PP on tetras with Ich, worked better than Quick Cure

[tpl*co]

Thank goodness for quarantine tanks! I bought tetras (school of cardinals, hatchets and black neons) to introduce into my large tank after they got out of quarantine. Well, someone in the group (or maybe all) spread Ich throughout the quarantine tank:(. I was losing fish and the remedy of Quick Cure at half dose just made them go faster without doing much of a dent in the Ich :(. Well, when I was down to my last 5 heavily peppered tetras, I thought, H*ll if I'm going to lose them anyway, I'm going to do a Potassium Permanganate treatment on them and what ever happens, happens. You know the PP worked better than anything else and the tetras handled it well showing no stress at all (just went to a light purple where you can still see everything). In fact they looked so much better and happier during and after the treatment! They are showing less and less spots and I'm repeating the treatment every 3-4 days or so till I totally break the cycle and see no more spots on anybody.

I've read online that PP is even used on farmed catfish to get rid of Ich.

After all the spots are gone though, how long should I wait till introducing them to my main tank? Will they be carriers and can never be introduced?

Tina

[Tropical Haven]

Tina,
Once you get rid of the ich you should be fine to place them in with your discus. I would wait an additional 3 to 4 weeks after you clear up the Ich to make sure noone comes back down with it before introducing them to your discus.

[Polar_Bear]

Tina,
I would definately not be using PP that often. I would consider once a week to be pretty much max. PP as you know is one of my favorite meds, but it does burn gill lamellae so must be used with some caution. Use no more than 2 ppm, which from the sounds of your post seems that you did, if at all possible leave the PP in for a full 24 hours.

[Graham]

can't really agree 100% with Larry here..PP is an oxidizer and at any level will have some affect on the fish. The lower the level the safer it is, but at 2ppm it's not going to have any major or lasting affect on the fish.

Depending on what you're trying to kill, PP can be used daily or ever 2nd,3rd,4th day...whatever it takes. The repeat will depnd on the life cycle of what you're trying to kill. If I'm trying to kill Costia, they get it daily at 3ppm.............

A PP treatment should not be stopped, allow it to run it course...you'll know when it's finished as the water wll be a tea colour or darker. Even then do not clear the water with hydrogen peroxide....do the next treatment and so on. After all the treatments are done then do a good water change and use some peroxide to clear the water.

PP is great stuff but all doseages should be weighed out...never go by colour...that's just a disaster looking for a place to happen.


G

[tpl*co]

Thanks Guys,

I found another problem with that tank. The stupid Stealth heater totally stopped working and the water temp dropped! Luckily it was the tetras and some blue eye rainbowfish that were in there. Put in another heater and will keep up with the PP treatments.

Tina

[kaceyo]

Tina,
Let us know how often and at what dosage your doing the PP treatments if you can. I have no solid info to back up either Larries or Grahams ideas on the frequency of PP use but it would be interesting to note how your fish react, especially since they are small fish. I've always tried to keep PP treatment s down to once a week at most. Better to ere on the side of caution when you really don't know.

Kacey

[tpl*co]

Tina,
Let us know how often and at what dosage your doing the PP treatments if you can. I have no solid info to back up either Larries or Grahams ideas on the frequency of PP use but it would be interesting to note how your fish react, especially since they are small fish. I've always tried to keep PP treatment s down to once a week at most. Better to ere on the side of caution when you really don't know.

Kacey


With Ich, it is temperature dependant on how quick those pustules (white spots) release the contageous stuff. I've done about 3 treatments so far about 3 days appart. Believe me, those guys looked very bad before the first treatment and during it they actually started perking up and showing their colors better. Quick cure was more like a quicker death to them, really stressed them out and I always had some dead the next day :(. I don't know the exact dose I used with the PP since I go to a specific purple that has always worked for me, which I use a diluted amount to obtain. Everybody looks spot free except for one little blue eye rainbowfish. I could probably get a scale and measure out the grams needed to get the PPM amount in the tank.

Graham, I do let it run it's course without hydrogen peroxide (with it on standbuy just in case) but it seems to go away within an hour or two.

Tina

[greyhoundfan]

thanks for posting this. I am QT'ing some Black Neon tetras. I'll probably do the same. I lost one just yesterday to some sort of body fungus. Fished him out right away.