Loaches Online Forum

Just when my little guy quit saying "My fish are dead" (which by the way none of ours died yet), ich comes along and ruins my evening. I wasn't even going to do a water change today since my parameters were spot-on. But, low and behold, there it was. Crap . Off to the store I go and get Mardel CopperSafe. I does the tank at half dosage (as directed on other posts). I removed the charcol filter. I added anything to this tank for 2 weeks or changed anything.

What else should I do? How often should I do water changes? (I have been doing 10% 2x weekly). What should I watchout for in copper toxicity? I'm going to be very sad if anything happens to these fish

Any other suggestions at all?

Thanks all for your help


3 B. Kubatai
4 Long Fin Rosey Barbs
3 Balas
1 Rainbow shark
4 Otocinclus

Community
6 Rummynose Tetras

Q-tank
empty

Usually the best way to get rid of ich is to shock it out rather than to use chemicals, as copper is very crappy for scaleless fish. Wont kill them necessarily.

Im concerned about the maximum temperature tolerance of those bala sharks though...

IMO the best way to kill ich is to shock it the same way you shock a plantar wort on your foot-

If your tank is usually 80F jack it up to 88 for about three hours, then bring it back down to about 85 and leave it there for a couple of days. If your fish show signs of distress, bring the temperature back down immediately.

Remember, as complex organisms, the fish can take rapid changes in temperature very easily compared to ich.

My tank regularly goes from 82-79 or 80 within the space of 2 or 3 minutes when I do a w/c and nobody bats an eye (not that they could as they have no eyelids...)

Continue the copper medication, at a lower dose than the box says given the scaleless fish. Try increasing the temperature as noted but dont leave it high for too long.

The rainbow shark gets stressed when the temperature goes above 80. I did use it at half strength from the bottle. At 8p at night, my choices were limited. Does anyone keep medications around "just in case"? If so, which ones? I heard that some aquarium salt might also help, but I'm concerned about the combination. I'm also going to leave the light off for a few days.

On the up side, all were eating fell tonight on frozen bloodworms.

QueenDustBunny wrote:The rainbow shark gets stressed when the temperature goes above 80. I did use it at half strength from the bottle. At 8p at night, my choices were limited. Does anyone keep medications around "just in case"? If so, which ones? I heard that some aquarium salt might also help, but I'm concerned about the combination. I'm also going to leave the light off for a few days.

On the up side, all were eating fell tonight on frozen bloodworms.

The salt will damage your loaches more than the ich will...