Unknown Disease in Panda Corydoras?

[Angelshark8]

I cannot tell what is wrong with my corydoras if there is even anything wrong at all. Many of my cories have bloodied tail fins with sections which appear to have been torn off. Some are missing barbarels, and one has a reddened mouth as well. One of my corys was swimming really odd last week, so I treated it for parasites and it stopped swimming like that, but its still really bloody. One of my older female corys was also laying on her side a few minutes ago, and I removed her for possible treatment. She immediately perked up when I put the net in and has been doing nothing odd since, but I cannot tell. This started to happen after two major events.

My guppies have been dying off because their gene pool got all messed up, and I was left with one male male born on 9/11/2012. I bought two females and a younger male to keep the line going. All came from different sources. The male was from someone's aquarium that nuked, one is a regular female from the store, and one is a feeder from the store (good genes in those feeders even without the color). I treated all three, for bacterial infections without even showing symtoms and released them after four days. I would have quarantined them longer, but that is another story for why I was unable to. All three are doing well and show no signs.

I have started cleaning the water in my aquarium every two weeks now rather than weekly as well. I live in California and a drought is messing us up. The local reservoir is getting low, so I have been more sparing in my maintanance. Basically, we are running pretty low on water out here (driest year in recorded history), but that is also another story...

My cories also scrape against the substrate, but they have been doing this for about a year, and I have only had one death while I was away, so I think they are okay.

How should I address this issue? I not seen one of the eight in a few days, so I am getting pretty worried.

[madagascariensis]

It sounds a lot like if rot and septicaemia. Have you tested Your water parameters, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate lately? I bet that since you are cleaning less due to the drought, bad water quality may be doing this. Also what is the temperature around there?

[mommy1]

I agree with Madagascariensis. You might want to check the GH of your tap water and compare it to the GH of the tank. Fluctuating GH is very stressful on fish and drought conditions might change the GH of your tap water.

You may need to consider tearing the tank down until drought conditions improve and you are able to do the required water changes.

[Angelshark8]

I think you may be right, about one of the two. Only their fins are degrading for the most part however, so I think it may just be an odd looking fin rot. I will attempt to treat the school with one of my antibacterial medications.

Testing the water would be useless right now because if the water is toxic, which it likely is, I would be helpless to do anything about it. I am pushing my luck by changing the water every two weeks as it is in this drought. The farmers are suffering down here and because we produce about a fifth or the world's substantial food supplies, prices will rise if we do not get more rain. The rainy season is almost over, so it looks like I am going to have to wait for next year for more abundant water changes. The weather service here actually made a puddle app where you can take pictures of your fun the the very little rain that has been falling and share them (probably an attempt to increase moral).

Can you explain to me the process of "tearing down the tank". I do not want to get rid of my fish, and I have nowhere to put any fish. My church doe have a pond, but everything would die out there from the cold or those mosquitofish. I will thin my corys if that is needed, but that probably will not help. Also, water changes are probably going to be every 3-4 weeks. because I have heard rumors that more server rationing may need to start soon.

I want to keep my shoal alive because I have just been breeding them from the first four I bought. The same with the guppies, but I think the old male doesn't have enough steam in him to mate with any of the new females. I will just put him in only with her in an empty tank for a day or two so he can easily get to her easily, but that is another story (wow; a lot of stories :D)

[madagascariensis]

Look into chemical filtration like carbon or purigen.

[Angelshark8]

I have biological, chemical, and mechanical filtration in my aquarium, but it has not helped a lot. I actually have too many panda corys because as I mentioned, they breed, and their fry hide in this one rock pile around a java fern. I cannot get them to stop very easily so I ended up with eight.
Also, one of the guppies I bought apparently brought ich into my aquarium, so now I need to go to the store tomorrow and buy more medicine. Are aquariums supposed to get infected this often, because it seems my aquarium gets something every 3-6 months. The golden female guppy is the only one infected, but I do not want those parasites to spread. Well, I guess I need to put the corys back and treat them when the parasites are gone to prevent recontamination D: . I hope they last, but I still do not know what their disease is, and I have not started treating them because I was only able to catch 5/7 yesterday. I guess I will do it again in a week or whenever the ich is annhilated.

[Angelshark8]

Also, I forgot to give the specifications of my aquarium

20 Gallons

1 Betta (temporary; in a net)
4 Neon Tetras
2 Otocinclus
8 Panda Corydoras (only wanted 4)
4 Guppies

[madagascariensis]

chemical filtration media is supposed to be replaced every so often. stuff like secahem purigen absorb bad stuff from water and once saturated, have to be replaced or re-charged.
I am actually surprised you go so long without a constant onslaught of disease without a quarantine tank. most store fish are sick with something, and most aquarists use extensive quarantine procedures to
keep the rest of their stock healthy.

[Angelshark8]

I change the chemical filtration monthly as specified. Should I change it more?

My parents will not let me get any more aquariums, and I tried using a plastic container once, and they did not like it. Now I just use a little things, to treat everything I buy for bacteria outright. I would use my bacteria, fungal, and parasite meds, but I do not want to push my luck by medicating them for four day.

[madagascariensis]

I highly recommend you talk with your parents. keep in mind a quarantine tank is small(5 gallons or so) and temporary(set up for a few weeks max). there arent many other options
to prevent disease from constantly invading your tank.
Your one time dose method currently is ineffective with ridding fish of pathogens. for one, antibiotics need to be used over multiple days to kill everything. a one dose treatment will kill the majority of bacteria, but the remainder will
just emerge resistant to the medication and be much, much harder to treat next time round. many parasites(including ich) are immune to medications when embedded on the fish, and as only a single stage of their life
is vulnerable to medications. you'd need to repeat treatment multiple times to get any effect. a one time treatment also will not affect anything inside the fish, so internal worms and protozoa slip by completely unscathed.

when you are treating anything you also should remove any chemical media, as it is indiscriminate in what it absorbs.