Goldfish with Ick?

[jphendren]

I have a two week old 10 gallon aquarium with two Comet Goldfish and one Black Moore Goldfish. On Saturday I placed some Anacharis plants in the tank that I purchased from Petco; this Monday I noticed that my largest Comet Goldfish was sitting under his rock and only coming out to feed. His fins are also clamped against his body. My wife said that it could be Ick, so I looked it up on the internet, and I tell you it sure looks like it. He had small white spots on his fins, and a few on his body. I immediately went to Petco and purchased Mardel Coppersafe, and dosed the tank carefully as directed on the box. I also put in one tablespoon of aquarium salts, as a Petco employee said that could help. I had also read that the Ick parasite's cycle is sped up by raising the temperature of the tank. I have been trying to keep the water below 74º F, but installed my heater and heated the tank to 78º F, as that is as high as my heater will heat. I did this thinking that the warmer water would speed up the Ick cycle and allow the Coppersafe to kill the parasite, but so far I am seeing little results. Now my other two Goldfish are also covered in white spots

Last night I went to my LFS and they told me that Ick takes advantage of a weakened fish, and that I should NOT have raised the tank temp, that Goldfish become weakened in anything over 72-73º F or so. So I came home and removed the heater, and this morning my tank is 72º again.

Now the first Comet (Lightning McQueen) that contracted the Ick has bloodshot fins, and scales falling off, I'm afraid that he is dying. He still eats when food is available, but hides most of the day. The other two, despite all of the spots, are still behaving normally as before.

Water:

Nitrate - 10 ppm
Nitrite - 0 ppm
Total Hardness - 300 ppm very hard
Chlorine - 0
Total alkalinity - 120 ppm
pH - 7.8
Ammonia - 0

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Jared

 

[jphendren]

Well, now the other two are just laying on the bottom, pretty much acting like Lightning McQueen. They are pretty much covered from head to tail with the tiny white spots, looks like somebody sprinkled sugar on them.

It seemed to have gotten worse when I lowered the tank temp back down into the low 70's. There is so much conflicting information on the internet when it comes to fish, that I'm not sure what to do

Some people say to raise the temp toward 80º F, others say it will kill a goldfish, who knows? The fish seemed to be doing fine when the tank was around 79º F. Should I throw out my anacharis plants, the main culprit as the source of the Ick? I believe that I read that water in the low 70º's will make this take quite a bit longer, so I am leaning toward raising the tamp back up.

Jared

 

[reefdiver]

raise the temp to 82. lower temps are what make ick trive.

 

[jphendren]

Can goldfish survive in 82º?

Also, I re-started my heater, they definitely seemed to do better in the warmer water. My problem is I have a kit heater, and it is set at the factory for between 76-79º, so I cannot get the tank up to 82º with this heater. Will 78º do anything to the ick, or should I buy another heater?

Jared

 

[glassbird]

Are you familiar with the "cycle" that a new aquarium goes thru? You need to read up on this, right away, if not. Three goldfish in a 10 gallon tank is WAY, WAY too many. I am astonished that your ammonia is at 0...is this a number obtained from a test done at home? Or at the pet store? Was a drop-type kit used? Or strips?

Be very wary of advice given by employees at pet stores. They are there to sell product, and may or may not know what they are talking about. If they suggest something, run it thru this forum before you do it, and someone will help you do it right.

Yes, heat will speed up the life cycle of the ich parasite. I do not know if 78 degrees is enough. I will let someone else speak to that. (82 degrees is fine for the duration of this problem.) I do know that plain un-iodized salt is far more effective, gentler, and cheaper, than so-called "cures" sold at stores. Search on this forum for the method of using salt for ick with goldfish. (I would post a link, but I should be working and can't make this post as detailed as I would like!)

 

[jphendren]

Yes, I am familiar with cycling the tank. I put a bottle of Tetra Safe Start when I set up the tank. At the time I did not know better about how many goldfish in a given area, and tank cycling, so there have been casualties. Now I realize that I should have a 50 gallon tank for these three fish. I am planning to move them to a larger tank in the near future.

