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need help with my oscar and ick2007-11-24 23:38:51

our oscar has ick because we were feeding it feeder fish. we started treatment yesterday am[ick treatment]. my daughter got off work last night and did not see no improvement so she put more in. she got up this am and still no improvement so she put more in. question, is she putting to much ick in tank? its a 55 gallon tank with two oscars.

Answers:

First of all - Ich is an Ectoparasite that has 3 different stages. If your fish have very small white spots on them (kind of like someone salted them) then you definitely have Ich. However - buying meds at this point is a waste of money because the parasite is not vulnerable to meds in this stage. Once the white spots have fallen off the fish - they go down into your gravel/substrate and begin an encysted stage where a single Ich parasite multiples up to 2,000 different ones. Once they become free swimming - they are vulnerable to meds/salt, but not before that point.

I just got through treating one of my tanks with Maracide Concentrate by Virbac Animal Health, and Evaporated Sea Salt. All you honestly need though is Salt. If you have a biolocial filter which has carbon in it , and treat with meds, you will need to take them out all together (because if you don't they will just remove your medication from the water). Salt by itself however you don't need to do anything but put it in and raise the water temp.

Salt, and raising the water temp to 85-86 degrees (provided your species of fish can tolerate that temp) is the best way to treat this mess. I wish I would have had the article out on Wiki before I started my treatment. Could have saved a ton of time and money had I done that. I'll post it for you here in my sources. The guy who wrote this truly is the Internet authority on Ectoparasitic treatments. Just use Evaporated Sea Salt, and warmer water and you will be ok. Go to the website in my sources and read the article out there. You will have a full understanding (more than you ever wanted to know) once you read it.

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Yeah give it a chance to work read the bottle and call your local fish store ya don't wanaa OD the poor thing :0)

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I think it takes a day or 2 for this to clear up. We had the same problem for the same reasons. I think adding more and more treatment to the water is not going to harm your fish- but you need to give it a chance to work before adding any more.