treating ick with salt & increased temp.

[lisaann4jc]

I started treating my 20G tank of fish with salt ( 1Tbs/5 gal.) and raised my temp. to about 85 yesterday. It's been just over 24hrs. When should I expect to see it resolving? Do I need to do water changes?

3 dwarf gouramis
4 zebra danios
4 platys
3 red serpae
1 catfish

 

[nlmadison]

Here's a link to info re: treating ich. When I got ich in my tank it took almost 3 weeks to completely clear it. The ich goes thru "phases". It's all explained in the article.

http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=39759

N.

 

[M.A.G.]

ick has a 5 day life cycle and cant reproduce in your 85 degrees.you will see results shortly

 

[M.A.G.]

oh and keep treating even after its gone i say a week to make sure.

 

[Harry Tolen]

At 85*F, the life cycle of ich is 3-5 days. Within one complete cycle, you should notice a definite dropping off of the number of cysts on your fish. However, you will want to continue treating for around 15 days, because even with salt and heat there are a few survivors from the first two generations that can easily re-infest your fish.

Since one of the stages of the life cycle of the ich is as a spore resting in your gravel, vacuuming the gravel every day or so (and replacing the water thus removed with new, salted water) will also reduce the ich population and thus the incidence of re-infestation during the treatment period.

Finally, remember that the most serious site of ich infestation is on the gills of your fish. Suffocation is actually what kills most victims of this disease. So even if you can't see any more ich on the outside of the fish, keep treating for the full 15 days to get the ich that you can't see.