Ammonia and Ich in a "cycled tank"

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FishayFishay

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So I've had my tank for about 2-3 weeks now but I used filter media/water from my cycled 1 g and also safestart that seemed to work wonders. Turned out that because I got lazy with the vacuuming the gravel, I'm guessing the water chemistry changed quick in my 10G and my fish became stressed and now they have ich. It's only been1-2 days since I detected it and I've been watching over them so close all weekend since they've been glancing and flashing a lot. Now I understand. I'm going to vacuum thoroughly today and do a 50-75% water change. And apply some medicine. I don't want to try the heat method even I cranked up my heat from 79 to 82 which is allowed with my cardinal tetras and DG. They don't all have the spots yet but are bound too and the tetras are the worst of them all. Woke up in the morning to them being colorless. It was a scary sight. How do you guys think I should go about this when it comes to what medicine and how to apply and future tips to avoid this problem again. I haven't been lazy with water changes, I change about 20% every week. And for the water parameters, I always test, more than once a week and they seemed fine. On test strips that are completely useless. I ordered the liquid kit but so far I only have pH tester and that's 7.6. I'm desperate for help, quick replies please! Thank you
 
Ammonia and Ich in a "cycled tank"

So I've had my tank for about 2-3 weeks now but I used filter media/water from my cycled 1 g and also safestart that seemed to work wonders. Turned out that because I got lazy with the vacuuming the gravel, I'm guessing the water chemistry changed quick in my 10G and my fish became stressed and now they have ich. It's only been1-2 days since I detected it and I've been watching over them so close all weekend since they've been glancing and flashing a lot. Now I understand. I'm going to vacuum thoroughly today and do a 50-75% water change. And apply some medicine. I don't want to try the heat method even I cranked up my heat from 79 to 82 which is allowed with my cardinal tetras and DG. They don't all have the spots yet but are bound too and the tetras are the worst of them all. Woke up in the morning to them being colorless. It was a scary sight. How do you guys think I should go about this when it comes to what medicine and how to apply and future tips to avoid this problem again. I haven't been lazy with water changes, I change about 20% every week. And for the water parameters, I always test, more than once a week and they seemed fine. On test strips that are completely useless. I ordered the liquid kit but so far I only have pH tester and that's 7.6. I'm desperate for help, quick replies please! Thank you


My 45g is just recovering from ick, quarantine all infected fish, unless that's all of them, and I cranked up the heat to 90 degrees F. Raise the heat 2 degrees every 45-60 mins.

Ick cannot survive at that high of a temperature and beware some fish might not either but....

My ick(it was really severe) disappeared completely in around 3 days. I would have had less deaths if I had known of this treatment sooner.

If their fins are deteriorating, a salt bath is a good remedy to help soothe them.


EDIT: that's my experience with treating ick and I found heat to be the best way. LFS stores do sell liquid ick remedies but they are not cheap IMO.


Caleb

~10g tiger barbs
~45g ick problems/loach and 5 tetras left.
~75g going to be African cichlids
 
Ammonia and Ich in a "cycled tank"

Ick usually comes along when your fish are stressed, judging by the title I would say your ammonia level stressed them out and caused the ick. Keep doing water changes ammonia needs to be at 0ppm AT ALL TIMES

What are your water parameters?


Caleb

~10g tiger barbs
~45g ick problems/loach and 5 tetras left.
~75g going to be African cichlids
 
Ick usually comes along when your fish are stressed, judging by the title I would say your ammonia level stressed them out and caused the ick. Keep doing water changes ammonia needs to be at 0ppm AT ALL TIMES

What are your water parameters?


Caleb

~10g tiger barbs
~45g ick problems/loach and 5 tetras left.
~75g going to be African cichlids


I honestly wish I can tell you. I have test strips right now and ordered a master liquid test kit. I'm getting a friend to maybe let me borrow his and I'll let you know later but I do know the pH is 7.6. I'm going to do a big water change today and add some ich medicine. Do you recommend that I take out the decor in the tank?
 
QT'ing sick fish when ICH is present in a DT (display tank) is a fruitless effort. If it's present in the DT, the entire system needs treatment as there's no way to properly isolate the problem from said tank.


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QT'ing sick fish when ICH is present in a DT (display tank) is a fruitless effort. If it's present in the DT, the entire system needs treatment as there's no way to properly isolate the problem from said tank.


