Ich?

[Michael]

Hi. I have had a 10 gallon aquarium for about two months. I have an
external power filter, a bubble-wall, and a heater. My pH has remained
steady at ~7.6.

Over the lifetime of my aquarium I have had four fish; three have died
and the fourth has started exhibiting the same symptoms as the
previous fish. After about a week (today is exactly one week since I
got my most recent fish, a platy) the fish develop little white spots
on them; this fish has about six dots. I can also see A LOT of
floating white dots in the water.

I have read about Ich and assumed with the previous fish that that was
the cause. I raised the temperature of my water to 82-84 degrees and
used Ich Away. Still, the fish did not respond to the treatment and
died after a couple of days.

After the fish died, I drained the tank and let it sit dry for a week.
I boiled the gravel and set up the tank again. I let the aquarium run
without a fish for a week. I saw nothing in the water to suggest that
Ich was still present, so I introduced my current fish.

I have been testing the water nightly for ammonia and nitrites and I
have been doing a 30-40% water change every night to keep the ammonia
at safe levels. After a water change, I treat four gallons of water
and I let it sit for 24 hours in the same room as the aquarium so that
the temperatures will be close for the next night's change.

Last night, nitrites tested above zero for the first time and I first
noticed the white spots on fishy. Is this Ich or could it be something
else? I vowed to this fish on the way home that I would keep him
alive, so I want to do everything possible to keep that promise.
Should I raise the water temperature? Should I use Ich Away again? If
I add Ich Away I need to remove the medium from my filter, which I
assume hosts the bacteria I need in the tank. So removing the filter
seems like a bad idea.

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Michael.

[Mbuna]

Michael,

This could be ich. Ich is almost always present with fish and only
becomes a real problem with the fish are under stress.

Continue doing your water changes to keep Ammonia low. Make sure that
the water you put in is the same temp/pH as the water in the tank.
This will minimize stress on the fish. I wouldn't raise the water
temperature as it will do little good. However make sure you are
completely vaccuming the gravel when you do your water changes. This
will suck up the ich parasites that settle in the gravel until they
become water born.

Stop by FishGeeks and post this in the health forum for more
suggestions on what to do.

Sean

__________________________________________________
Posted via FishGeeks - http://Aquaria.info

[Dick]

On 11 Oct 2004 07:22:47 -0700, (Michael) wrote:

>Hi. I have had a 10 gallon aquarium for about two months. I have an
>external power filter, a bubble-wall, and a heater. My pH has remained
>steady at ~7.6.
>
>Over the lifetime of my aquarium I have had four fish; three have died
>and the fourth has started exhibiting the same symptoms as the
>previous fish. After about a week (today is exactly one week since I
>got my most recent fish, a platy) the fish develop little white spots
>on them; this fish has about six dots. I can also see A LOT of
>floating white dots in the water.
>
>I have read about Ich and assumed with the previous fish that that was
>the cause. I raised the temperature of my water to 82-84 degrees and
>used Ich Away. Still, the fish did not respond to the treatment and
>died after a couple of days.
>
>After the fish died, I drained the tank and let it sit dry for a week.
>I boiled the gravel and set up the tank again. I let the aquarium run
>without a fish for a week. I saw nothing in the water to suggest that
>Ich was still present, so I introduced my current fish.
>
>I have been testing the water nightly for ammonia and nitrites and I
>have been doing a 30-40% water change every night to keep the ammonia
>at safe levels. After a water change, I treat four gallons of water
>and I let it sit for 24 hours in the same room as the aquarium so that
>the temperatures will be close for the next night's change.
>
>Last night, nitrites tested above zero for the first time and I first
>noticed the white spots on fishy. Is this Ich or could it be something
>else? I vowed to this fish on the way home that I would keep him
>alive, so I want to do everything possible to keep that promise.
>Should I raise the water temperature? Should I use Ich Away again? If
>I add Ich Away I need to remove the medium from my filter, which I
>assume hosts the bacteria I need in the tank. So removing the filter
>seems like a bad idea.
>
>Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!
>
>Michael.

I have treated Ich before. It is my understanding that fish rarely
die from Ich, but rather from the quality of water. In your case this
wouldn't make sense as you are doing frequent water changes.

Raising the water changes supposedly speeds the Ich cycling. There
are 3 forms Ich goes through. The one we see is on the fish. The
white spots drop off to the sand and from there go to a swimming phase
where they once more attach to fish. So, changing water not only
keeps the quality high, but removes ich from the water and the bottom
if you vacuum the bottom.

Having said all this, it would appear you have done all that is
suggested. I am not well informed on fish diseases, but if I were you
I would start some new research and hope someone will come up with
alternative diagnosis. Usually Ich is easily treated, however I got 6
Clown Loaches via internet and they all had Ich. Two responded to
treatment, but I destroyed the other 4 as they continued to get worse.
The vendor verified he had a bad batch and a month later (waiting for
a new shipment and time for observation) sent replacements.

I quit treating my community tank even though the two Clowns I kept
still had spots. I noticed that none of my existing fish had picked
up the Ich. I remembered someone stating healthy fish do not get Ich,
so on this assumption decided the two Clowns might recover if I
focused on keeping my 75 gallon tank water clean (more water changes).
The 2 were fine by the time the replacements arrived.

At the time I did not have a quarantine tank, but do now. I have had
fish I suspected might have Ich that I moved to the Q tank and the
spots would go away. My community tanks have dense populations and I
assume that moving to a low density population is also helpful as
stress is often mentioned along with water quality as promoting Ich.

Sorry you are having such a problem. This is my third turn at keeping
tropical fish. The first was as a teenager. If there are not
problems I worry if there will be problems, but I keep on going. I
now keep 5 tanks including the Q tank and they have all been clear of
illness for over a year. Now I worry about my live bearers and a
month ago separated them by sex.

Good luck, I hope someone more knowledgeable will come up with more
information.

dick