Wiped out tank... what to do next

[isu_guy]

am using a 20 gallon as a quarantine as I stock my 75. The last batch of fish (1 pleco, 1 angel, 3 platies) had an ich outbreak(or what I think is ich, its not super granular like I thought and have seen, but its sort of close). All parameters were fine. Noticed that one of the platies was hiding a lot, then the others started to as well. I lost the angel but didn't notice any ich right away. I finally discovered it and by the time I got home from work and had stopped for meds I lost all but one platy. I increased heat, cleaned the gravel, used the meds, added a bit of salt, gave the platy a salt bath(which I could have done wrong, I've never done one before). Now (hours later) he is swimming very irradically and I doubt will survive.

SO....
assuming he is a gonner, what is the best thing to do. Should I tear down the tank and wash everything out very well to rid it of anything that could be wrong. I can steal bacteria from my other filters and start small so that I can avoid needing to do a proper cycle.

Should I just jack the heat way up so that the life cycle of the ich speeds up and dies

Something else

-I just don't want to go through this again because I introduce fish into this environment
thanks in advance for your help

 

[Tempestuousfury]

It was probably velvet: a parasite similar to ich.

As for what to do... if th eonly problem is ich or velvet, all you have to do is increase the temp and add meds. Without the meds, the parasites will not die. The heat is to make the cysts break in order to get to the developing parasites on the fish.

 

[annka5]

Whitespot / itch cannot survive long (I think a couple of days) without a host once it is at the appropriate stage of its lifecycle. Not sure about velvet.
If I were you, i would use the meds, assuming they do no damage to filter bacteria. I would also add ammonia whilst the tank is sat without fish.