Ich

[Jaide]

My poor lovely Handsome boy has ich - I've just noticed this after I put him in his new tank and the red light I use in that tank showed the white spots up on his mainly white body. Poor wee boy has been poorly for a few days and I couldn't figure out why.

Anyway, he came from a community tank (but is in his own tank now and have given him meds for ich) - none of the other fish in his tank show any signs of ich and aren't acting poorly at all - should I medicate the tank anyway?

[Dave+Amy]

I would just for safety, are you using Furan2 or melafix?

[Jaide]

Just tonic for now. I had used melafix in the tank for new set up anyway and it didn't seem to help (so I was treating him without being aware)

[Davd-lw]

white spot cure mate! white spot is frequent probs in this time of the year in both cold and tropical tanks . just be carefull about the dosing. good luck mate.

[Stella]

MEDICATE EVERYONE!!!!

And read this site closely: http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/docs/health/ich.shtml

The ich lifecycle is widely misunderstood, leading to repeat outbreaks.

You can't kill the visible spots. They are still alive when they fall off, and a little while later (depending on temp, hours to days) they burst forth with hundreds of infectious things that you CAN kill. Once they find a fish, they are unkillable, but not visible for a while.

And they can survive unseen on the gills of fish.

Moral of the Story:

You treat that tank based on length of time after the last spot was seen.

Read the article. Seriously. It is heavy going but the best I have found.

(I have some fish with Ich at the moment too, realised yesterday. Highly pissed off about it. In coldwater I am looking at a treatment time of at least three weeks Personally malachite and formalin are my meds of choice)

[yeh_buddy]

Nooooo not Handsome!!! Ooo get some whitespot cure in his tank pronto!! Before it gets worse. Let me know how he goes. :oops:

[Jaide]

I know Buddy It was only because they showed up under the red light that I could see them. On his mostly white body - they were impossible to see. I treated his tank with tonic last night and he seems to have perked up this morning - there's also melafix and tonic salt in his tank, so that should help too.

I googled whitespot after I started this thread (actually, as soon as I saw the spots I knew what it was as I had been googling to find out the problem with my other betta, so have found out all sorts of fish diseases in my efforts to diagnose him), and it said to treat for a week as the parasites have a lifecycle as you've mentioned Stella. The tonic bottle doesn't say any of this I'll do a water change in a few days and will treat again.

I only have a little bit of malachite green I purchased years ago - I don't know if I can buy it anymore. It won't be enough to treat the big community tank but could possibly use it in betta's tank? I'm out of formalin - again, not sure if I can still buy it. I couldn't buy acriflavin for the fungus problem with my other fish, someone happened to have some old stock otherwise I would have been stuck

So, you don't think tonic will do the trick? It's supposed to cure whitespot. I have plenty to administer both tanks.

[yeh_buddy]

Lol, Dont know why but I had thought you meant tonic salt!!!ahahahaha :lol: :oops: my bad! Yeah Tonic should do the trick glad to hear hes perked up though! Hes a big boy he should be able to pull through no problemo. And Fluffy is he still putting up a great fight?

[Jaide]

I have to laugh that you always refer to him as being big - Fluffy is twice his size!

Well, he's going to get worse before he gets better - that's how Ich works, while he has the spots on his the meds don't work, they need to go through their cycle before the meds start to work, hopefully that will be only a day or two. The warm days and nights have increased the tank temp so that will help speed up the process too. He's still eating but he's not looking well either - he sits around a lot but still swims too - he's a tough wee boy who will pull through I'm sure

I've also treated my community tank even though none of the fish in their are showing any signs of ich.

As for Fluffy - well, I applied acriflavin both directly to the fungus on his head and to the tank - have since dosed up with furan2 and will do another treatment tomorrow. Although the fungus is staying at bay, it won't go away - it seems to fall off, so there's only a small spot left, then regrow again. Anyway, I think that due to this and his previous injuries, he'll never be what he was, if he lives. He'll just sit at the bottom occassionally swimming to the surface for a gulp as bettas do. He always was a percher but not to this extent. He's hungry when it's feeding time but he's hard to feed as he doesn't always see the food due to his blind left eye - I rain it down on him as best as I can but he only has a piece or two and that's it - it's very frustrating.

[yeh_buddy]

Why dont you handfeed him bloodworms? Thats what I do with my boys I hold the bloodworm block and they come up have a nibble once I know they've had their share i take it out and throw it to the rest of the fish who swarm around it and make it dissapear within seconds! I guess its not really handfeeding in the sense everyone else thinks of it but I think of it in that way.

:lol:

That way poor Fluffy doesnt have to chase it around.

[Jaide]

I do handfeed my fish. I handfeed blood worms and brine shrimp and any other frozen food - makes it less messy in the tank too

With Fluffy, I would hold the cube in the water above him so the food would drift down and land on his head - he'd only eat one or two pieces though. I tried putting my hand right in down beside him but it spooked him a bit - will persevere though.

As for Handsome, he's doing really well