Need Advice on My Persistant Ich

[lizard]

Hello, all.

As I've previously mentioned, my Neons have ich. I had CopperSafe in the water for about 18 days, at a half to three-quarters dose. There's still some CopperSafe in the water now, but I did a partial w/c the other night and didn't have any CopperSafe left to add. The Neons still have ich. I haven't seen it totally disappear off of all fish at any time during this treatment. No other fish in the tank have ich. I don't really have a way to go get more CopperSafe right now, as our car has decided to quit working. I do have malachite green, but from the bit of reading I've done, it's not at all good for plants. And I know it's not good to switch meds around, either, but the CopperSafe doesn't seem to be working. I'm wondering if I should pull my other ten gallon out of storage, put the Neons on there, and treat them with malachite green. Husband wouldn't be thrilled about a *third* tank being set up, but he'd understand and wouldn't mind *too* much, 'cause it'd be a temporary situation. Oh, the tank temperature has been kept around 80* for the last couple weeks.

So, what do you all think? Should I try to get more CopperSafe and keep going with that, even though I've seen no signs of improvement in the nearly three-weeks I've been using it? Should I put the Neons in a quarantine tank and treat them with the malachite green? If so, do they need to be given a half-dose?

Edit: Or should I just raise the temp up to around 85* for a week to ten days and see if that works? I have Neons, Kuhlis, Panda & Pepper Corys, and an Oto in the tank.

Thanks for any comments or suggestions. They're much appreciated

Pamela
aka Married LIzard

 

[Bustacapp]

Ive had the same problem your having and after a bit of googling ive found out this great information on the parasite.

ick matures on the fish under the skin as a "cyst" (stage one)after a few days (depends on the temperature of the tank) it falls to the bottom and into the gravel from there it reaches another stage where it becomes kind of like a egg then the final stage the "egg" burst open with 100s if not 1000s of parasites which then become free swimming till they find there host. the parasite itself (from what ive read) can only be killed during its free swimming stage so its very important to keep the affected tank medicated for a few days after you stop seeing the ick and to take all the carbon out of your filter. I just today found out about this info myself i hope this helps and wish i had more to offer on this terrible plague.

on another note im not sure but i think copper and salt and such is mainly more of a prevenative than a cure i would go with the common ick cures such as rid ick or quick cure unfourtunatly they stain the silicone

Edit: Also if one fish is infected the whole tank is infected and setting up a third tank would just mean you would have to medicate 2 tanks for it .you may notice your fish scratching thereself on ornaments and such (mine do all the time poor fellas) this is the first stage of ick at its earliest my mistakes have been once i no longer see the ick i stop using the meds only to find a huge outbreak of it the next day or so im goina continually medicate my tank for 3-4 days after i no longer see the ick and also do 50% water changes every other day hopefully this will work for me ill keep ya posted though

 

[lizard]

I have two things I can/want to do to treat the ich. Does one sounds better than the other?

I just put some carbon in my filter. I figure I'll let it run like that for 24 hours, then I'm thinking of adding Malachite Green. Two issues with malachite green: 1) MG box says not to use it on Tetras or scale-less fish (both of which I have) and 2) I've read it's not good for plants. Soooo, do I use something like half or three-quarters the recommended dose? Should I remove the plants to another tank for a few days (what a pain!)?

My other idea (and my preferred one, but not sure how effective it'll be and whether or not the Corys and Loaches and plants (Java Fern & Moss, Amazon Sword, Hygrophilia polysperma, Banana Plant) can withstand the higher temps) is to not use the MG, raise the temp to 85*, and do frequent water changes - continuing for at least a few days after I don't see anymore signs.

Comments, concerns, suggestions?

Thanks so much!

Pamela
aka Married Lizard

 

[yhbae]

Although I cannot strongly recomend (since I only did it once and it worked for me), I did treat the whole tank using high temp method. 85F isn't high enough though - that will probably accerate the whole process of spreading ich. You really need to go 87F or higher. (I think I used 89F, if I remember correctly). Not sure if your plants will handle this level of temperature, however...

During my experience of this treatment, I managed to cure all fishes without loosing any.... In other boards, some moderators swear by this method, so I tried it... Oh, I had java moss and java fern - both did fine.

 

[blue_ram]

The Temperature is way too low; at 80 degrees, you're only helping the ich. The fastest way to kill ich is to crank up the temperature to around 90-92 degrees and add 1tb spoon of salt per gallon of water. If the fish were healthy to begin with, most fish will survive. I see two problem with lizard's fish though. Khulis, Corys, and Otos don't like salt. Khulis, don't like high temperature. Second best medication is copper safe, but since you don't have any.... malchite green will have to do. I'm not so sure how effective it is. But do get more copper safe or rid-ich.

If you're worried about the plants, move the fish to QT. Use malchite green at half-strength, and raise the temperature to about 86 degrees. Constantly monitor the fish for signs of distress. Also monitor the water for ammonia. For the planted tank, raise the temperature to about 90 degrees. Unless you have a cold water plant, they should be fine.

 

[Discomafia]

Yea, at least 86F and make sure it stays that way for a while...

