Copper sulphate!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dear Prof,

Recently i read a book on diseases and found out my molly has dropsy and it said the cure was copper sulphate.So i asked my science teacher if i could have some.She gave me about 100g and i put 10g in a small jebo tank.now the plants stems have darkened,leaves have gone pale and im rely worried because my teacher also told me that they used copper sulphate in the army to prevent mens hormones going crazy now im worried my fish wont breed!

Is any of this true Prof Bellstedt?

Thankx for helping:bigsmile:

Take care

 

Dear DS DG,

I fear that the book that you looked at was severely outdated as copper sulphate as an aquarium treatment belongs in the museum. Copper sulphate in the amounts previously used may be mildly antibacterial against the dropsy, but for the rest of the system it is toxic. It will kill snails, damage the reproductive system of fishes and will intoxicate the plants as you have told us. I would do a number of large 50% water changes over the next couple of days to get rid of it. I would also use a water treatment most of which are specifically geared to bind toxic ions such as copper. I would use one of the medications from waterlife, tetra or sera for the treatment of dropsy, but forget about copper suphate.

Unfortunately, you must tell your teacher that this army treatment was just as rumour as many things were in the army way back then.....

I hope that your aquarium will recover.

Kind regards,

Dirk