Ich, clowns and temperature

[mango]

Firstly, hello I'm a newbie. I've read the sticky and posts about ich (and one below on temp), and it's been really helpful.

Our loaches got ich a few days ago, (we'd introduced new unquarantined fish 2 weeks ago) My husband added aquarium salt. All fine but no improvement. Kept the temp at the usual 24 - 26c as we have a community tank.

Yesterday I got a malachite blue cure and we put that in at half dose last night, as well as raising the temperature to 28c (or 82F). This has slowed some of the other fish in the tank, and unfortunately we lost a loach at 3am this morning

My question is: is raising the temperature by this small amount enough to be useful? Or should we continue, as some have suggested up to 30c is better? We also have in the tank neon tetras, dwarf gourami, bristlenoses, cory and a platy - and I'm not sure that all of these could take the temp change.

It's a 3 day dose, so we're due to dose again Thursday night, and then unfortunately we go away on Sunday. Should we see improvement by then? Thanks for any advice - it's all so worrying!

[wasserscheu]

I don´t want to compete with expeerts, but do want to contribute what I´ve read/learned. According to that, temperatures exeeding 28°C slow the swarmers down again. The temp. should be put up to 28 though, to speed up the "breeding" of ich. and Malachtitygreen can catch as many in the open water as possible.

Recently I was stupid enough to carry Ich. from my Q-tank into the main system and also treatied with half dose MG. I had only occasionaly one fish only (Striata again) per day with max 2 dots on the fins - not more. Even though I get tha same (occasional spots) again this week. I called a medication producer and was recommended "protazol" as it may be easier on loaches.
THe Q-tank gat full dose and is clear now (Rainbow fish).

I was surprised that the spots did not spread more before medicating the main system - and so was my consulting party. In Nature, he said, that´s what ich looks like, only occasional spots - once in a while. Now I´ve added "Protazol" and hope that works. I´ve put a piece of Rainbow-fin under the mikroskope an found busy traffic of little guys that rather looked like "Costia" so I may have had both - but madication covers both.

PLease make sure you get planty of oxgen into the water.

Just want to add: before I went with half dose (of description on package) I explored the internet and found recepies, that are close to the half-dose amount (calculated the MG content) - however did not work for me.

[Marcos Mataratzis]

Hello Mango,

Welcome to LOL!

First of all I would do a 50% water change on your tank to remove as much salt as possible as Corydoras and loaches do not tolerate it much.
Then, I would raise temperature to 30°C and apply the MG. Lights off would be adviseble as well.

Wish you luck!

[Doc]

Ich will not only slow down at temps higher than 28 degrees C , but in temps over 30 degrees will actually cease reproducing and higher still result in it's very fast death. If you do raise the temp over 30 degrees then try to aerate the water as much as possible. You can still add the treatment but to be honest it isn't really necessary at the higher temps.
If you keep your temp at 28 degrees then all you doing is speeding up the life cycle of the protozoa to around 3-4 days so that the treatment will be able to deal with and eradicate it faster.

[mango]

Thanks everyone. We'll do the 50% change as several have advised, and buy another aerator - we currently have one, with one pump. The consensus seems to be to get rid of the salt and make the temp a bit higher (just not sure how the others will cope.) I wonder if it's perhaps the salt that is making the others sluggish, rather than the meds and the temp.

[Emma Turner]

Hi mango,

I presume by 'aerator' you mean an air pump? If so, air pumps do not actually add a huge amount of oxygen to the water - certainly not enough when raising the temperature higher than normal. Oxygenation will only occur in the small area where the bubbles break at the water's surface, and so are more of a decorative product (or a handy 'back up') than anything. Far better would be to temporarily drop the water level in the tank by an inch or so, so that the water returning from the filter splashes down onto the water's surface creating turbulence. A powerhead with the flow diverter angled upwards will also help. The more agitation at the water's surface, the better, as this incorporates much more oxygen. The cost of a small powerhead (make sure it has a protective cage underneath to stop fish from getting drawn in) could easily compare with a decent airpump and associated bits & pieces needed, and will result in much more richly oxygenated water.

Personally, I would advise that you use a loach-safe whitespot medication in the tank, coupled with an elevated temperature. With all the recent reports of much more virulent strains of whitespot around, just using higher temps or salt (which I would never recommend myself) can backfire at great expense to the fish. Far better to get a tried and trusted treatment in there as soon as possible IMO, rather than wait and see.

Of course, this is just my opinion, you go with what you feel is best.

Emma