My Fish Have Ich?!

[Phenz]

i've got 2 rams and 7 tetras in a 20 gallon tall, heavily planted tank.

I called up the LFS and they said they have a medication to fight ich.

apparently it will kill all the plants in my tank?

he suggested i get a hospital tank with an air stone and treat them in there.

that means i need to get a new tank, an air pump, make that fish food filter, a heater and then get the medication?


if white spot is free swimming in the main tank, won't my fish get sick when i transfer them back?

 

[Sambo]

i've got 2 rams and 7 tetras in a 20 gallon tall, heavily planted tank.

I called up the LFS and they said they have a medication to fight ich.

apparently it will kill all the plants in my tank?

he suggested i get a hospital tank with an air stone and treat them in there.

that means i need to get a new tank, an air pump, make that fish food filter, a heater and then get the medication?


if white spot is free swimming in the main tank, won't my fish get sick when i transfer them back?

i had whitespot a week ago, and i used treatment but it didnt kill any of my plants.

 

[andywg]

i've got 2 rams and 7 tetras in a 20 gallon tall, heavily planted tank.

I called up the LFS and they said they have a medication to fight ich.

apparently it will kill all the plants in my tank?

he suggested i get a hospital tank with an air stone and treat them in there.

that means i need to get a new tank, an air pump, make that fish food filter, a heater and then get the medication?


if white spot is free swimming in the main tank, won't my fish get sick when i transfer them back?

Ich requires a fish to host on. If there are no fish in the tank for about 10 days then all of the ich will die without being able to find a host. The downside to this is the loss of part of the bacteria colony that may occur without a food supply of ammonia. You can try either adding ammonia/flake food or moving the filter over to the hospital tank as well.

The best site on the web I have found for ich knowledge is this one.

 

[black angel]

You can treat the whole tank using protozin. It doesnt harm anything in the tank apart from the parasites.
Turn the heat slowly up to 82f and add extra air.

 

[Phenz]

i got some king british white spot control and bought a small tank and an air pump.

I made the filter out of an air pum and a fish food container - the method thats pinned on this forum. its sitting in the 3 litre tank which is floating in the original aquarium, duct taped to the side, to regulate the heat effectively.

i've added the medecine but the rams are just sitting on the bottom of the tank. i sprinkled some food in and put gravel in the bottom. i've switched off all the lights hoping that might help.

 

[jgray152]

I thought I had ick before cause I swa some white spots so I put the 2 fish in a hospital tank, I was going to treat the infected tank too.

After looking at the fish I decided to add some MelaFix, which is just a natural treatment for bacterial and fungus infections. Low and behold the spots went away. Im guessing it was velvet? Usually I added salt but I decided not to this time.

So are you completly sure its ick? I have delt with velvet or similar before and always at first though it was ick.

 

[Phenz]

i'm not positive that its ich, i've had 3 panda corys die within a week of entering the tank. they looked to have slightly withered fins but i'm not 100% sure of that as i hadn't studied them heavily before they were lying at the bottom of my tank.

these are my first dead fish and don't know what to attribute after death rather than before.

 

[LisaLQ]

Do your fish actually have white spot, or are you just guessing? Because if so, you could be treating them and stressing them out for no reason, or it could be a different illness and they could die from getting the wrong treatment.

 

[hogan53]

could be fin rot needs to be treated with api prima fix for 7 days and melafix to help fin regenaration.

 

[jgray152]

NOOOO API! (Atleast I will never again use it)

I used that crap once and it made my fish 1000000 times worse within a few days. Although I may have treated for the wrong thing, I have NEVER seen a med make a fish so bad within a couple days before. Even if I was treating for the wrong thing with other meds, they would not get worse like with API. After water changes, the fish got better, but died a few weeks later. This was months ago.

Crap is horrible, to much color dye, stains everything and some of their meds STINK.

I Highly reccomend MelaFix though. Thats my drug of choice.

 

[Phenz]

i'm certain my fish have white spot. they're much worse today.

I've got a pair of rams in a 3 litre tank with a filter and heater with gravel on the bottom and medication.

They look like they haven't had a swim since they've been in there.

Has anyone used King British white spot control?

its active ingredients are; malachite green, acriflavine, quinine sulphate. and its luminecent green.

i'd feel happier if i put my rams back in the bigger tank, and medicated the whole thing. will it kill my plants and stain everything?

 

[black angel]

Personally I would treat the tank and fish as a whole. 3 litres is so small it will only cause stress and then they may even die.
Your plants will be fine with the protozin or King british.
Dont worry about the tanks cycle either you can sort that out after.
Add the meds at night so you keep the lights off for at least 12 hours as this gives the meds time to work.
Keep the temp at 80f and do gravel vacs each day before the next lot of meds go in.

 

[Phenz]

i've got the temp up at 83F cause i heard that the higher the better and this seems to be acceptable for both the neons and the rams.

i'll transfer the fish to the larger tank, add medication - says to dose every 48hours.

i've got an airstone so i'll have that going full whack all the time.

i'll change the light cycle to 12 on 12 off

hopefully they'll get better.

 

[black angel]

Make sure to keep the aeration up and i would only have the lights on for a few hours each day.

 

[Phenz]

these are the best photos i could get of the white spot.