the salt I removed when adding the new water.  When that did not work I tryed stage 2. Then stage three. I even tryed dosing my tank with meds. Nothing seemed to work.  None of my other tetras looked ill either and my water parameters were on point. Sorry I couldnt help more.