My fish's ick doesn't seem to be clearing up.?

Question

They got it last week. In that time, i lost both goldfish (which i found out after i bought them that they shouldn't have been in there anyway.) i've also lost my pleco, a black skirt tetra, 2 ghost shrimp, and a molly.

My temp is at 84* and i cant seem to get it any higher. they have aquarium salt in their tank. I bought the dissolving tablets last week and it seemed to almost go away. after using that for a few days, they ran out, but i figured that the high temp and salt would help make sure the ick is gone.

well...i guess it wasn't. it came back full force on my other black skirt tetras. my platys dont seem to have it, nor my blue guarami. but they are staying in the tank for treatment just in case.

should i isolate my tetras since they have it the worst? their back fins now seem all torn away (fin rot?). i'm so worried i'm going to lose the rest of my fish. i started yesterday with quick cure , and it doesn't seem even the slightest bit better.

any advise?

BTW, my tank is 30 gallons. i just wanted to add that before people said my tank was overstocked.

um, yes i read directions. my carbon filter has been out since the first treatment.

wow. most people cant seem to read the question correctly. i HAVE been putting in meds, and dont tell me that the temp is too high! it needs to be high because it help clears the ick! the goldfish aren't even in there anymore!

Answer 1

The tetras will have more of a problem with ich, because they're sensitive to both salt and medications like Quick Cure. If you followed the directions given on the product, it tells you to only use half the recommended dose with them.

Just overnight, you may not notice a difference - ich, even under the best conditions, will take 10-14 days to cure. You could move the tetras if you have another tank, but you'll still need to treat both tanks - once the spots (cysts) on the body burst open, more of the parasites are released into the water, so if you don't treat the tank they're currently in, the other fish could still be at risk.

I don't know what the active ingredient was in the tablets you were using, but I hope you did a large water change to remove it before you added the new medication - otherwise, your fish will be exposed to possible three medications to which they might be sensitive. If you didn't change the water, you might want to do that, and give the gravel a good cleaning with a siphon - that will remove any of the parasites on/in the substrate that haven't been killed, and it can improve the water quality as well by removing any organic debris that may have built up - sometimes this is enough to prevent fin rot, depending on what the quality of the water has been like in the past.

As long as you were able to raise the temperature any amount, this will help get the ich out of your tank faster - this speeds up their life cycle so they drop off the fish sooner. On the fish, when they're inside they protective cyst, they aren't affected by the treatment - only when they're in the water.

I would recommend going ahead with a water change if you didn't do that before you added the Quick Cure, then after you add the replacement water, only start with 1/2 of the dose (use 1 drop for every two gallons instead of every gallon). Then over the next few hours, build to the full dose. Also, be sure you have the carbon out of your filter - if you leave it in, it removes the medication from the water, so it doesn't treat anything.

And you'll want to continue treating for 3-5 days after you stop seeing spots - it takes a little while to kill the parasites, and if you stop too soon, they can reinfect your fish.

Answer 2

Copperhead has a excellent answer. I had a severe ich outbreak a few months ago and it took me alot of research and some opinions from a few top contributors to help me get rid of it.
I used Quick Cure which is a very good medication. I did my weekly partial water change and vacuumed the gravel well. I took the carbon out of my filter and then I added the medication. I also have Tetra's so you have to half the dosage. I kept the hood lights turned off and completely covered the tank. Every third day before I added the medication I vacuumed the gravel. What water you take out replace it, then add your dose of medication. I continued to treat my tank for a full 7 days after I saw the last white spot. Ich lives in your tank, in the gravel and such. I also put 1 tsp of aquarium salt to each 5 gallons of water in my tank. My Tetra's did fine with the salt levels.
I wouldn't recommend you removing any fish from the tank because the whole tank needs to be treated. Remember that it will take a few days to see any major changes. Good Luck!

Answer 3

Ok, first of all, the temperature should not go any higher because around 80-84 is perfect for an isolation tank. I would recommend checking your water quality because that is probably the main cause for the ick. Also, you never said how many fish are in the tank or how often you have been cleaning it. I would check the levels of ammonia, nitrate, and nitrite. In between doses of medication you want to make sure that you are doing a 25% water change. I would not move the fish unless you have an established isolation tank already set up otherwise it will just stress out the fish more. Plus, the infection has been in the tank for quite some time so you should be treating the entire tank anyway because, though they don't show any signs of it, your other fish could get or have ich. Instead of adding salt to the entire tank, possibly try doing just a salt dip of the infected fish. Look up directions online for the amount of salt needed. I have heard these are effective. Make sure you are not just mixing different medications without doing water changes first!

Answer 4

Ok, are you sure it is Ich and not a fungal infection? You very well may be, but you don't have any pictures posted so I thought it would be best to ask. Sometimes despite following all the right advice, fish still die. It would be much nicer if we could treat and cure everything that goes wrong with them, but we are unable to do so all too often. The only thing I would say to do is re-treat with the tablets since they seemed to work before, keep the salt and temp high, and hope for the best. Keep treatment up a full week after the ich appears to be gone. Other than that, I hope your fish get better.

Answer 5

very frequent gravel vacuums help a lot -- ich runs in 3 cycles -- only one is on the the fish -- then it falls into the gravel and divides and comes back up -- its the floating stage that the meds help because this is the only time you can kill them. i have used maracide made by mardel with success but it gets really expensive in larger tanks. anyway try to gravel vacuum frequently to get it out of your gravel and keep up the meds.

Answer 6

I have had ick in my tank a ton of times.. i have never raised my temp.. that can stress out the fish.. Have you tryed the ick drops.. they do turn the water blue but that is the only thing that seemed to work for me.

Answer 7

Your tank is way too hot. Goldfish like their water cool. Average temp with other fish in it should be around 70-75 degrees. You have to clean out your tank with boiling water. For the fin rot there's medication for that. Isolate the Tetra's and treat them. Your fish aren't salt water fish so DO NOT add salt. Don't buy fish from that store anymore.

Answer 8

I used this websites advice before when my fish had Ick and it worked:
http://www.nunnie.com/ick.html

Also, don't raise the temperature above 82 at the most. Fish are very vunerable to temperature change.

Answer 9

well my advise is to find this medication: Mardel Maracide. I am currently using this on my 55 gallon tank and it seems to be working so far. hope this helps :)

Answer 10

You may want to talk to a fish specialist. Some stores even sell ick treatment stuff. When my mom's fish had ick, she went to the store and bought some. It worked, her fish no longer have ick.