Not sure ich recovery is going well - need help

Tina, welcome to the forums! I assure you that we can all sympathize with your frustrations. To begin, would it be possible to get a few photos of the ill fish? I (and all the other regs. here) will feel better knowing that we're giving advice for the right disease.

Please describe how you've been dosing the salt. If it truly is ich, I would have expected some improvement to have been made with the salt and temperature regimen. It makes me wonder if perhaps you're fighting something else....

At this time, please rest easy on the pH issue. This is the least important parameter you're facing at the moment.

Great, we'll assume its ich with that characterisitic 'salt' like appearance. Here are just a few additional photos for comparison:


Ichthyophthirius


Oodinium (aka 'velvet')


Bacterial infection


Columnaris (a very virulent bacterial infection)


Ectoparasites

How exactly (and amount) have you been dosing the salt to the tank?

My recommendation is to stop using the QuickCure and resume the salt regimen. Here is a fantastic cut/paste from Lupin on the General Freshwater article page re: treatment of "white spot disease". I would follow the guidelines for addition of salt and temperature increase to the letter:

White Spot Disease
Synonyms:
Ich, Ick

Symptoms:
Early signs of white spot begin when fish flick themselves against rocks. They may also swimming in an odd behaviour as if they were trying to use the water to wash away an irritation. Some of the more common causes are stress, bad water conditions, live food that have been infected by the pathogens or already infected fish without quarantining it.

Description:
Ich is a protozoal infection that afflicts fish and can rapidly kill them, most often by damaging gill tissue. It is highly infectious and potentially lethal and manifests as tiny white spots all over the fish. The spots are no larger than grains of salt. The wide host range of this parasite is its life cycle, and speed of multiplication especially in a tropical aquarium. When you see the white spot on your fish, it is already too late for those ich particles to be avoided.

The organisms, trophonts goes through a life cycle of a small white spot feeding on your fish which drops off to the floor of your tank and encases itself in a cyst called tomont. While encased in a cyst, it divides into up to 2000 new mobile organisms called theronts. The cyst then ruptures, thus releasing the theronts which seek out a host to feed into. They must locate a host within 24 hours otherwise they will die. Only the mobile stage is vulnerable to treatments.

Ich will appear if the fish is stressed. Note that it acts more as a 'contaminant' and is not part of the tank's ecosystem. Any new fish should be quarantined for 2-4 weeks. Failing that will increase the risk of introducing diseases which wil affect other occupants. New fish are always possible carriers of diseases.

Treatment:
Salt
Increase the temperature to at least 84-86 degrees as much as the fish can tolerate. Add aquarium or table salt (dissolved in water) at a ratio of 2 teaspoons of salt per gallon of water in your tank. While waiting, it does not hurt to add a powerhead or airstone to increase the oxygen level. Over the first couple days, your fish will appear worse and will eventually recover as the treatment progresses. In most cases, ich will disappear on the sixth day. However, there is still a probability that some cysts have not yet ruptured so it is advisable to keep the treatment up for full ten days.

If you are not able to raise the temperature at all, you need to extend the treatment. At 85 degrees Fahrenheit, the life cycle of ich is quicker. The colder the temperature, the slower the life cycle thus the treatment will extend even longer than required.

Unfortunately many plants do not do well with this salt treatment and may appear to be failing but will usually come back in time. Removing them to a salt free environment after a thorough rinsing may save them, however they must be kept at the high temperature as well. When the cyst breaks up in the plant holding tank, the small parasites will be unable to find a host and will die within 24-48 hours. Ich is easily transferred to other fish tanks so do not share nets, heaters and wet hands between infected and non infected tanks. Fish in treatment appear to do better with a reduced feeding regimen.

When you look into a fish store's aquarium, their fish may appear healthy without any signs of disease. Ask how long the fish have been in the store and when the last time new fish were added to that tank. If it has been 2 weeks or more, your chances of getting disease free fish is high.

Clown loaches and young oscars are notorious for getting ich after they are transferred to your tank. These and many others can tolerate salt. If you are unsure about your fish’s tolerance for salt, be sure to look for answers in a reference book or ask an expert.

A salt test kit available at your local fish store will help you get the exact dosage. Something in the range of .2%, is where you want to be.

Other Treatments:
Malachite Green, Formalin

Authors:
Anythingfish
ChileRelleno
guppy
SkepticalAquarist.com
Tokis-Phoenix

naturegrl said:

Thank You DrVader for the info. I really appreciate your help. Here's the latest...

Our (entire community's) pleasure...

I really felt that I should quit the quick cure, do a big water change, put the carbon back in the filter and see what happens.

If you use carbon regularly in your filter, make sure you change it (replace it) very regularly. I'd say at least once every 1.5 weeks or so to make sure it doesn't start leaching contaminants back into the water. Many users (including myself) don't use carbon unless we're trying to remove a contaminant from the water column.

I stopped in my lfs and they agreed that we need to stop, take a break and see where we're at. He was concerned that maybe we are dealing with somehting else too.

I'm happy to say we have no more spots!

Great news, congrats! Remember that if it was ich, you should keep the salt treatment up for the full 10 days (see the instructions in the article above).

Unfortunately, my gouramis and black phantom tetras look bad. Maybe a fungus or fin rot?

I doubt its fungal. Fungal infections do occur in our tanks, but they are relatively rare and are almost always associated with a prior injury.

I tried to get a few pics but it's like trying to wrangle puppies-- couldn't get anything clear. I'll try to explain the best I can... My gouramis, one powder blue and one red dwarf, are getting dark tips on their little pectoral fins(not the "feelers") The red 0ne (My favorite fish) is very dull in the front half of his body. He used to be silvery but now is very dull gray. His dorsal fin looks like it is getting more transparent. The blue one sits at the bottom, fins clamped--he's been like this for over a week. He will swim a little but goes back to sitting on the bottom--haven't seen him eat for a few days.

The phantom's tails were nipped quite badly by serpae tetras who are no longer with us. Now their tails are kind of whitish on the edges. They look pretty bad. We lost one yesterday. I came home to find him stuck to the filter inlet.

Sorry to hear about the losses. It looks like you've had some recent stress in the tank (nipping) which can bring out ich and other diseases in susceptible specimens.

I did a 30% water change while vacuuming the bottom thoroughly yesterday. Water temp is still around 85 degrees. Everything testing normal. Ph is hanging around 8.2-8.4.

I'm not sure what to do at this point. The lfs suggested the water change and clearing the water with the carbon back in the filter and then just waiting it out for the weekend and see how things are Monday before we try anything else.

I agree that at this point, you should not initiate any new treatments. I can't see much in the photos, but the fact that the spots have now dissapeared suggest it certainly could have been ich. I would keep to the 10 day treatment course and concentrate on providing very clean water (change ~25-33%% daily). This clean water will definitely help your fish recover from whatever is ailing them. Finrot and other conditions often reverse on their own simply by providing a high quality diet and clean water.

I haven't read anything about fin rot/fungus yet. Is it possible that those things could just go away on their own? I have not added any salt. Does it have any positive effects on fungus or fin rot?

Salt will not help the specimens recover from finrot or fungus. However, keep it up for the ich treatment until the 10 day course is over. If your specimens continue to get worse in coming days, you might want to consider starting treatment with an antibiotic. I've subscribed to this thread and will keep checking for your updates. In the interim, concentrate on the clean water. Good luck!

I'll stop there for now. Thanks so much for the input.

Tina

Remaining survivors:
3 tiger barbs
2 dwarf gouramis
1 cory
1 pleco
4 black widow tetras
3 black phantom tetras

Click to expand...

See above in blue...