 

[yhbae]

Another small detail - since I had cories in my tank as well (they had ich as well), I didn't use salt. The 4 panda cories are still with me, almost a year after treatment... I guess usage of salt is optional...

 

[Elisabeth83]

I just went through treating ich and I managed to cure it in 8-9 days using JBL punktol which the active ingridient is malachite green. It was recommended to me to turn my heaters up to 80 and in doing so it would speed the lifecycle of the ich to be over in 5 days.

In one of my tanks I treated I have a bristlenose pleco who also had ich and I researched and researched and found out that if you must treat do half the dose on scale-less fish. That is what I did and my pleco is still alive and doing just fine.

I'm not sure about the live plants though I have Amazon swords and they were in the tanks during treatment and I have noticed the leaves getting thinner in some spots but I'm not sure if that was due to the ich medication or if I just stink at keeping aquarium plants alive

Good Luck

 

[NinjaSmurf]

I wouldn't move your fish because this will stress them out and make the ich worse. I'd crank up the heat and do frequent water changes, being careful about stressing the fish. My pictus got it the first day after I got it and this worked out fine, it was gone in two days. I've heard that stress makes fish prone to actually developing ich, so maybe you could fins out why they are so stressed out? And be careful on the meds with the cories, I'd hate for you to lose them. From what I've seen neons seem to be really prone to ich anyways, but I hope yours get better soon.

 

[Elisabeth83]

Oh sorry forgot to add that I treated every other day and on the days in-between I did 25% water changes and gravel vacs to try and get as many spores as I could.

With the medicaition I used your supposed to do a 50% water change before each follow up dose but for 2 of the tanks I only did half doses so I only did 25% water changes.

HTH

 

[lizard]

Thanks, all!

I'm slowly raising the temperature up to at least 86*. I'm a little worried about the Kuhlis in that though...I'll watch 'em closely and see how they do. As far as a QT tank goes - the biggest empty tank I have is a ten-gallon, and I think putting all the fish in there would stress 'em out a lot, which wouldn't help the problem any If I did have a big enough QT tank, I'd definately move the fish to it, treat them with MG, then turn the temp on the planted tank up a ways.

I think they got stressed because the water temp was fluctuating a bit - I didn't have a heater in there all summer 'cause the tank stayed at a pretty steady temp, but the outdoor temps started cooling down, which in turn cooled down the apartment, which in turn cooled down the tank. Tried using the heater that came with the tank and found it didn't keep the temp steady. Had a bit of lag time before I was able to get out and get a new heater, so I think it was temp changes that caused the fish to stress. Now I have a heater, that's working well, so hopefully we won't have any more temp problems

Haven't seen ich on any fish but the Neons, but I've read that the ich can be on their gills, too. Perhaps that's why a couple of my Corys seem to be breathing fast/heavily?

I'd love to be able to add some salt to the tank, but with the Otos, Corys, and Loaches in there...well, I don't think they'd appreciate the salt much. So, for now we'll just go with higher temps and frequent water changes and see how that goes. I noticed last night that most of the ich spots have left the Neons... I'll keep you updated.

Thanks, again!

Pamela
aka Married Lizard

 

[BobK]

If the Ich spots are disappearing, that's great news. This means the parasite is in the free swimming stage. That is when they respond to the meds. I'm not sure about the other meds, but Rid Ich s/b used at 1/2 strenght for tetras and cories. I've heard you can use a small amount of salt for the cories, but it's like only 1 part per thousand. I'm not sure if that would do any good or not. Follow the instructions very closely and good luck. I never had much luck curing Tetra's of Ich. My cories survived and are doing great.

 

[lizard]

Amazing what those high temps will do Tank has been up around 86* for about a week now and I don't see any ich spots on my Neons anymore \/ Haven't for a number of days either. Yay!

The only trouble I had while the temperature was high was my Panda Cory dieing Not sure if it was related ot the higher temps or not, though.

Just wanted to let y'all know :

Edit: Guess I spoke to soon I went and looked at my fish again and few minutes ago and the Neons have ICH SPOTS AGAIN! They didn't have any yesterday or the day before or the day before.... How is it that ich can live at 86 or 88* for a week? I thought they couldn't tolerate temps over 85. Humph. Darn ich.

Pamela
aka Married Lizard

 

[gaya]

If you can afford $40 invest in a UV sterilizer. It’s not supposed to take care of everything I guess but I haven’t had a problem since I got one.
(now watch tomorrow I’ll have ick)

 

[minirock]

I found the best way by far is to raise temp and add salt, keep the light off. Find those meds just kill everything apart from the parasite!!!!

Had two breakouts of ich, lost a lot of fish first time, used king british med, killed all the plants, none of the fish liked it, would all lie at the bottom gasping for air, had 2 guppies that survived.

Second breakout i had ran of of med from the first time, and wasn't too sure about using it again anyway. So raised the temp and added salt, kept the light off. I was resigned to the fact that they were gonna all die. Just put some food in every morning not even loooking at. Very depressed about it all, quite new to fish keeping and was thinking about packing it in. After a week, thought i would turn the light on just to see how many were left, there they all were swimming fine.not a sign of ICH!! coundn't believe it!!!

Had another few little signs of ICH in my smaller tank upstairs, did the same and all fine!!