Sick puffer, please help!

[cyates]

I bought a new plant, and it infected my tank with what I thought was ick. At first it looked like small white specs, so I bought Ick Guard II which is supposedly for scaleless fish.
I did a 25% water change before the first medication, took the carbon out, and re-added medication every 24 hours for three days in a row. Since it wasn't working, I switched to Ick Guard I (the blue stuff) and have applied the 4th application with that.

About a hour ago a catfish died and a bala shark. Is this really ick? If so, what am I doing wrong? If not, what do I do?

Please help! THank you.

Puffer has progressed from small white specs to this:

 

[cyates]

Also, I increased the temperate 1 degree every 12 hours until it got to 82 to help speed up the process. Does that mean that I should have increased the frequency of doses?

Also, everywhere I read all it said was to take out carbon, but nothing mentioned about other media such as ammo-chips. I forgot that I left the ammo-chips in, would the ammo-chips cancel out the meds? It doesn't say that anywhere on the med bottle or the ammo-chip carton.

When the bala shark died it didn't really have that many white spots like I've seen pictures of fish with ick on the net. In fact, none of the fish have white spots bigger than maybe a grain of sand or so.

The fish tank is over 3 months old, and water properties are stable.

 

[cyates]

Also, thought I should mention that the ammo-chips in there are the same ammo-chips as when I first set up the tank. I've washed the media cartridge in tank water in a 5gal bucket, but other than that left it, so they are not recharged and may not have had an effect even if they were supposed to.

The puffer is the only one with this sort of white guck. I assumed it was because it's scaleless. All the other scaled fish just have the tiny white spots.

 

[Essayons89]

This certainly looks like Ich to me. Good move taking the carbon out of filter. I would take out the ammo chips too just to be safe. I've never used them so I can't tell you for sure as to whether or not they will draw out meds.

Ich will normally run its course in 7-10 days. The higher temp will speed the life cycle up some. I always treat for 14 days just to ensure that the parasite has been eliminated. Be sure to remember that once the cysts fall off of the fish the Ich isn't gone-it's entering its second stage. A few days after falling off the fish the cysts will burst releasing the free swimming tomites. This is when Ich is vulnerable to meds.

Rid Ich is another product that is safe for use on scaleless fish. It's a diluted malachite green based med.

Good luck.

Bryan