# My tank has ich! :(



## isimek (Jun 9, 2010)

I noticed ich on my clown loaches, angelfish and one gourami today. 

I am sooo paranoid that i will end up killing all my fish trying to treat it, or at least my loaches.

My tank is a 55gallon planted tank. I have 4 Three Spot Gourami, 4 young Angelfish, 5 young clown loaches, 1 bristlenose pleco, 1 otto cat, 1 cory cat, and 3 guppies.

The tank is usually at 77-78 degrees but since I noticed the ich I am raising it a few degrees. So far to only 82 degrees. 

How do I wipe this out? I know clown loaches are sensitive to ich treatment... and they are my favorite fish.


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## Ponyo (Jul 24, 2010)

I'm sorry to hear this. I just discovered that my fish probably have Ich too, I can't see any white spots yet, but my platies have been rubbing or flicking against plants and ornaments. One of them is also hiding in a corner a lot. I plan to raise the temperature, as you have done, but I'm not sure how high I should go or for how long. I hope this thread yields some good info.


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## aunt kymmie (Jun 2, 2008)

My advice (and speaking from experience) is to leave the tank temp where it normally is. Get either Aquarisol or Kordon's Rid Ich+. Use only at 1/2 strength and follow the directions to the letter. I've treated ich successfully this way, with not one fish loss. I keep clown and yoyo loaches, otos and a pictus...all sensitive fish to meds and they were just fine. (Salt/heat has never worked for me)
I will always use this method to treat ich. Good luck!


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## Ponyo (Jul 24, 2010)

Will Aquarisol or Kordon's Rid Ich hurt live plants and snails?


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## aunt kymmie (Jun 2, 2008)

Ponyo said:


> Will Aquarisol or Kordon's Rid Ich hurt live plants and snails?


Not on the plants, not sure about inverts. The meds do not contain copper so I would think it safe but I don't know.


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## isimek (Jun 9, 2010)

i had planned to go get ich medication today. 

I looked in the tank about an hour ago and noticed that my angelfish had spawned. 

Will the ich medication affect this? Should I separate the fish?


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## aunt kymmie (Jun 2, 2008)

If it was my tank (and it's not) I wouldn't separate the fish. Once one fish has ich they are all infected, as is the tank. Your Angelfish will spawn again. I'm sure treating with meds will effect the outcome of the spawn but I'd rather save my adults than lose a batch of fry. Just my 2 cents.


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## LisaC144 (Oct 22, 2009)

+1. Great advice, Kym. I also treat with RidIch+ and never had a loss. Kepp the temperature where it is. it will only stress the fish more by increasing heat. Like Kymmie said, treat at HALF strength for the duration stated. Treat for an additional 3 days after all signs of Ich have vanished, The only way to kill Ich is in the free-swimming stage when it will not be visible to the eye. Keep all the fish in the tank when medicating. Once you have a mated pair of Angelfish, they will spawn twice a month. You'll have another spawn soon. I know from experience ;-)


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## Russell (Jun 28, 2010)

I have never treated ich with meds but, I may in the future considering the success stories here. I use salt and heat and it will work but you have to go further than you might be comfortable with for it to work. The most common ich strain struggles to survive above 84 degrees and all ich strains are heat sensitive however some strains are resistant up to 90 degrees. This means the minimum heat for treating ich in a tropical tank is 84 degrees but success is not guaranteed until above 90 degrees. Even then it is impossible to catalog and test the characteristics of every single strain and there may be strains resistant to temperatures above 90 degrees. Now to the issue of salt, one tablespoon per 5 gallons as is written on the side of the aquarium salt box isn't going to cut it. You are going to need 2-3 tablespoons per each gallon. I have treated tanks in this manner with many fish none ever showed signs of stress although I did have a fish die that was the first to show symptoms and another jumped out once during treatment. I know he jumped out because of stress but there never were any visual signs of stress. So salt and heat does work but there are drawbacks.
I have always chosen this method because I am wary of chemicals for fish. There aren't rigorous studies done on them and rarely are there any long term studies done for them. Some fishkeepers like myself worry about the long term effects of these chemicals there have been claims that they cause fish sterility and other undesirable conditions. I don't necessarily believe these claims but I don't disbelieve them all either. 
Also a little side info on salt, there are studies that show salt is an effective treatment and an effective co-treatment with antibiotics for bacterial infections. The study I saw was on commercially raised catfish. Salt works because complex organisms like fish can control their internal chemistry and counteract osmosis to maintain proper salt levels in their body provided the difference isn't too great and therefore the effect of osmosis too strong. Simple organisms like bacteria, fungus, parasites, worms, and flukes do not have this ability and will absorb the salt which in turn disrupts their biological processes and harms or kills them. Also, it is an irritant to freshwater fish and will encourage slime production which helps to protect wounds from infection and provide a barrier against parasites. I do not advocate its use as a general aquarium tonic. But, it is effective against a multitude or diseases if you are willing to raise the level high enough. It is inexpensive. It never expires. And it has uses outside of the aquarium.


