Ich in the tanks! Please advise! shrimp, pleco, platy, goldie...

[Lollipops]

I managed to get ich in both of my tanks I should have kept the new fish quarantined longer...

I understand that plecos and shrimp are both very sensitive to ich treatments?

My 50 gallon tank has my common goldie, a rubber lip pleco.
My 10 gallon has platies and shrimp.

I see white spots on one platy, and the poor pleco shows spots. No spots on the goldie but I see bubbles in his slime coat that I think are due to the ich...

I have a third tank I could put to use. All the tanks have sand.


THE PLAN!!!
1) I could move the pleco to the shrimp tank for sensitive care. (If the pleco eats some shrimp, at least he'll be eating...)

2) Move the platys to the empty tank.

3) Treat the goldie tank and the platy tank using medication... I trust Seachem so I'm considering Cupramine... oh they also sell ParaGuard...?What's the difference...?

4) Do some research, because I hear higher temp and salt are a way to treat the shrimp/pleco... I hear reef safe ich treatments dont really work... or they only mask the problem... I was looking at Chem-Marin Stop Parasites

Thoughts?
Brand suggestions?

Thanks

 

[Lollipops]

Cupramine seems terrible and dangerous... ParaGuard seems safer though still not \for the inverts

 

[mimiheart]

Can you move the shrimp anywhere?

If the pleco has it, it's in the water. Your best bet is higher temps + salt, which the goldie won't like, but can deal with with proper aeration. If you can't move the shrimp, you may want to put everyone in the big tank, put your plants and shrimp in the small tank and just treat the big tank using pleco safe meds + salt with the temp a bit higher than normal. Clean the substrate and filters well in the small tank. You'll probably end up with a small cycle, but the shrimp should be okay. I'd just do bare bottom in the big tank if you can during the treatment.

 

[idol1]

I have been using salt for years to kill fresh water ick.

The only parameters of salt that I have found to work completely is 1.000 to 1.004 at six weeks.

There is only a few types of fresh water fish that will tolerate this level of salt.

The only fish you have that will tolerate that much salt is your platys

You will still have a ick problem. the lower level of salt and higher temp will get it off the fish but it will still be free swimming not dead.

I am going to talk to University of Hawaii about doing a study on salt and fish diseases, since no real scientific research has been done on this.

I can only tell you what has worked for me.