A Clown Loach with Ich.

i don't know about staining the rocks or not but please be careful treating loaches with commercial ich medications as they are very sensitive to them. also do some looking into shrimp and ich treatments as many will wipe them out and make the tank unsafe to keep them in later on. it would be odd to me to see the loach having ich for 2 weeks and not spreading it to the other fish. have any been acting odd or rubbing on stuff? i would go for a more natural salt and warm water treatment because of the loaches and shrimp. also, loaches eat shrimp so if you are planning on keeping shrimp loaches are not the best idea. they also require groups of their own and grow to be up to 16" long so should be in a large tank.

I would either use the "salt and heat" treatment or look into Kordon's Ich attack, its a natural cure that doesnt stain or kill anything and is invert safe aswell.

salt won't hurt any of the fish as long as you don't add too much. your tank is 26g so i'd add between 20 and 25 teaspoons of aquarium salt. you could safely add a little more than that too if you wanted. slowly raise the temp up to 84. make sure the salt is all disolved in warm water before adding to the tank. when you do water changes be sure to replace the salt that gets taken out with the water. keep the water salted for 2 weeks. when it's time to remove the salt be sure to do it a little at a time.

rbishop said:

2-3 teaspoons per gallon is the generally accepted need...keep the tank at the raised level until one full week after all visible signs of ich have left..

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i agree with that but i have treated my loaches for ich twice using 1 tsp/g successfully so that is the amount that i recommended.

If you like loaches, but don't have a huge tank, you can get a school of Kuhli Loaches depending on your stock. Good luck with the treatment!