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Yeah that's what I thought should happen. I think I caught it really early so it might not have gone through every little thing but better safe than sorry.
 
Yeah that's what I thought should happen. I think I caught it really early so it might not have gone through every little thing but better safe than sorry.


Catching it early is good but chances are if you physically see it on the fish, it's everywhere. Here's some good reading that may help you. http://www.aquariumadvice.com/freshwater-ich-yuck/


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I agree with Treeman, if you see it on your fish it's already taken over. Try to get that liquid test kit as soon as possible. They are soooooo much more accurate. Let us know when you get those parameters.

Many ick remedies say on the bottle to do a PWC before each continual dosage. Meaning before you add another dose, change the water to clean the tank from the last dose. So you will likely be doing a PWC every day. I think around 20%-30% is what I saw on a bottle.

Good luck keep us posted!


Caleb

~10g tiger barbs
~45g ick problems/loach and 5 tetras left.
~75g going to be African cichlids
 
I agree with Treeman, if you see it on your fish it's already taken over. Try to get that liquid test kit as soon as possible. They are soooooo much more accurate. Let us know when you get those parameters.

Many ick remedies say on the bottle to do a PWC before each continual dosage. Meaning before you add another dose, change the water to clean the tank from the last dose. So you will likely be doing a PWC every day. I think around 20%-30% is what I saw on a bottle.

Good luck keep us posted!


Caleb

~10g tiger barbs
~45g ick problems/loach and 5 tetras left.
~75g going to be African cichlids


A quick update: I got the liquid test kit and just tested my water parameters and I was actually a bit shocked at the difference between test strips and liquid kits. So here's the results

Ammonia: we're looking at 0.25 I also did like a 50-60% water change so it probably helped a lot and I'm going to do another 30-40% right now.

Nitrate: 10

Nitrite: 1.0 I'm seeing, possibly 0.25 but let's go for worst case scenario.

I did a big water change last night and fairly vacuumed thoroughly, I applied API Super Ick Cure. It says 5ml per 5 gallons, I only used 5 and it seemed to be doing it's job IMO. The fish are more active, a lot less glancing and itching. The spots seemed to have vanished from my biggest tetra. The gourami doesn't itch himself at all. Things are getting better. Tomorrow night I will apply maybe 10ml like the bottle suggests and hopefully things go well and I have happy healthy fish in a healthy tank. Any suggestions of where I should go from here?
 
A quick update: I got the liquid test kit and just tested my water parameters and I was actually a bit shocked at the difference between test strips and liquid kits. So here's the results

Ammonia: we're looking at 0.25 I also did like a 50-60% water change so it probably helped a lot and I'm going to do another 30-40% right now.

Nitrate: 10

Nitrite: 1.0 I'm seeing, possibly 0.25 but let's go for worst case scenario.

I did a big water change last night and fairly vacuumed thoroughly, I applied API Super Ick Cure. It says 5ml per 5 gallons, I only used 5 and it seemed to be doing it's job IMO. The fish are more active, a lot less glancing and itching. The spots seemed to have vanished from my biggest tetra. The gourami doesn't itch himself at all. Things are getting better. Tomorrow night I will apply maybe 10ml like the bottle suggests and hopefully things go well and I have happy healthy fish in a healthy tank. Any suggestions of where I should go from here?


Even though you can't see the ick anymore because the spots will go away, that doesn't mean that the ick is gone, it hasn't completed its life cycle yet. Give it about 2-3 weeks to be sure it's cleared out the system and keep up with those water changes that helps get rid of it faster.

Great job :)

P.S. It's amazing how much better liquid is isn't it :D


Caleb

~10g tiger barbs
~45g ick is fixed!
~75g new community tank.
 
Yeah it really is man. But I had the temperature raised to 82 just to kinda speed up the process. Do you think if I turn it back down to 79 F when this is over will it affect the fish too much? They can handle 82 but I just think 79 is good for them.
 
Not sure about the temp change. Whatever you do, make sure the change is gradual. Less stress for the fish.


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I'm not gonna go crazy with a multi quote package but here goes :
1. Now you can help tell folks the difference between strips/liquid.

2. Agree that just because you don't see it, doesn't mean it's gone. With 82°, I'd definitely make this a 3 week process. 14 days if it was around 86°.