I have used the test strips to measure my water, as well as a Mardel Live pH, and Live ammonia. The live ammonia is yellow, which means safe. The strips are turning slightly pale green, which is not 0, but it is reading less ammonia than .05, which is stress. I also found a local fish/aquarium shop with a very knowledgable employee, and he measured my water using test tubes and drops. He told me my tank water is quite good, but that I did have trace amounts of ammonia. I have been doing a 1.5 gallon water exchange every couple of days, and so far no bad ammonia spikes. He said keeping the ammonia in check will prolong the cycling process, and that fishless cycling is a better way. That is what I will do on my next tank.

I found that asking for advice at Petsmart, or Petco is useless, they don't know much about aquariums. After reading up about tank cycling, I went into Petsmart and asked the girl working in the fish department some questions, she had never heard of the nitrogen cycle or tank cylcing!

I also put some aquarium salt into the water when I put in the Coppersafe, but probably not enough to kill ick. By the way, what is the correct spelling, ick, or ich? I have seen both used.

Jared

 

[reefdiver]

you may try doing a 50% W/C every other day. Try to find a way to raise the temp. Don't add chemi. as they really don't help that much. ICK lives in the water so you may have to do more W/C in the week. And as others have told you for most fish its a 1" per GAL but for gold's it's 3" per GAL. Also every time you add new water make sure to treat it.I would personly suggest you upgrade your tanks, the bigger the better. I know it sounds dumb but the more space you have it will give you more time between W/C.

 

[jphendren]

Well, out of the three goldfish, only our Black Moore named Googles is still alive. The Coppersafe appears to be useless. We lost Afry 4 (my kids name our fish), and Lightning McQueen last night. My wife and I did a 50% water change last night, vacuumed the gravel, added a second filter, and an airstone. I removed the anacharis plants that I believe started this whole thing and threw them away. I then added aquarium salts to the tank and brought the salinity up to 1.003, which is what I read it should be for the salt treatment.

So now there is only one goldfish in a 10 gallon with two filters and an airstone, so hopefully the water will stay clean enough now. I still can't get the tank temp over 78º, my heater is factory set. If 82º is needed maybe I can get my wife to go buy an adjustable heater and install it. My local aquarium told me to not raise the temp, as heat kills goldfish, but when I left the aquarium cold the ick got much worse.

Jared

 

[reefdiver]

if u just google it you will see that everyone has coments the same comments. Now dont trust fishshops like petco or petsmart they ususally have some " guy " that thinks he knows what he's talking about. If its not 100% fish shop you not getting 100% answer. Check this link.Treating Ich with Salt | Illness and Treatment

 

[reefdiver]

Now you have to be patient with this as it will not cure as fast as one would wish.

 

[jphendren]

The last of my goldfish passed yesterday morning, Lightning died sometime in the night, and Googles around 9:30 AM. The Coppersafe did not seem to work. Anyways, my tank is now empty, I put the gravel in a 1 gallon fish bowel I have, and put in some bleach/water mix, and the 10 gallon itself also has some bleach/water mix in it as well. I scrubbed the entire tank with a soft sponge soaked with bleach/water. Is there anything else I should do before putting it back together and starting to cycle the tank? Should the filter media be replaced, could it have ick in it? I know that ick will die in several days if no fish are present; I just don't wan't to go through this again.

Jared

 

[reefdiver]

it be best to just sanitize every thing.

 

[reefdiver]

Srry you lost your fish. It would be best to sanitize every thing and startfrom scratch. What are you planing to keep in the future?

 

[jphendren]

I have another 55 gallon tank that I plan on doing either a FOWLR, or a reef tank with corals, I'm not sure yet. I'm still doing my research, so I have not yet begun putting the tank together yet.

No plans for the 10 gallon yet, I don't think that I am going to do anything with it, maybe a quarantine tank for the salt water tank?

Jared