Can i use salt?

[Jonny2007]

Yes this is another ick thread, after I had to miss my weekly water changes, I final was able to make it home and the first thing I see is my female gold ram has about five or six white dots! I was just wondering if salt is ok with gold rams, neon tetras, and glo light tetras?

 

[Dreamingdragon]

If I see white dots on my fish. I turn up my heater 5 degree till the ick is gone after that do water change and turn your heater back to were it was so if you have your temp on 70 turn it up to 75 or 80 salt you can use as exstra

 

[Dreamingdragon]

How ever salt is not nessery.

 

[Jonny2007]

I have to get another heater today, because I'm having issues keeping my temp up with the cold weather.

 

[siva]

Are you sure it's ich? Are the spots like grains of salt?

With your stock, I would try heat only first. Gold rams are very sensitive, and neons don't do so great with salt either. You need to slowly raise your heat to atleast 86 degrees, and keep it there, while doing frequent PWC's and gravel vac's, for about 2 weeks, atleast 1 week after symptoms are gone.

 

[Jonny2007]

Yeah, it's little white specks on her body and tail fin.

 

[Retired_AF]

Salt isnt absolutely necessary but it may help. I have neons in a tank that I kept salted and it never seemed to bother them. Temperature is the better solution, but salt may help the fish recover faster. I keep my tanks at 80 degrees. If I see any ich, I increase the temp to 85 over a couple of days and let it stay there for a couple of weeks. Be sure to vacuum the gravel and do frequent water changes during that time to remove as many spores as possible.

 

[Dreamingdragon]

I agree salt isn,t a must. The heater will do it's work.

 

[Jonny2007]

Thanks for the advice!

 

[Mumma.of.two]

The temp will have to be 86 at the absolute minimum to eradicate the ich. Any lower will just speed up it's life cycle.

 

[jetajockey]

I recall reading something on IFAS about Ich having some strains that are more heat resistant than others, but they are uncommon, so the heat only method should be fine. I've used heat + salt every time to treat ich no matter what the fish is and it's always worked great. I know that some fish are more salt sensitive than others, but I believe that a low level concentration short term isn't really that big of a deal, but I think people tend to add heat+salt and then watch a few of the fish die in the following days and assume it was the salt or heat that did it when it wasn't either.

If you look at what the big aquariums and other type places use, the ones I've seen use a salt bath immediately on their new arrivals and suspected sick fish (that salt can deal with).

 

[pitdogg2]

I disagree salt can be very helpful. Ich really likes the gills of fish. When you see ich on the fish they've had it in their gills first. Salt does two things it's very hard on the parasite and it help the fish produce extra slime to help slough off the parasite plus helps the gill functions. The heat turn it up as high as you can it will super speed up the life cycle of the parasite so much it hard for them to sustain the cycle.

If you're having trouble with keeping the temp stable that may be the cause of the ich infection.

 

[pitdogg2]

The temp will have to be 86 at the absolute minimum to eradicate the ich. Any lower will just speed up it's life cycle.

higher speeds up the life cycle lower does not. you need to speed it up fast enough to make it unable to sustain the life cycle.

 

[Mumma.of.two]

higher speeds up the life cycle lower does not. you need to speed it up fast enough to make it unable to sustain the life cycle.

It has been found that Ich does not infect new fish at 29.4°C/85°F (Johnson, 1976), stops reproducing at 30°C/86°F (Dr. Nick St. Erne, DVM, pers. comm.), and dies at 32°C/89.5°F (Meyer, 1984), [1]
http://www.aquahobby.com/articles/e_ich2.php