3. I too see no issues when bringing the temp back down as long as its moderate as stated by David.

4. Congrats on getting thru it !!


Sent from my iPhone that doesn't like me. Or you !!
 
I'm not gonna go crazy with a multi quote package but here goes :
1. Now you can help tell folks the difference between strips/liquid.

2. Agree that just because you don't see it, doesn't mean it's gone. With 82°, I'd definitely make this a 3 week process. 14 days if it was around 86°.

3. I too see no issues when bringing the temp back down as long as its moderate as stated by David.

4. Congrats on getting thru it !!


Sent from my iPhone that doesn't like me. Or you !!


Thanks bro, it's been a ride so far.
 
This is an updated version of what's been going on lately. I made a new thread about it but I'm gonna post it here just to get ahold of you all for sure.

I still have an ich problem. Also realized my "cardinal tetras" are actually neon tetras. My LFS has some explaining to do. I couldn't really tell at the time since they were juvenile when I got them. (Easy mistake). Therefore I've been keeping a third eye on them but they've handled everything well including ich and stress and an ammonia spike. Aside from that I still keep seeing ich spots on my DG. It's gotten way better with behavior and my water parameters are on point 0/0/10. I've been dosing every other 48 hours unless it gets too noticeable (the spots). I've had a couple of questions regarding the filter media, should I clean it or replace it during or after the treatments are over? I've been dosing lower than recommended cause that medication is just wicked blue and scary looking once it's in my tank. I've been dosing a little more than half is recommended but last night my gourami started twitching really hard and I thought that was out of the picture by now so I panicked and dosed the recommendation. Probably should've done that from the start. Basically now I'm wondering where do I go from here and when can I add some plants in my tank?
 
I've been dosing lower than recommended cause that medication is just wicked blue and scary looking once it's in my tank. I've been dosing a little more than half is recommended but last night my gourami started twitching really hard and I thought that was out of the picture by now so I panicked and dosed the recommendation. Probably should've done that from the start. Basically now I'm wondering where do I go from here and when can I add some plants in my tank?

The blue is part of the medication. Medications are dosed at concentrations that work so ramping up and routinely under-dosing can prevent them from being effective. Also increases the chances of developing resistance.

I always suggest use the medication or don't ... half way is not a good option.
 
Basically now I'm wondering where do I go from here and when can I add some plants in my tank?

I certainly wouldn't add anything new until you've been ick free for some weeks.

Have you actually completed a course of treatment or have you been under-dosing for all this time?
 
I certainly wouldn't add anything new until you've been ick free for some weeks.



Have you actually completed a course of treatment or have you been under-dosing for all this time?


For the most part, underdosing. And yeah I was thinking 3 weeks after the spots clear away.
 
For the most part, underdosing. And yeah I was thinking 3 weeks after the spots clear away.

Well if what you're treating with is what I think it is it's supposed to deal with ick within days. With the caveat of course that you have to get through the life cycle of the bug... So perhaps the concentration isn't high enough? Or perhaps try a different medication. If you're going to change meds make sure to do a big water change between them and run carbon. Don't want to mix most meds.

Are you only treating when you see spots then taking it out when it clears up? And you're not running carbon with the meds are you?

Perhaps you're treating the free swimming bugs but not the protected ones and then it is coming back? If you haven't already look up the ick life cycle. It's only susceptible to treatment during the 'free swimming stage.'
 
Well if what you're treating with is what I think it is it's supposed to deal with ick within days. With the caveat of course that you have to get through the life cycle of the bug... So perhaps the concentration isn't high enough? Or perhaps try a different medication. If you're going to change meds make sure to do a big water change between them and run carbon. Don't want to mix most meds.

Are you only treating when you see spots then taking it out when it clears up? And you're not running carbon with the meds are you?

Perhaps you're treating the free swimming bugs but not the protected ones and then it is coming back? If you haven't already look up the ick life cycle. It's only susceptible to treatment during the 'free swimming stage.'


No I'm not running carbon with the medication and I raised my temp to 82 hoping to at least slow down the growth of the parasite but it doesn't seem to be working I guess. I only see glancing and itching from the dwarf gourami and it's minimal. I think the medicine kinda killed off most of it but they keep sticking towards the gourami since he's always towards the floor of the tank. I do my normal water change weekly 20-30% so I don't have another ammonia spike that caused this.
 
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