Ich Battles

I don't know how it happened but one week ago I turned on the lights and there they were - the iconic salt-like flecks dotting the bodies of my poor rummynose tetras. And then within two days it spread. First to my neon tetras, and then my ember tetras.

Ich is not something new. I have encountered it before when I kept fish years ago (pre-blog hiatus). It's basically really common and is the equivalent of your dog or cat getting fleas. I figured that since I caught it early I would go the high heat + salt route. But then I thought again. After all, aquarium salt and a fully planted tank don't exactly mix well.

I visited my local fish store to ask for some advice. They told me that while salt and heat work well, they use a product called "Quick Cure" in their store when new shipments arrive with ICH. Quick Cure is basically formaldehyde + methylene blue. It's toxic stuff so don't get it on your skin or ingest it by accident. Since the owner was gracious enough to give me some Quick Cure for free, I decided, why not? Apparently in most cases it worked within 2-3 days.

Well, I'm sad to report that I've been dosing it for 7 days and one of my skinniest rummynose tetras still has a single, stubborn ich spot. And the meds may have adversely affected 2 of my kuhli loaches because they've become pale and lethargic. One even developed a fungusy-looking patch. Ugh.

The thing about ich is that even when the spots disappear off of the fish's bodies, it doesn't mean that it's dead. Oh no. Far from it. They have simply moved onto their free-swimming stage, where they fall onto the gravel bed and start cruising around for fresh bodies to infect. Stupid parasites.

Heat (82-86F) speeds up their life cycle so the parasites fall off the fish's bodies faster, allowing meds to kill the free swimming parasites. However, if you don't get to all the free swimming ones in time, they will infest a new set of fish and the cycle starts all over again. Hence why this post is titled - "ICH Battles".

So, Quick Cure has not completely eradicated this pest for me. I suspect the main reason may be because for the first 3 days I only used half the recommended dose because the instructions say tetras are sensitive to the meds and may die. Well, the good news is, the tetras were all totally fine with the meds (even when on days 4-6 I upped the dose to full dosage). Bad news is, the half doses did squat and did not kill the free swimming parasites.

Yesterday I bought a 250ml bottle of Paraguard. I will try Quick Cure for 2 more days and if my tetras aren't cured by then I will try a few days of heat and good partial water changes. And of course if all else fails, Paraguard, here I come!

Fingers crossed!

Cheers,
Chesmok