I've got a pure Bluegill as well as a 9-10" Chocolate pleco currently in my tank, I used to have a smallmouth bass but no longer. both my fish have fish lice, The bluegill has several 'lice' on his fins, while the pleco only has one at the moment. I am going to treat my tank, however my lfs do not have very good chemicals/medecations to treat external parasites and such. All I've been able to find were tablets, which take one tablet per ten gallons and with a 125G tank and looking at atleast a few treatments to get rid of the fish lice in particular going to tablet route is going to be expensive. I think I'm just going to buy Prazipro off amazon and that will be at my doorstep within two days.
Anyways, A few questions I have for you all. My subsrtate is pool filter sand, and I already know if I want to completely kill off all the living fish lice/larvae I'm going to need to get rid of the sand, I'm sure there are tons of larvae within my substrate. I'm not familiar with doing treatments on tanks whatsoever, as I've never needed to do them, my fish have always been fine without any problems. I do not run carbon at all in my filters (Two aquaclear 110's), Don't even own any for that matter.. but I'm assuming once it's all said and done, and completely treated I will have to throw some carbon in my filters to get rid of the prazipro.. am I right by saying this or will I be fine without the carbon?
Also, My tank is completely cycled and I don't want my bacteria to die off when I'm taking the sand out.. I was thinking about completely draining my tank and taking all the sand I could get out and then refilling it up, I'm sure I'll still get a mini cycle out of it, but if I can keep the bacteria in both my filters alive for a few hours in the meantime I think I will have no problem getting all the bacteria I need established again.
I am going to be getting rid of the bluegill once I start the treatment, as I'm switching over to tropical fish (Im an avid fisherman and LOVE native fish, but I'm done dealing with them.. haha) so all that will be in my tank throughout the treatment will be the 10" Chocolate pleco.
Any and all help to get me through this treatment process of eliminating the fish lice, getting my sand out, etc etc would be greatly appreciated!
P.S. after it's all said and done I think I may go with a bare bottom tank with lots of driftwood, but I've always had either gravel or like I currently do sand so I'm not quite sure what I want to do.
Anyways, A few questions I have for you all. My subsrtate is pool filter sand, and I already know if I want to completely kill off all the living fish lice/larvae I'm going to need to get rid of the sand, I'm sure there are tons of larvae within my substrate. I'm not familiar with doing treatments on tanks whatsoever, as I've never needed to do them, my fish have always been fine without any problems. I do not run carbon at all in my filters (Two aquaclear 110's), Don't even own any for that matter.. but I'm assuming once it's all said and done, and completely treated I will have to throw some carbon in my filters to get rid of the prazipro.. am I right by saying this or will I be fine without the carbon?
Also, My tank is completely cycled and I don't want my bacteria to die off when I'm taking the sand out.. I was thinking about completely draining my tank and taking all the sand I could get out and then refilling it up, I'm sure I'll still get a mini cycle out of it, but if I can keep the bacteria in both my filters alive for a few hours in the meantime I think I will have no problem getting all the bacteria I need established again.
I am going to be getting rid of the bluegill once I start the treatment, as I'm switching over to tropical fish (Im an avid fisherman and LOVE native fish, but I'm done dealing with them.. haha) so all that will be in my tank throughout the treatment will be the 10" Chocolate pleco.
Any and all help to get me through this treatment process of eliminating the fish lice, getting my sand out, etc etc would be greatly appreciated!
P.S. after it's all said and done I think I may go with a bare bottom tank with lots of driftwood, but I've always had either gravel or like I currently do sand so I'm not quite sure what I want to do.
