cichlid has ich that wont leave.

[Evil_angel_fish]

I am trying to get good pictures of this but at this moment I can only describe it. I am not good at al lwith cichlids at all and I got this one totaly on accident from the feeder tank at Petco some time ago and since realising it as i was going to feed him to my turtle, I did the only thing I could, I put him with my Goldfish. I kno now that tis was a big mistake and that he was the reason my goldfish died, since then I have moved him to his own private tank and a few weeks after I noticed that he was devloping white spots, having seen ich beforeI got some ich treatment and been using it for the past week and a half now, i have been doing water changes every other day and its only getting worse, I have a few plants with him, could that be the cause? I dont really know.

 

[QCppg]

From my experiance ich medecine is worthless and the only thing that works is the salt bath. Add 1 tbsp of aquarium salt per 5 gallons of water and raise the tank temperature to 85 degrees. Maintain the temperature and salinity for about two weeks, then do a heavy water change, thouroughly cleaning the tank floor and substrate to remove any remaining cysts (I would recommend a double or triple total water change to be certain). This worked for me and seems to have worked for several others on the forum.

 

[daveedka]

I would dis-agree that ich meds are worthless, but would definately agrree that the salt and heat method is far superior. There are many other factors that reduce the ich meds ability to be effective, while salt will be effective in almost any condition and causes less stress on your fish. Here is an article from the skeptical aquarist that will describe methods including meds and salt, and help you better understand the life cycle of ich which of course makes it easier to interrupt the life cycle. ICH

 

[Evil_angel_fish]

I read the article, hmmm, I dont have any spare heaters so all I can do for now is salt it. I have no gravel or anything in the bottom of the tank so the bottom is easier to clean.
going to start the salt later today after water change.

 

[Evil_angel_fish]

just looking at that picture you can see the ich.

BTW anyone kno what type of cichlid he is?

 

[Harry Tolen]

Actually, that doesn't look like a cichlid at all, but rather a sunfish (family: Centrarchidae ). Could be a hybrid, or a green, or a warmouth, for example.

Will definitely do better in its own tank, long-term.

As for the ich, the effectiveness of your medicine depends on a lot of factors. For example, the presence of carbon in your filter can remove most of the medicine before it even gets a chance to work.

I myself have always had good luck with the malachite green/formalin combo meds, and tend not to use the salt treatment because a lot of the fish I keep will not tolerate it and it is very difficult to completely remove it from your water when you are done.

Good luck with curing your fish, either way. It looks like it will be a nice specimen when it has recovered.

 

[daveedka]

Looks like a green eared sunfish to me as well, but I'm hardly the cichlid ID expert. The salt will work without elevated heat, but the process will be much longer, I'd go 3-4 weeks to make sure.


Harry, enlighten me (no sarcasm intended at all) My observation has been that the meds are much more stressful than the salt with every type of fish I've kept. what fish do you find respond better to meds than salt Just curious.

 

[Evil_angel_fish]

This may sound weird but I dont think its a sunfish... all the sunfish pictures i looked at today were very odd looking. my fish is very streamline. I am trying to get a decent picture, but he started suicide jumps, thank heavens i have a top on the tank.

 

[daveedka]

It's highly possible he is a cichlid, I didn't mean to indicate otherwise. Only that he did look a lot like a green ear to me. When looking at sunfish pictures there are quite a few differnt types as well, and juveniles have a slighly different body shape than adults. My sunfish knowledge comes from 30 years of fishing.

I would look at some of the species profiles on this site and see if you can match him up to a cichlid in one of them. Stick to south and central american fish if it will sort that way. If it is a cichlid, it is imost likely an american cichlid.

 

[PumaWard]

It looks like a pumpkin seed (my vote) or a red eared sunfish(brother's vote). It's almost certainly not a cichlid.