Cardinal tetras meds

[Acgelok]

Hi all.. as some of you know cards & neons are often bred in large heavely
medicated ponds in asian countries so they can ship large quantities to
suppliers in the U.S. and Can. But by the time they get to the customer the
meds are starting to wear off and the fish start dying. These fish are offered
for sale at reduced prices and thus are tempting. Some time ago someone
mentioned to slowly wean these fish off meds, sounded like a good idea!!! Now
what I would like to ask is, :what medication is recomended when placing these
fish in ones isolation tank:? and hopefully save most of them. It would be a
good way to start a nice shoal of perhaps 30 or 40 cardinals witch are usualy
rather costly in my neck of the woods. So if anyone out there is in the know
on the meds please let me and everyone know. I for one would appreciate it very
much regards ART

[Margolis]

"Acgelok" > wrote in message
...
> Hi all.. as some of you know cards & neons are often bred in large heavely
> medicated ponds in asian countries so they can ship large quantities to
> suppliers in the U.S. and Can. But by the time they get to the customer
the
> meds are starting to wear off and the fish start dying. These fish are
offered
> for sale at reduced prices and thus are tempting. Some time ago someone
> mentioned to slowly wean these fish off meds, sounded like a good idea!!!
Now
> what I would like to ask is, :what medication is recomended when placing
these
> fish in ones isolation tank:? and hopefully save most of them. It would be
a
> good way to start a nice shoal of perhaps 30 or 40 cardinals witch are
usualy
> rather costly in my neck of the woods. So if anyone out there is in the
know
> on the meds please let me and everyone know. I for one would appreciate it
very
> much regards ART


never heard of such a thing. I never medicate my tanks, and I never have a
problem with any of the cardinals or neons either. If you have problems
with them dying in the tank after "the meds wear off" then there is a
problem with the tank or water situation. It is not because of "meds
wearing off".

--

Margolis
http://web.archive.org/web/20030215212142/http://www.agqx.org/faqs/AGQ2FAQ.htm
http://www.unrealtower.org/faq

[Dr Engelbert Buxbaum]

Acgelok wrote:

> Hi all.. as some of you know cards & neons are often bred in large heavely
> medicated ponds in asian countries so they can ship large quantities to
> suppliers in the U.S. and Can. But by the time they get to the customer the
> meds are starting to wear off and the fish start dying. These fish are offered
> for sale at reduced prices and thus are tempting. Some time ago someone
> mentioned to slowly wean these fish off meds, sounded like a good idea!!! Now
> what I would like to ask is, :what medication is recomended when placing these
> fish in ones isolation tank:?

Normally fishes should not receive medication at all, under proper
aquarium conditions they should stay healthy as, by the way, they do in
the wild.

However, in my experience newly bought fishes are so stressed from
transport and cramped condition in dealer tanks that they are prone to
opportunistic infections. I have reduced my losses from 50% to near
nothing by using medicated food (TetraMedica, which contains
tetracyclin) during the first 10 days, then switching to normal food in
one go. Reducing the dose slowly is NOT recommended, because it
increases the likelyhood of bacterial resistance to antibiotics.

Note also that such opportunistic infections, once established in
newcommers, may spread to existing fish. This can be prevented by the
use of a quarantaine tank. I keep any new arrivals in quarantaine for 3
weeks, and add them to the main tank only if they stayed healthy.

Fortunately, once a tank is well established, adding new fishes is
required only rarely.