Ich Emergency

[bigscout]

Just to clarify some obvious confusion, all strtains of ich are killed by temperatures above 86*F not some. The trick lies in the difficulty of garaunteeing every bit of you tank water is that hot or hotter while still keeping fish alive. one cool spot and ich continues it's life cycle.

There are a lot of different strains of freshwater ich, Some will tolerate no salt, some are tolerant to low levels. Only one strain has ever been documented as survivng as high as 5 ppt of salt, and nothing ever past that.

2 teaspoons per gallon will put you at just below that 5 ppt mark (4.248 ppt based on average weight of one level teaspoon of Mortons non Iodized table salt), and essentially garauntee irradication in all but a very few very resistant strains of ich in existance. 3 teaspoons per gallon will kill every strain known to science. Additionally most folks dose based on the rated size of their tanks, for instance if they have a 10g tank They'll dose for 10gallons of water, when the volume is actually closer to 7.5 gallons. This puts the 2 teaspoon per gallon reccomendation right at or sometimes above the 5 ppt needed for sureity.

Soft water fish will have no problem tolerating 2-3 teaspoons per gallon, as long as you don't add it too quickly.
I never reccomend less than 2 teaspoons because of the Murphy factor combined with the fact that some strains can live through low salt levels. You may get lucky with lower dosage, and you may not. I personally don't trust luck when it comes to my fish, I think too much of them for that.

Most of the variations of treatment you see written up are from people who have not studied the science behind it, but rather just took hearsay or casual observation and started spouting it as gospel. This is also why some people will tell you salt won't kill ich, they didn't study, treat properly, or try to learn the whole of the story before they began telling other what they knew. This is the same process that is behind every myth in the hobby.

 

[Cathy G]

Soft water fish will have no problem tolerating 2-3 teaspoons per gallon, as long as you don't add it too quickly.

Sorry, Mike Wise - Apistogramma.com said he wouldn't recommend more than 1 teaspoon per 10 gallons for soft water apistos. Be careful when you make statements like this.

all strtains of ich are killed by temperatures above 86*F not some

Where is your documentation? Why do most of the advisors and their articles say otherwise? Why do so many fish geeks point to a strain of Ich in Florida which has withstood temps in the 90's? Can you prove this is rumour?

If indeed all strains of ich are killed by heat, why the need for salt? Heat alone would be all that is necessary. I am sure many aquariasts would be able to add extra heaters or thermometers to make sure their tanks are all above that threshold.

Most of the variations of treatment you see written up are from people who have not studied the science behind it, but rather just took hearsay or casual observation and started spouting it as gospel.

Some of the treatments I see have the appearance of this, but most of these forums are overseen by folks with years and years of solid experience. And, as a point of fact, there are some advisors here who do base their evaluations on the science of the matter. They do compile University research, links to studies, etc. in their articles. I doubt many of their articles are based on hearsay and rumour...

All of us keeping our fish need to be careful and realize that not all fish are alike, not all fish can handle the same treatment. We need to know our fish and be careful.

Cathy

 

[bigscout]

I'm not a big fan of arguing points that can be clearly found on the web, but I'll at least address your last post.

Sorry, Mike Wise - Apistogramma.com said he wouldn't recommend more than 1 teaspoon per 10 gallons for soft water apistos. Be careful when you make statements like this.

I'm not sure who Mike is, so the name means nothing to me. I have seen apisto's kept in water with High TDS levels for the last 20 years in this hobby, 2 weeks of salt for ich treatment won't harm them if they are acclimated. I've seen it done plenty of times, and have done it with Fish which supposedly don't tolerate high TDS levels myself. We are not trying to breed apisto's here, we are trying to Kill ich. It is a short term treatment that will be removed as soon as the ich is dead. If the apisto's Mike keeps are really that weak, I seriously doubt they'll survive the stresses of ich anyhow.

As said most strains will succumb to low levels, but I don't personally like the risk.

If indeed all strains of ich are killed by heat, why the need for salt? Heat alone would be all that is necessary. I am sure many aquariasts would be able to add extra heaters or thermometers to make sure their tanks are all above that threshold.

My statement specifically said:

The trick lies in the difficulty of garaunteeing every bit of you tank water is that hot or hotter while still keeping fish alive.

Obviously we can just heat the tank to a point where we know ich won't survive, but it would most likely be desireable to have fish still alive afterwards. Almost any fish except Discus (There may be a small handful of others) are going to feel stress when we approach the upper 80's Taking a tank into the low 90's will kill most species in our hobby. It is not at all uncommon to find 6 degrees temp variation in a tank system, it of course varies tank to tank and system to system, but to say the least it's sketchy and poses a huge variable. And the reccomendation in general would have to be low 90's. That's really hot. My fish change behavior when the tank raises to 82 on hot days in the summer.

Where is your documentation? Why do most of the advisors and their articles say otherwise? Why do so many fish geeks point to a strain of Ich in Florida which has withstood temps in the 90's? Can you prove this is rumour?

