Treating Ick With Bgk, Clown Loaches And Shrimp

[JonathanWebb]

Help. I have a black ghost knife, four yo-yo loaches and two Clown loaches among other fish which are not as important for this topic. My tank has ick for the first time, the tank is 2 1/2 years old. Given that these are sensitive fish I have been doing a lot of reading but depending on what I read I am getting conflicting information. Please share any well founded knowledge or experiences with treating sensitive and scaleless fish as well as shrimp with ICK. In case it's important, it's a 55 gallon tank with live plants (not sure what kind.) Also note that the clown loaches and BGK are small babies that I have only had for about a month. I realize that in time they will need a larger tank. Thanks in advance!

 

[Baccus]

Ideally if you could remove the shrimp (not always possible depending on their numbers and size) then its easy enough to treat loaches and other scaleless fish with half dose medications designed for a particular illness. Half dosing may mean you need to treat the fish for longer, but I have found it works fine. You can also raise the water temperature in the tank, but I am not inclined to do this because most medications as already going to in some way stress the fish and raising the temperature will lower available oxygen in the tank causing more stress.
I have tried a couple of medications and so far found them safe with cherry shrimp (well no immediate deaths or other signs of distress or noticeable early death), but I do not know what would be available to you in Canada in the medications department.

 

[NickAu]

Hi sorry to hear that
 
With the elevated temp method you need to keep the temp at 86 for 2 weeks, Add an airstone,  Vacuum the gravel at least 2 times a week and make sure that the water you took out is replaced with treated and heated water, Make sure its 86 deg, also try and ensure that you have no cold spots in the tank.
 
Due to my stocking I have looked into this.
I have a Betta Kuhli Loaches a Baby Albino BN Pleco Red Cherry Shrimp all in the same heavily planted tank and there is no way I could catch anything but the Betta even if I had to, If worst came to worst and I did have an out break the above method is the first thing I would try.
 
I even have a plan for if worst comes to worst pulling the tank apart enough to net all the fish move them to a Qtank and treat them , Then reassemble the tank and starve the ich out, Shrimp cant get it anyway.

 

[nic1]

Hello,
I have used esha exit and esha 200 together for an out break and I had loaches shrimp and corys at the time, I had no casualties and white spot had cleared up, although I had to drag the medicated period out for a lot longer as I used a little less than recommended.
There were no ill effects either. Hope this helps. 

EDIT: Esha  '2000'

 

[Ltygress]

This is three days late, but try Paraguard. It takes care of viral symptoms, bacteria infections, fungus infections, and parasite infections, and it's safe for baby fish and invertebrates. I've personally used it ON shrimp (Red Cherry Shrimp) who had problems with no ill effects, as well as a new batch of betta fry.