white spots on new fish (overnight appearance)

[treedae]

I just bought 4 glass catfish 15 hrs ago and they had no signs of disease. This morning however, I noticed small white spots on a couple of them and a couple of my tiger barbs. They're not acting strange, but I want to take care of this quick before it gets out of control. What's my best approach?

 

[malkore]

it's ich
is this tank planted at all? what other fish are in the tank?

since you have 3 infected fish, assume the entire tank is infected. Get an ich medication, something with malachite green is my suggestion. it's strong stuff and will stain silicone seals AND anything plastic...so remove decorations and driftwood first.

Also, raise the tank temp to 80-82 degrees, as this will speed ich thru it's life cycle to the stage where the meds are most effective.


(a mod. might wanna move this post to the Unhealthy Fish section)

 

[treedae]

Yeah, it's pretty heavily planted with Cabomba and Cryptocoryne. I have 4 glass catfish, 4 angelfish, 4 tiger barbs, 2 upside down catfish and 1 lonely goldfish. I've been doing a bit of reading since my post and am thinking that I might want to use Cu based medication instead. (Yeah, I have a couple snails, but I'm not fond of them and would like to see them go before they multiply) Does this sound right? Will this medication stain decorations too?

Also, I've read that non-iodinized salt is helpful in killing the parasite. How effective is this?

 

[TankGirl]

I have, unfortunately, treated for ich in a heavily planted tank, and have had success with Rid-Ich (this is a lower concentration than some and safer) as well as high temps. I use 86F for about 10 days, and the plants do not like this but they all bounced right back. Salt is probably going to be harder on the plants than the temps, but they may have an equal negative impact.

This is another great reason to quarrantine new fish, as it is so much easier to treat a bare tank.

There is some good reading in our articles section about treating for Ich, if you have not taken a peek at that yet, treedae.

I'll move the thread over to Unhealthy.

 

[treedae]

Is this why pet stores recommend draining the bags of their water before adding the fish to the tank? To minimize the risk of introducing disease?

 

[TankGirl]

Yes, it is always a good idea to net the fish out of the pet shop bag so you get as little of their water mixed with yours as possible.

I acclimate the fish by adding tank water to the bag as it floats over the course of 30-45 minutes, depending on how different my water is from theirs. Then net the fish out.

 

[treedae]

Ok, well the pet store didn't have Rid-Ich so I decided to go with a Cu sulfate treatment to be easy on my plants. The Ich isn't too severe right now, so I'm thinking this less toxic medication combined with a high temp for 10-14 days will do it. Thanks for the help.

 

[treedae]

Is this Cu sulfate going to significantly disrupt my biological filter? And if so, will water changes to keep NH3 levels down before my Cu treatment alter the medication levels significantly? Thanks.

 

[TankGirl]

I would do frequent water changes whenever dosing meds, usually about 10% daily before dosing. I don't think copper is going to harm your biofilter if you use it as directed, but I'm not positive about it. It is good to be concerned about that though, so keep a close eye on these values. If your plants are thriving and growing well you might not see any buildup of NH3, as they will utilize it out of the water before it shows up.

Keep us posted, though, as I am always interested in how meds affect plants and fish, and whether or not they cause a mini cycle.

 

[treedae]

How long should it be before I stop seeing spots on my fish? It's been a whole 24 hours and the spots are still there!

Ok, seriously though. I've got the temp up to about 80 and am slowly rising it about 2 degrees/day.

I decided not to do a water change today b/c the toxic ammonia was only about 0.006. (Trying to keep the Cu levels as high as I can to get those nasty little parasites )

BTW, my KH jumped from 3 to 5 overnight. I would have thought the GH to jump with it, but it stayed at 4. Any ideas?

 

[TankGirl]

I would do a water change every day right before you dose - you can get some of the free swimming nasties in the process.

I would expect to see improvement over the course of 3-4 days, but continue therapy for an additional 4 days after the last spot is gone. Forgive me if I already said that - I'm like a robot when it starts to get late, LOL!

