Ick thread**ongoing treatment

[Beverly]

Stress alone will NOT cause ich. Ich has to be introduced into a system, either on a new fish, in frag water where there was ich in the tank, a cup of sand from someone who has ich in their tank, or any other means of introduction, before it becomes active. Stress may cause a fish to become more highly infected with ich, but stress cannot cause ich.

[blood_hound]

Originally Posted by Beverly

Stress alone will NOT cause ich. Ich has to be introduced into a system, either on a new fish, in frag water where there was ich in the tank, a cup of sand from someone who has ich in their tank, or any other means of introduction, before it becomes active. Stress may cause a fish to become more highly infected with ich, but stress cannot cause ich.

That is why it is best to put the fish in QT for a few weeks before introducing it to the main tank

[BCOrchidGuy]

My understanding is that Ich is everywhere. Unless you start with sterile everthing and don't put any livestock in the tank you'll have Ich in there. I'm with Sean, hyposalinity and copper (cuprimine) to get RID of Ich. To help prevent it, garlic, good husbandry, QT tanks and NO STRESSS!!!!!

Doug

[danny zubot]

Well, I have given up on the Kick ick treatment. I saw very little signs of improvement over the past week, and I didn't want to wait until they were too far gone before hyposalinity. So I've set up a 20 gallon quarenteen tank for them, I should have done this from the beginning. I'll continue the kick ick treatment on the tank just to be sure the little buggers are gone.

I've read anywhere from 2 to 4 weeks is long enough for the ick to cycle and be dead. I was thinking 4 weeks just to be safe though. Confirm?

[Beverly]

Keep the display tank without fish for six weeks to be absolutely sure ich is dead.

[BCOrchidGuy]

I agree but even after six weeks there will still be a bit of Ich in your tank, it's normal though so don't worry about it.

Doug

[Beverly]

From this webpage, Marine "Ich":

http://www.petsforum.com/personal/tr...marineich.html

Is "Ich" always present in our aquaria?

There is a widely held belief in the marine aquarium hobby that "Ich" is always present in our aquaria and this belief is often repeated on marine bulletin boards. There is much information in the scientific literature that contradicts this belief.

C. irritans is an obligate parasite (Burgess and Matthews, 1994; Dickerson and Dawe, 1995; Yoshinaga and Dickerson, 1994). Obligate means the parasite can not survive without infecting its host, in this case, fish. Theronts have been shown to die if a suitable host is not found within the required time. Yoshinaga and Dickerson (1994) found that few theronts (0.34%) were viable 12.5 hours after excystment and Burgess and Matthews (1994) found that no theronts were viable 18 hours after excystment. Colorni (1985) found that some excysted tomites (=theronts) were observed to be moving weekly after 48 hours. While the life span of the theronts appears variable, it is limited and all will die without finding a suitable host.

If an aquarium has no fish in it, and there are no additions of fish, or anything else that could be carrying trophonts, tomonts, tomites or theronts for a period of 6 weeks or longer, all parasites will have died. An aquarium such as this is an obvious exception to "Ich" always being present.

[BCOrchidGuy]

Bev oh okay that sounds good but what about the fish, even after a treatment is there absolutely no Ich left on or in the fish? I can understand that Ich can die in a sterile environment with out a host but what about when you add that fish?
Always love your links and quotes, never a single one that's not been an excellent tool.

Doug

[Beverly]

Doug,

My understanding of ich is if the fish are treated for the parasite properly, there should be no ich left on the fish or in the treatment tank. The key here is proper ich treatment. Obviously, if the treatment did not work, ich would still be present on the fish and in the treatment tank, and further treatment would be required. Products such as Kick-Ich, IME, are of no value for treating ich. I would only use cupramine or hyposalinity for ich treatment.

I had the unfortunate occasion last year to I bring home a fish with ich, though I did not know it had ich. Within a couple of weeks, all the fish in my display tank got ich. I quickly set up a treatment tank with new saltwater and filtration from a tank without ich. As soon as all the ich were off the fish, I put the fish into the treatment tank. Well, none of the fish in treatment tank got ich in that tank, so I kept them in there for six weeks without treatment. They were ich free the whole six weeks.

I must have been extremely lucky to have removed the fish from the ich display tank at the exact time when no ich were on the fish. I was also very careful did not transfer water from the ich tank to the treatment tank.

The ich display tank had no fish in it for six weeks, so the ich went through their life cycle without hosts to attach to. The dang things must have died during the six week fallow period because when I put the fish back into the display tank, there were never any outbreaks of ich afterward.

[danny zubot]

Doug, thats were the hyposalinty treatment comes in. No inverts, including parasites can survive below a specific salinty, depending on the species. You can actually see the little buggers fall of the fish, once the threashold is reached. After maintaining the low salinity for a while everything other than fish will be dead.