White spot on Clown Loach's tail

[neurotik]

I've had a couple smaller Clown Loaches in my 55 gallon tank for a few weeks now and they have both been doing fine -- very active, eating well, and I do partial water changes on a weekly basis. The tank is properly cycled, I keep the temperature around 80F, and water parameters are usually 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, and around 10 nitrate before I do each partial water change each week.

Anyway, getting to my point. I awoke this morning and noticed that one of my Loaches had a small white spot on the edge of its tail fin. I examined the Loach more closely and I don't see any other white spots on it or any of the other Loaches or fish in the tank. From what I've read, I would assume this is Ich, but I've read several different methods of treating it. Some say to do a large PWC and then slowly increase the water temperature up to around ~86F and use one of the various Ich medications available, others say that simply increasing the temperature will be enough, as the medications can be harmful to Loaches, and other people seem to recommend a combination of increased temperature, medication, and aquarium salt.

My question is -- is this in fact Ich, or could it be something else? The Loach is still acting perfectly fine. He's swimming all over just like the other fish and eating fine. And if this is Ich, which method of treatment should I use? I'd like to get moving on this as soon as possible so that things do not become worse, but I just want to make sure I'm doing things properly so that I don't put any of my fish at risk of dying.

Thanks for the help!

 

[neurotik]

Just thought I'd provide some updates on my situation. There is still only one spot on one of my Loach's tail fin as of this afternoon, none of the other fish are showing any signs of Ich yet and they are all still acting normal.

After reading some more threads on these forums of people who had similar problems with their Loaches having Ich, I've done a PWC and I am now starting to increase the temperature in my tank gradually until I get the water to around 88F. I have adjusted the outtake of my Eheim Ecco 2236 filter so that it is pointing upwards a bit so that I have more water agitation to help provide more oxygen to the water as the temperature increases. I have also added a small air stone to the tank to help further with the oxygen, just to make sure that my fish do not suffer from lack of oxygen when the temperature gets near the 88F mark.

I'm going to stick with this method of treatment for a couple of weeks and I'll be doing PWC every day and also do some slight gravel vacuuming during those water changes as well.

If there is anything else I can do to along with this, please let me know.

 

[Zagz]

It may not be ich. Can you get a pic? Does it look like a grain of salt? If not, it is not ich. You can continue with the treatment, it will not hurt.

 

[neurotik]

I'll do my best to get a picture of it tomorrow morning/afternoon and post it for you. Yes, it looks like a grain of salt, but it is slightly larger than a single grain of salt would be I think. There is only one spot though, no signs of similar spots on his fin anywhere else or on his body or anything, and the other clowns have no spots either.

Is there anything else that it could be if it is not Ich? I know for a fact that the white spot was not on its tail before I woke up today, so it has to be something, I just assumed it was Ich based off of other cases I've read about in the past, although I've never had any hands on experience with dealing with it yet. I also found it a bit strange that there was only a single spot on one of the Loaches -- I was under the impression that Ich would cause there to be several spots on the fish, almost like a peppering effect on their fins and body, and I also thought that I'd see signs of it on more than just one fish since there are several other fish in my tank, none of which seem to have any visible signs of spots though.

Anyway, thanks for the response, I'll continue with the temperature increase and I'll see if things have changed at all by tomorrow morning and I'll report back here to let you know. Hopefully I'll manage to grab a decent picture of the Loach by then too for you to see.

Any other info would be helpful, thanks again, Zagz!

 

[ezy33]

First I would like to say spotting one spot on one fish shows you are consciences about keeping fish. Wait until you see a second spot or see any fish flashing. Then I would start raising the temperature and add a half cup of aquarium salt or rock salt that has no additives. As Clown Loaches are scales fish use half the salt as recommended. IMO any significant change in salinity will help. It may be one Ich spot and may not reproduce under your conditions, Ich can be brought on by stress as it may survive in the system for months without becoming a major outbreak.

 

[neurotik]

I do my best to examine all of my fish each day to make sure everything is alright with each of them. Hopefully if this is Ich I'll have caught it early enough to not cause me too many problems with the rest of my fish.

I'll check closely in the morning for any additional spots on my Loach or any other fish.

Thanks again for the responses.

 

[neurotik]

Well, it's about 1;15pm today and I just checked all of the fish in my tank and none of them are showing any signs of white spots or acting strange or anything like that. I fed them earlier this morning like I always do and they all ate, they were all very active and social, no change from yesterday it seems (aside from my water temperature being higher, obviously). The one Clown Loach still has that single white spot on the very edge of his tail fin, but that's it. He's still acting fine, he ate just as well as the others did, and is still swimming around and being playful and active like the others.

Sadly I have still been unable to get a picture that actually shows the single white spot on him yet, the little bugger won't stay still long enough and at the right angle for me to get one! I'll continue trying today though.

Any other thoughts?

 

[neurotik]

Another quick update on the situation with my one Clown Loach. As of this morning, the single white spot on the edge of its tail has now disappeared, no signs of similar white spots on the rest of his body or any of my other fish. Does that sound like it was probably Ich then? I've continued to keep the water temperature raised just to be safe. All of the fish are still doing fine it seems -- none of them have been showing signs of oxygen deprivation or anything from the elevated temperatures.

 

[neurotik]

Maybe I spoke too soon about the spot being gone on my Loach. The original spot that was a bit larger than a single grain of salt was gone as of this morning, but I just checked him a few minutes ago and now he has a couple very fine salt-like spots on his tail fit and one on his top fin as well. So I guess it's definitely Ich then.

One slight issue I'm having with the temperature -- I have a 200W AGA submersible heater that came with my aquarium kit when I bought my 55 gallon tank and I seem to be having trouble getting my temperature up as high as you recommended. It seems to not want to go higher than ~84F at any given time. I have the temperature dial on the heater turned up as high as it will go too. Do I need a higher wattage heater or an additional heater for the size tank that I have, or is my heater just not performing properly for some other reason, or maybe my digital thermometer isn't giving me an accurate reading or something?

Any input would be much appreciated, thanks.