 

[Canuckfan]

The med you bought , Cu Sulfate , is copper sulfate . The copper will most likely kill your plants & any invertebrates in your tank , which would include your snails . A med like Coppersafe , used at full strength , will prob do this . Another med , like Aquarasol , is also copper based but isn't as strong as Coppersafe & prob won't kill your plants . This shouldn't affect your PH , but you might get increased readings of amonia , nitrite , & nitrate , if all your snails die off & you don't remove them from your tank . Remember to continue to treat your tank for 2 weeks after the last white spot disappears . I failed to do this & had ich in my tank for almost a month . Luckily I didn't lose any fish . Good luck .

 

[treedae]

Actually I bought the Cu b/c I read online that it was less toxic to the plants. We'll see how it goes. Fortunately, I only had like 2 or 3 tiny snails I saw in my jungle, but I'm more than happy to get rid of them b4 they get out of control. My nitrites and toxic ammonia have risen a bit overnight (0.2 and 0.01 respectively). I did the pre-treatment water change as you rec Tank girl and hopefully this will help a bit.

One question.....I treated my tap H2O w/ aquaplus to remove the Cl, but I noticed on the bottle that it removes heavy metals too. Is this going to mess w/ my Cu levels too much?

 

[TankGirl]

Plants do use copper to a very small degree, so I have heard of planted tank people using it for treatment of ich.

I suppose the water conditioner might interfere, but I'm not positive about how it goes about binding the heavy metals and making them inert. Perhaps you could switch to Wardley's Chlor-Out for the time being, as it is straight dechlor.

 

[treedae]

What a sad day. Found 2 of my glass catfish dead today caught in the tentacles of my Cabomba plant. I measured my toxic ammonia (still 0.01) and nitrites (up to 0.5) now and did a 25% water change followed by treatment w/ Cusulfate.

The spots are gone from my barbs, but the one glass catfish I can locate is still obvious with disease. I wonder where my 4th catfish is?

 

[treedae]

Ok, well 3 glass catfish and one tiger barb later the white spots have officially dissipated. Now I guess I have to wait it out another 10 days of treatment to eradicate the rest of the buggers.

Of note, my nitrites have risen tremendously (>1) while my ammonia levels have tapered off. I wonder if the bacteria that reduce the nitrite are more sensitive to the Cu than those that reduce the ammonia. Any comments?

 

[humblebumble]

glass catfish and meds

Hi-
I've only had our glasscats for about a month, but when I was talking to the woman at our LFS (the one person I trust the opinion of there-- she has worked there 14 years and keeps many tanks of her own at home), she told me that glass cats are very sensitive to medications and before I put anything in the tank with one, i should make sure it is safe for scaleless fish. She told me that many medications that are fine for other species are toxic to glass cats and will kill them within hours. (She said for many, half-doses are recomended, but that I would need to check for each because this is not a general rule of thumb to use halfhazardly with any additive)
I am not sure if you unintentionally stumbled into one that was toxic to them (but I THINK I was cautioned not to use copper-containing meds, though I may be remembering wrong. I also think she told me she keeps her school of glasscats in her shrimp tank because many of the same things will harm them), but it is something to keep in mind for future. She told me that much of what I've learned about keeping other fish will not apply for a sick glass catfish, and any advice/information I seek i would have to make sure is specific to them. Also, she said "water quality, water quality, water quality"-- even more so for them then other species. (though it sounded like your water quality was super and it wasn't the issue...)

 

[Hobgob]

Is this why pet stores recommend draining the bags of their water before adding the fish to the tank? To minimize the risk of introducing disease?

Exactly a parasite could be in the water from them. You can just net a fish also. If I was you I would raise my temp to 86f for 14 days atleast that's all you need at 85f ich can reproduce and at 86 they can't attach to a new host. Salt might do a lot to your plants and why would you want to use meds....