Goldfish with ICK - Need Help!!

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Welsh

Aquarium Advice Freak
Joined
Jun 30, 2010
Messages
336
Location
South Wales, UK
I know the best way to treat a tropical fish with ick, is to gradually raise the temperature and sometimes use AQ salt but I'm not so sure with a goldfish :s is it the same? This goldfish was mine as a child but I eventually gave it to my neighbour, who then put it in her pond and he's been there for the last 12 years, however now he's got white spot and his colour has faded, What's the best way to treat him? we live in Wales but the temperature has been pretty hot lately.

Thanks :)
 
Best way to treat goldfish with ich is with salt. You will need to treat him in a hospital setup (you don't want to salt an entire pond.) Gradual (over 24 hr) increase of salt to 0.3% is recommended, and you need to keep the salt at that level for at least 1 week after the ich spots are gone.
Treating Ich with Salt

You can optionally raise the temp to high 70's (26C ish) to hasten the ich lifecycle and shorten treatment. This temp is not high enough to kill ich out-right so salt is still needed. You will need to have excellent aeration to maintain goldfish in higher temp.

For severe infestation, i have also use salt dip to quickly stripe off the slime coat & remove the parasite load. I would use 0.5 - 0.9% salt bath (lower conc. if fish is weak) for 15-30 min. Followed by the long term bath at 0.3%. <Some go as high as 3% - full marine ... but that is tough on the fish.>

During treatment, maintaining perfect water condition is a must. That means setting up a cycled hospital tank, and lots of pwc. <Some advocate daily 100% water change to remove all cysts that had fallen off the fish.>
 
Would it have to be cycled? or could I just use some gravel, filter media, etc from an already cycled tank?
 
If you take enough media from a cycled tank or pond, then you will have an instantly cycled hospital tank. <I keep extra filter pads in my sump just so I can do this.> You can monitor parameters & do pwc's as needed, but with good seeding, the most you would see is trace levels.
 
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