rosalie68

i turned my water up to 84 degrees for about 3 days and i have changed the water 2 times now. i am changing it every other day and doing about 20-30%. i vacuumed the gravel a little but its not very dirty b/c its a new tank and its still being cycled. i was wondering how many days it will take before the ICH will be noticably less. a few of my fish have died today and the fish are just covered with ich and my pictus cats seem to be struggling for air. im afraid i will lose all of my fish if it doesnt start to go away soon. in case of emergency i am draining my 55 gal and bringing it here as a quarentine just until the ich goes away. it wont have any gravel just water and a heater. i will treat it with copper b/c this is the only thing that has worked so far to rid my fish of ich ever. i dont want it in my main tank though because i dont want to start over with the cycling and bacteria. i have already spent so much money on biospira to cycle a 220 gallon. if the ich doesnt go away and i have to remove my fish and treat them in the 55 gal how long should i leave them in there before returning to the main tank? how long does it take for ich to die without any hosts? i really want to do this without moving my fish to another tank. i dont want to stress them out anymore by moving them around as we have just moved them here about 2 weeks ago. please help!!
kim

angelfish220

You need to keep the heater up for 2 weeks minimum.

I would change water daily, 20% at least. I understand that that is alot of water in a 220 but I think that would keep you water at its best.

They are probably struggling for air because as water gets hotter there is less oxygen for their use. Do you have a couple airstones to keep the surface moving? If not I would add some.

rosalie68

i have an airstone that is 12 inches long. its just the pictus cats that are acting that way. do i need more air than that? will they start to get better in a few days? i understand that i have to keep the temp up for atleast 2 weeks but will i notice that they are getting better soon? like maybe after a week? i have lost alot of fish during my move and now they are dying from ich and its just driving me crazy. they have gotten worse since i turned the water up. is this supposed to happen? thanks!
kim

outlaw

Sorry I can't help more but if you are going to use the 55Gal as a qtank, you still want to keep some of the gravel(if there is any) in there or your going to have another cycle and stress the fish more. Sorry to hear about your fish too btw.

rosalie68

i dont plan on keeping it as a qtank. just using it this one time to treat my fish with copper. cant use it in my reg tank b/c it will kill my bio bacteria. i thought that even if i did keep the rocks that as soon as i added copper it would kill it all any way. i just planned on doing daily water changes until all the ich was gone. i really do not want to move my fish again though and will only do this as a last resort. that tank is not at my house so i need to clean it out and transport it to my house. i hope i dont have to use it. do plecos and african clawed frogs get ich?

outlaw

Not sure about the frogs but the plecos can.

Again, this is just my opinion. I would use a little bit of the gravel... but I don't know about the copper killing it. From a search, it looks like it could go either way.

HERE is a post that talks about ich. Hope this helps and Good Luck

Fishies-for-me

Copper safe says it will not affect biological filtration if used as directed

rosalie68

thanks for your help. everyone was telling me not to put the coppersafe in my main tank. i paid so much for the bacteria and im in the middle of a cycle that i didnt want to start all over. i have also read conflicting information about it being safe with bacteria. some say yes and some say no. i lost a bunch of my fish the last 2 days so i moved them into the 55 gal and added copper. i have the heater and a 12 inch airstone. i will keep testing the ammonia to make sure it doesnt get high. if i see any i will do water changes. how long does it take for the ich to die off with no fish? i have left the water up at about 86 degrees in the empty 220 gallon. do i need to feed the tank to keep the cycle going? im just waiting for my nitrites to go down. they are at a 4 and 10 nitrates. no ammonia. i really hope this works! it was the last resort. thanks again for everyones help.
kim

Fishies-for-me

I heard ich can only live for 3 days without a host...so I would say that by the time your fish are ready the tank will be safe also.

rosalie68

thanks thats what i figured too. just trying to be safe. thanks again!