Jo Bohannon,

It is good that you are trying to get your pH down. If your problem is
Flexibacter columnaris as speculated by Gregory, you are only making it
happy by keeping the pH in the higher regions for it likes this condition.
Also, if you have Flexibacter columnaris using salt (NaCl) is not a good
idea either because this animal likes environments high with sodium.
Instead of using NaCl you would be better off using the Salt CaCl2. It is a
little more expensive, but has no sodium Even though Flexibacter columnaris
likes harder water it does not do well with CaCl2 (Calcium Chloride) in the
water. Stay away from Magnesium salts also.

Dips in PP or copper sulfate can be effective at the start of the infection,
but in advanced cases Oxytetracycline is a good water borne antibiotic.

HTH

Tom L.L.
"Jo Bohannon-Grant MD" wrote in message
...
Today is the 5th day since I discovered white sores on some of my fishies.
I think it's fungus.

Fishies living in upper pond, approx 1900 gal; total system 2550 gal.
Pond was enlarged last year but smaller pond still not finished, so I
have not added plants and I put up a fish gate at the step-down stream
to keep fish out of it.

Water crystal clear, no algae, plants healthy. No ammonia, no nitrites
or nitrates.
pictures at:
http://community.webshots.com/user/skndeep1

*I have added malachite green/formalin three times on consecutive days.
*I have added rock salt slowly to increase salt concentration from 0.02%
to 0.1%.
*pH over 9. Some mortar must be leeching into the water. I added 16 oz
of muriatic acid, which did not touch the pH but dropped the kH from 80
to 40. I then went out and bought a pound of "pH Down"
(powdered sodium bisulfate anhydrous) and have added a third of the jar
without it lowering the pH, but the kH is back up to 80.
*Today I bought some antibiotic fish food and fed the fishies once. They
are eating well.

The fish whose sores I am tracking appear to be getting a little better-
the sores have less white and aren't getting deeper, BUT I see
previously unaffected fish with new white areas on their sides.

I bought a 20 gal "plantainer" at Lowe's and a 10 gal $9 aquarium at
Walmart, but the fishies are too fast for me to catch, so please don't
tell me to catch the fish and treat them in a hospital tank! I suppose I
could catch them if I drained the ponds, but I would prefer not to do
that.

so-
what do I do now?
How high can I get the salt concentration without hurting my flora?
How do I get the pH down without losing my buffering capacity?

thanks for any advice!

Jo Bohannon
Richmond, Va