Treating a planted community tank for ICH.

[Gern]

I have a heavily planted, 84 gal tank with Congo Tetras, Black Skirt Tetras, Neon Tetras, Blue Gouramis, a Dwarf Gourami, Zebra Danios, Australian Rainbows, Siamese Algae Eaters, Ottos, and a very fat female Black Molly. I felt sorry for her and bought a male Black Molly. I isolated him in a 5 gal hospital tank and after a week or so, introduced him to the big tank. Almost immediately he showed signs of ICH. He went back into the hospital and was treated. Once clear he came back and got sick again! This happened a third time and he is once again isolated and healthy. I figure my only option is to treat the big tank! I plan on using NOX ICH at a lttle under half strength. Any recommendations??? Will the treatment hurt the plants? Pond snails came along with some of the plants. Will the treatment hurt them? Should I also increase the temperature? If so, to what and for how long?

Thanks!!!

[bs6749]

I normally recommend Quick Cure or meds for the treatment of Ich and am not a big fan of the heat method. However, in this case I would recommend the heat method to you. You should get the temperature of the tan at or above 87 degrees. You are going to keep it there for 14 days or more depending on the health of your fish. Add an extra airstone to the tank because higher water temps hold less oxygen and the extra airstone will allow more oxygen to be dissolved into the water. If you go with the NOX Ich, you will most likely stain the tank blue or green depending on the active ingredients in the medicine. This is not something you want in a show tank such as yours. Stick with the heat treatment for this one since you will want to treat ALL of your fish for Ick now.

[Zagz]

I am the opposite of BS6749 usually but this time he is recommending the same thing I would do. I have done this several times with great success.