Rate of salt removal....

[cohazard]

Dave's article says to just remove the salt used during the "heat and salt" treatment for ich, by sticking with your weekly maintenance.

My weekly maint includes 50% water changes....

Is that too fast to remove the salt? To drop the salt content from 2tsp/gallon to 1 tsp/gallon in that short ammount of time? Am I missing something in my math? lol

Thanks in advance for the help...

[ashdavid]

No that will be fine Serg. I just finnished a battle with ich that came in on a fish that I bought from my LFS, and as I have always done , I did a 50% water change on the first day and then another 50% change on the second day and from then on my usual 50%　bi-weekly water changes. I have never had a problem with this method.

[OrionGirl]

Agreed. Going from a higher salinity to a lower one is not stressful, but going from a lower one to a higher one quickly can be very stressful. I've always just don'e my normal water changes following a salt treatment with no problems.

[happychem]

To build on OG's statement: salt is an irritant, which is why it works, it stimulates extra mucous production. Removing it with regular maintenance should be viewed more as removing an irritant than the change to aquatic chemistry.

[OrionGirl]

Yes and no. In FW, this is completely ture. But, even for SW organisms, going to a lower salinity quickly is not as stressful as going to a higher salinity quickly. Hence, FW dips, or low salinity treatments for parasites are fine, but a supersaturated salinity dip, or evena much higher salinity dip, can be lethal. Why, I'm not sure.

[happychem]

Ah. I'm only versed in the magics of FW. That salty necromancy is too dark for me just yet. :D

[nursie]

I too do the weekly 50% water changes, and I think I remember Dave reccomending keeping the salt level up for 2 weeks. So for the water changes during which I was maintaining the same level of salt, I replaced what I took out during the water change. Hope that makes sense.... :o After the 2 weeks was over, I didn't replace it when I did water changes.

[cohazard]

Thanks for all the help, as always you have been more than helpful. I learned something new about my hobby (or life, lol) today.

Here's another question..........I've been doing the salt treatment on my 29g for 3 weeks now at 2tsp/gallon.

The new juvenile blue dempseys are looking great. They've reached the size of my first blue dempsey (that one succumbed to ich when he was this size appx 2.5-3") and there's no sign of any ich left in my tank.

I haven't seen any fish flash in a while (appx. a week), but should I keep up the treatment another week?

I've also gotten a lot of new fish recently (and 2 new tanks, woo hoo!!) and the newbies have been in quarantine for about 2 weeks with no signs of ich, is it safe to move them over to their permanant tanks? I did raise the salinity in their tank to 2tsp/gallon anyways, about a week ago.

Thanks in advance for all the help............I've been in the hobby for about 13yrs now, and it finally feels like I'm doing things right, heheheh.

[OrionGirl]

I prefer to keep treatment going for at least 4 weeks. It's likely overkill, but I'd rather treat for longer than not long enough.

[Raskolnikov]

Why salt works, in this instance, is because chloride is lethal to the free swimming stage of Ichthyophthiriasis (Ich).

Osmoregulation in bony freshwater fishes is largely a function of the chloride cells (as well as accessory cells), located on the gills. Freshwater bony fishes (guppies, rainbow trout and tilapia, in particular) have been shown to actually increase or decrease the number of chloride cells and accessory cells present in the gills when moved between freshwater and saltwater, and vice versa. This adaptation takes only 24-48 hours.

I'm less familiar with the function of chloride cell adaptation in marine bony fishes.

In my own experience in aquaria, I've found no advantage (measured in mortalities) to slowly adding 2 tbsp/gallon of table salt over a 24 hour period or adding it all within an hour when treating batches of fathead minnows (to be used as feeders) in multiple trials.

[cohazard]

Why salt works, in this instance, is because chloride is lethal to the free swimming stage of Ichthyophthiriasis (Ich).

Osmoregulation in bony freshwater fishes is largely a function of the chloride cells (as well as accessory cells), located on the gills. Freshwater bony fishes (guppies, rainbow trout and tilapia, in particular) have been shown to actually increase or decrease the number of chloride cells and accessory cells present in the gills when moved between freshwater and saltwater, and vice versa. This adaptation takes only 24-48 hours.

I'm less familiar with the function of chloride cell adaptation in marine bony fishes.

In my own experience in aquaria, I've found no advantage (measured in mortalities) to slowly adding 2 tbsp/gallon of table salt over a 24 hour period or adding it all within an hour when treating batches of fathead minnows (to be used as feeders) in multiple trials.

That's some good info there Ras......I've been wanting to feed live feeders, and now I know that I can treat them all at one time without killing them....

[tbone-ike]

Is it possible to test the salinity level when using table salt?

I've been treating for ich for a few weeks, and plan to discontinue salt addition at my next water change.

My concern: I'm getting some brown algae and plan to buy some ottos and I know they don't like salt; I just don't know how many water changes (or how much) it will take to get salt levels down enough to be otto friendly.

[OrionGirl]

Yep--but you'll most likely need a refractometer. Swing arm hydromters are often inaccurate at the lower levels of salinity. Wouldn't hurt to try it--but keep in mind that the dosage level used is below normal brackish conditions. (~1.005)