I've seen these claims as well, but have never seen a study that was done in a climate control environment that could assure no cold spots in the tank. The only way to make this test is to control the room temperature and therefore garantee tank temp via ambient. Every study I've found so far has been with less controllable temperature variables. If you have a study that says otherwise, I'd love to see it. There are no studies out there stating the error rate in ich temp information that I can find. When I read scientific documents, I look for variables and margin of error. With temoperature in a body of water that is constantly being cooled by ambient air, heated by a heater and circulated by a filter or pump, there are huge temperature variables that can effect the study. More importantly, we see a lot of studies on how to kill ich that will kill fish, I personally consider this useless science since it doesn't apply to our tanks.
All I can find is suspicion and rumors on ich surviving past 90*, I can find hundreds of studies that show ich dies at 85*.

Some of the treatments I see have the appearance of this, but most of these forums are overseen by folks with years and years of solid experience. And, as a point of fact, there are some advisors here who do base their evaluations on the science of the matter. They do compile University research, links to studies, etc. in their articles. I doubt many of their articles are based on hearsay and rumour...

I fully agree there is good and bad information all over the web, great articles written by knowledgable folks who did their research and a lot of garbage and myths by those who didn't. For every great ich article there are a multitude of poorly researched poorly written articles. The myths get far more publication than the truth.

All of us keeping our fish need to be careful and realize that not all fish are alike, not all fish can handle the same treatment. We need to know our fish and be careful.

I'll take that under advisement, and if I happen to find a fish someday that won't tolerate the treatment I outline, I'll let everyone know.

On these boards, Most of us try to reccomend thigns that will get the job done and at the same time can be broadly applied to all fish in freshwater. Ich is pretty easy to do this with, other things are not, but I've seen far too many fish killed because someone fell for the myth that fish can't adapt to simple changes in water type. It can be seen here or anywhere else on a daily basis.

 

[mattjkirkpatric]

Well, I think the fungus is gettin worse. The Green Tiger Barb's white patch is getting bigger and another tiger barb, who used to only have a faded patch is doing worse. His faded spot is now looks more like a dent and one part looks like an open wound. In addition to that he stops holding himself upright and will float upsidedown for a while. He looks really bad and I don't know what to do for them. My rainbow who also looks like he has some fungus has stayed the same.

 

[corbinld]

Why did you only use 1 1/2 tsp per 5 gal? In the article by David Sullenberger, he suggest 2 tsp per gal of water. I was just wondering your reasoning. I am in the process of treating my tank for what I observed as the beginning stages of ich. I have not lost any fish and my fish seem to be tolerating the 2 tsp per gal of water and the whole process in general. All the white spots have fallen off of the one fish that did have the tell tale white sprinkles. I chose to use Davids prescribed tx using salt for treating my ich because it was the only non med treatment I that I had info for and it was reccommended by several individuals in these forums.

Actually, it's a cooking/recipe thing. I used 1 1/2 Tablespoons per 5 gallons. The big T = Tablespoons and small t = teaspons. Sorry to confuse! I don't know the specific article you're referrencing--though I did see it posted in this thread.

While I might get slammed for this from others here, I was trying to cut the difference between the various sources I'd read that argued for either 1 or 2 Tablespoons per 5 gallons of water when treating clown loaches.

Because from everything I've ever read, clown loaches (and I also hear tetras) are the most intollerant of both salt & ich medicine--out of the species I have in my tank--that's what I specifically was trying to treat. My clowns are precious & I worried about losing them the most. They did, along with all of the other fish, make it just fine.

It was just my own stupidity (totally knowing better) that allowed me to not quarantine the hatchets I introduced, even when I do have a hospital tank...Stupid, stupid, stupid on my part.

I'm new to this forum, as you can see, but everywhere else I read recommended that recipe for Clown Loaches. That's where I came up with it. I hope that helps clarify things & I'm really glad to hear your fish are doing okay...

 

[Cathy G]

corbinld,
I figure that 1-1/2 Tablespoons per 5 gallons is about 1 teaspoon per gallon, right? Each T has 3ts. This is about what I'd add if my blue rams ever get ich. That's what I was trying to explain through my posts to bigscout. Glad to hear you came through it just fine. (With salt, one size doesn't necessarily fit all.)

Cathy

 

[confusion]

Just to clarify some obvious confusion, all strtains of ich are killed by temperatures above 86*F not some. The trick lies in the difficulty of garaunteeing every bit of you tank water is that hot or hotter while still keeping fish alive. one cool spot and ich continues it's life cycle.

A couple of months ago, I had a particularly persistent ich infection. It wasn't a rampant infection, though. I had my temp at 87F with 2TBSP of salt/10G for 3 weeks. The ich kept coming back about every 3rd day. I was pretty frustrated till I read about a relatively new strain of ich that was resistant to 90F. I increased my temp to 90F, and sure enough, the ich was dead within a week. In hindsight, I most likely didn't have enough salt, to kill it at the lower temps.