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## redchigh (Jan 20, 2010)

Salt is highly toxic to loaches. Go with the Ridich.

I've used salt and head to treat my planted livebearer tank, and I got it up to 90F and 3.5 TBSP of salt per gallon...
No plants died, and ich disappeared overnight. (Still have to treat for a week minimum though).

I've never heard that heat kills ich... That's interesting. Totally goes against the mechanics that I thought were at work. This is the way I had it worked out-

Ich, like fish, are cold blooded. Their metabolism increases with temperature.
Ich have a complex 3-stage live cycle, and the cysts on the fish and the eggs are immune to treatments. The parasite is only vulnerable in it's free-swimming stage.
Raising the temperature makes them multiply faster, but they spend less time in the resistant life cycles and move to the free-swimming stage faster, which helps the medication work...


Of course, I agree with you that salt and heat are both good treatments for a myriad of diseases...Not as a general tonic, and not for loaches (Or any other scaleless fish)

*shrug*


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## aunt kymmie (Jun 2, 2008)

Nor is that high temp healthy for many fish, such as Denison Barbs. I'm not sure how shortened their life spans would be subjected to such heat but I would think it would knock quite a few years off of their lives. I would suspect that kind of heat would negatively impact the lives of many of the fish we keep. Here's some interesting info from a post by Byron:

"Salt is detrimental to freshwater fish and plants in varying degrees. To understand why, we must understand what salt does in water.

Salt makes the water more dense than the same water without salt. The aquarium contains water. The bodies of fish and plant leaves also contain water [just as we do--we are, what is it, 90-some percent water?]. The water in the aquarium and the water in the fish/plant are separated by a semi-permeable layer which is the cell. Water can pass through this cell. When either body of water is more dense, the other less-dense body of water will pass through the membrane to equalize the water on both sides.

Water is constantly passing through the cells of fish by osmosis in an attempt to equate the water inside the fish (which is more dense) with the water in the aquarium. Put another way, the aquarium water is diluting the fish's body water until they are equal. Freshwater fish regularly excrete this water through respiration and urination. This is the issue behind pH differences as well as salt and other substances. It increases the fish's work--the kidney is used in the case of salt--which also increases the fish's stress in order to maintain their internal stability. Also, the fish tends to produce more mucus especially in the gills; the reason now seems to be due to the irritant property of salt--the fish is trying to get away from it.

I have an interesting measurement for fish. Dr. Stanley Weitzman, who is Emeritus Research Scientist at the Department of Ichthyology of the Smithsonian Institute in Washington and an acknowledged authority on characoid fishes, writes that 100 ppm of salt is the maximum for characins, and there are several species that show considerable stress leading to death at 60 ppm. 100 ppm is equal to .38 of one gram of salt per gallon of water. One level teaspoon holds six grams of salt, so 1 tsp of salt per gallon equates to more than 15 times the tolerable amount. Livebearers have a higher tolerance (mollies sometimes exist in brackish water) so the salt may be safe for them.

Plants: when salt is added to the aquarium water, the water inside the plant cells is less dense so it escapes through the cells. The result is that the plant literally dries out, and will wilt. I've so far been unable to find a measurement of how much salt will be detrimental to plants; all authorities I have found do note that some species are more sensitive than others, and all recommend no salt in planted aquaria.

Now you know why I never recommend salt."


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## Russell (Jun 28, 2010)

I definately don't want to get into an argument about this but I've seen studies that contradict Byron's post with actual numbers and data not just some "Recognized Expert's" writings. I have also seen fish including amazonian catfish and tetra tolerate 3 tablespoons of salt per gallon for over 3 weeks while medicating and by the math in the post this is nearly 100 times the fatal level. Also on the subject of osmosis, fish naturally maintain a specific gravity higher than the fresh water they are in. Until you exceed this level there is no osmotic pressure. Also read your ich medicine's botlle many commercially prepared ich treatments contain in addition to copper, malachite green, or some other toxic heavy metal, SALT. Also I am from Florida and I have been in fresh water that was in the 90 degree range and all the fish weren't floating belly up. Like I said in my original post I do not reccomend salt for general purpose use in a fresh water aquarium and would lower the dosage to 1-2 tablespoons per gallon for tetra and loaches but, it is an effective disease treatment that is used by veterinarians, commercial fisheries, and government agencies and has been for over a century. I just don't want newcomers to the trade gettting scared away from one of the most effective and proven disease treatments for freshwater fish when I have seen the numbers that prove its effectiveness and witnessed the results myself.


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