Treating Ich with a Loach

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lithe

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May 2, 2012
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I have 29 gallon tank with 5 african cichlids, a rainbow shark, 3 serapaes, and a horseface loach and a nasty case of ick that is unfurling at a startling rate. I upped my water temperature to 82-83 degrees, added an extra 3 1/2 table spoons of salt, but I'm noticing the ick seems to be getting worse. One of my chichlids has huge lumps on its face and lips and all my fish are now flashing and scratching. I also did a water change today for 10 gallons.

I'm worried because they are babies and I don't want to stress them out anymore and I was reading that increasing the temperature can hurt the loach. I also am aware that any ick treatments apart from salt and temperature can KILL the loach. I don't know what to do. As for my obvious posts in other parts of the forum, I have no idea what I am doing right now.
 
Btw loaches and cichlids need different temperatures and pH, as for the ich you should check by petsmart because they have some medicine for that.


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I know they make medicine for it but the problem is that I have a loach in the tank. Loaches are scaleless so they are very sensitive to the medicine that would be used to cure ick. I've heard that there is a special medicine for the loach but I'm unsure if it will treat the other fish properly. I really love my horseface. It's probably my favorite fish in the whole tank. :'(
 
Continue using heat and salt. Make sure to up your water surface movement by adding an air stone or dropping the water level so that there is more surface agitation. This will add extra oxygen to the water that is depleted with the warmer temps. The heat speeds up the life cycle of the ich so often they do get worse before they get better.


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About how long with this treatment until I can trust that the fish are healed and better? I lowered the water. The loach is moving about. He seems to actually appreciate the temperature increase, strangely. I'm still confused because some of the fish seem so affected. Will treating with out meds still be ok or will I be more likely to lose more of the other fish?
 
Raise the temps up to 85F or even 86F. If this is the loach you have, it will be fine at those temperatures: http://www.loaches.com/species-index/acantopsis-choirorhynchus The Ich will surely take out the Loach if you don't treat it correctly, so worrying about it not being able to handle the warmer temps shouldn't be an issue; Ich is a bigger threat to the fish than the warmer temps.

Check out the link below for some good info. There are a lot of myths about ich and this website does a good job covering some of the more popular misconceptions:

http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/ichthyophthirius
 
I just got over a rampant case of ich. I lost two fish. You have to get the temperature up to 86F like akdiaz33 said or it is only going to get worse. You can use a little Pimafix or Melafix for any secondary infections, but temperature and a little salt is the only way out. I even treated mine with meds. and it still did not go away. The only thing that nailed it was the heat.
 
The guy that sold us the ich fish at Petco gave me Special Blend and said it would cure the ich. He said to keep my heat up with the salt, remove my filter completely, and add half the bottle tonight and half the bottle 10 days from now. After that, I can add a new filter back into my system. He said DO NOT do any water changes. I am extremely skeptical about this approach. No water changes for almost 4 weeks? With no filter? I'm pretty certain I'm going to just have to wipe my tank and start all over again. My poor loach ;'(
 
If you let the ich continue you will certainly have to start over with a risk of getting it again. As for the no water change part I don't really know much about, I would get some plants to keep stuff clean.


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lithe said:
The guy that sold us the ich fish at Petco gave me Special Blend and said it would cure the ich. He said to keep my heat up with the salt, remove my filter completely, and add half the bottle tonight and half the bottle 10 days from now. After that, I can add a new filter back into my system. He said DO NOT do any water changes. I am extremely skeptical about this approach. No water changes for almost 4 weeks? With no filter? I'm pretty certain I'm going to just have to wipe my tank and start all over again. My poor loach ;'(
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The guy at Petco does not know what he is talking about. Don't even bother with the medication he sold you. Get the temp up to 86F and add 1 Tablespoon of salt per 5 gallons of water. This alone will take care of the Ich. With no filter on the tank for 4 weeks, if the Ich doesn't kill your fish, the ammonia will. Leave your filter on the tank. Most employees at the big chain stores mean well, but they don't know what they are talking about. Although I have heard of removing carbon from your filters so that it doesn't absorb the medication, I have never heard of removing the filter all-together.
 
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