how much salt for ick?

[andruboz]

trying to help somebody out on another board. he added 3 teaspoons to a 60+ gallon tank. seems like a drop in the bucket. whats the proper amount per 10 gallons to help treat ick?

[SBA]

1 - 2 tsp per gallon, added slowly is the advice that has worked for me.

looking through past posts on this forum though some people use upto 1tablespoon per gallon, which seems like an awful lot to me, but what do I know??

[wetmanNY]

Remember that 1 tablespoon = 3 teaspoons. If you don't draw a knifeblade across the top of the measuring spoon, you could have 20% more salt than you think...

[beviking]

Originally posted by SBA
1 - 2 tsp per gallon, added slowly is the advice that has worked for me.

looking through past posts on this forum though some people use upto 1tablespoon per gallon, which seems like an awful lot to me, but what do I know??

Ditto!

[aquariumfishguy]

I usually recommend one rounded tablespoon for every 5 gallons...thats if your using the salt to treat the tank.

[Nic & Ric]

Nice to see several people here using salt alone to treat ich. Seems a lot of people are quite skeptical about using salt alone to treat for parasites, which is a real shame. Not only is it not toxic to fish, not to mention carcinogenic to the fishkeeper, as all chemical treatments are, but it is also more effective and faster than any chemical treatment - and we've tried most of the popular ones in the past.

I've seen several sources claim that the 1 tablespoon per 5 gallons that is usually recommended on the aqarium salt package is insufficient for paracitic treatment, and that a 0.3% solution (about 1 tablespoon per gallon) is required. We have successfully treated ich once at not much more than 1 tablespoon per 5 gallons before though, so maybe ich is more vulnerable than other parasites. I'd split the difference and use around 1 teaspoon per gallon as most others here seem too. Just add it slowly, with divided dosages throughout the day, over the course of a couple days to be safe.

There's some excellent information on using salt for treating parasites here:

http://www.arborman.com/mistymt2.htm

Also, if you want to know exactly just how salt works so great at treating ich, there's a good explanation here:

http://www.fishdoc.co.uk/treatments/salt.htm

Basically, it works through osmosis...by increasing the salinity in the surrounding water, the water is drawn out of the parasite to the point of dehydrating to death, but it's not enough to do so to the fish which is much larger.

Ric