the time and seasoned water which has sat for a couple of days and been treated with a water conditioner if you have municipal water with chlorine and ammonia added, even daily 30-40% water changes of about the same temperature, are beneficial. That is removing the problem which compromised the guppy's immune system and allowed the bacteria to do harm in the first place.
Tailrot is nature's way of telling you the water is too polluted. Sometimes, I really hate "nature's way."
By the way, you are to be applauded for moving your male guppy to quarantine! That is not always easy, but it is wise. Hopefully he is located where he is still consistently about as warm as he was. :)
That may be fungus on the tail. Fungus is nature's way of cleaning up dead tissue. That needs to be lifted off, so the live tissue can grow and heal.
You can try a salt water bath where you put the fish into saltwater for 10 minutes. Remove it back to it's tank sooner if it shows distress or the gills are really, really working. Hopefully the fungus should life off and you can treat the fish with militant water change and possibly add an antibiotic, as per manufacturer's instructions
10G of salt for a Litre of water is one recommendation. Ok, since ...
1 level tablespoon Salt = Approx. 25 g or 1 oz
1 liter = 0.26417205 gallon
Then if you were to take a gallon of seasoned aquarium water, you could add 1-2 tablespoons of water to a gallon of water for a 1 to 2% solution. (Maybe pre-dissolve the salt in a smaller, soap-less, container, "shake and bake" and add it to rest of that gallon.) If you are using rock crystals, the solution may be a little more dilute. If you are using small grained feed or aquarium salt, the salinity may be a tad higher.
I have seen people who just netted and dipped the fish into that salt solution. If you are right there, monitoring for stress and will move that fish out before 30 minutes, that can work.
A kinder, gentler, salt bath is to put you fish in a container with just a quart or so of tank water. (Don't feed them for a day before this - so they don't regurgitate food and foul the water - or watch carefully with siphon tube at the ready.) Add a little bit of that salt water, maybe 25% of what is in there with the fish, every 30-60 minutes, until the fish is used to that full salinity.
Then after 30-60 minutes, drop the water level way down and gradually add tank water until the fish is used to the tank water again, which makes up 90+ % of what he is in.
This was your day off. Right? ;)
All the best!
u.s.
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