Pretty Sure its Ich...

[450rdawg]

DISEASE QUESTIONNAIRE


Problem

1. Please explain the problems with your fish. When did you notice the problems and did anything unusual happen that you think started them?

I have been on vacation for the past 3 days. When I got back this evening, I noticed that most of my larger discus have little white spots all on their bodies. I can't post pics yet or I would. Some of the fish are worse than others. It seems to be mainly on the adults. I just got 4 adults from Larry (bugman) on Wednesday. I'm pretty sure they were fine when I got them because he takes very good care of his fish. I haven't added any fish from LFS within the past 2 weeks but the tank is relatively new. Please help.


2. Symptoms (i.e. turning dark, excess slime, not eating, clamped fins, flashing, darting, clamped gills, white/yellow/green poop, hiding, headstanding or tailstanding, white on tips of fins, rotting or fungus, blisters/white zits on fish, bloated, cloudy eyes, wounds).

White spots on their bodies and fins. They are keeping their fins clamped a lot more than they were when I picked them up. Most are still eating well but it has definitely slowed down in a few of them.


3. What medications/ treatments have you already tried and what were the results. Include dosage and duration of treatment.

I haven't treated them yet but need to do something quickly.

Tank/Water

4. Tank size and ages, numbers and sizes of fish.

150 gallon, 8 discus ranging from 3"-6ish", approx. 20 different tetras, 3 corys, 1 pleco and 2 snails.

5. Water change regime (What percentage and how often).

30-40% 2 to 3 times per week.

6. How long has tank been running? Is it bare bottom? If you have substrate, what type and how deep is it?

2 months+/-. Substrate is fluorite (sp) and a mixture of pea sized gravel.

7. Do you age your water? If you do for how long and what is the ph swing.

I do not. ph drops about .2 within a 24 hour period.

8. Parameters and water source;

From the tap.


Note: Water Parameters are important in diagnosing problems within a tank. If you don't own test kits for the following information, you can purchase them, test your parameters and post this info as soon as possible.



- temp __82___

- ph __6.8___

- ammonia reading __never reading anything above yellow (lowest rating available on the color chart).__

- nitrite reading __?__

- nitrate reading __?__

What type of water or combinations of water sources do you use? If it is an RO/tap/well water mix, please list percentages in the mix.

- well water _X___

- municipal water ____

- RO water ____


9. Any new fish, plants or inverts added recently.

I have added 4 new adults from a reputable keeper. I have also added 2 new snails within the last week. I added 8 new plants last week.

10. Include any pictures or videos you have which shows the symptoms. If you can't add them to this post, please provide a link to them.

I can't post them on here and don't know how to post any links to them.



Please help me with this problem because I know it can be very bad. I also need to know if I can treat them with the plants, snails and smaller bodied tetras. I have some clout but am not sure if this is an effective treatment for ich or if it will harm my plants or the smaller fish.

[Crunchy]

in my experience ich is easy to cure in discus tank, you just up temp 33deg C, add salt, and prazi pro every 2 days if needed for a week. Prazi is only there if high temp and salt don't work. ich dies at abt 33-34 C.

[Tazalanche]

What you describe is probably ich, but we would need close up pictures to be certain.
Info about ich (http://www.simplydiscus.com/library/disease_medications/external/ich.shtml).

Proper quarantine procedures could have prevented this from affecting your display tank, but water changes, turn off the lights for 2 weeks, water changes, salt (aquarium salt or non-iodized table salt, 1-2 tbsp per 10 gallons of tank water dissolved in a cup and poured in tank), water changes, high temps (88-90 for 15 days to speed up the lifespan of the ich parasites & watch to guarantee its eradication) & water changes are all you need to treat discus for ich.

With the very short time frame that ich is actually susceptible to chemicals, plus the quantity of meds needed to treat your 150 gallon tank is an unnecessary expense & risk to the discus when salt & high temps can do the same thing. You didn't list what types of tetras are in the tank, but your plants, snails might not be able to handle the higher temps. If you have a smaller QT tank, you could consider treating them with a chemical treatment in it. Either way, to ensure total eradication of the parasite in the 150 gallon, it needs the high temps.

Merry & I dealt with a bout of this in December because we went lax in our quarantine procedures for some plants & mystery snails in an 86 degree discus tank. I turned out the lights on the tank, raised the temp to 88, added roughly 1.5 tablespoons of salt per 10 gallons & did feeding, water changes & everything else normally. At day 10 we turned on the lights to check everyone over, then turned the lights back off. On day 14 the lights were turned back on. On day 15 we dropped the temperature back down to 86. No ich since. Now all new plants get dipped & all new aquatic creatures get a 4-6 week QT in another room at the opposite end of the house from our display tanks.

If you wish to read up on it more, in the upper right corner of this forum, search keyword(s): ich salt raise temperature

Good luck!