joules
- #1
??? ???What is Ick and what does it look like? I just noticed that my fish have little white spots on them, is this what it could be? if so, what do I do? I am new to this fish world and still pretty confused!!!
White Spot (Ichthyophthirius)
A parasite that we will all encounter whilst keeping fish.
As an adult it is embedded in the skin of the fish causing irritation, your fish will probably be glancing off rocks and plants to alleviate the itching.
The parasite will feed and grow on the blood and skin cells of its host for a few days until it is fully grown.
It then bores its way out of the skin and drops off into the substrate, it then forms a cyst which then goes through rapid cell division until about 1000 young are released into the water to start the whole process again.
The whole process takes just five days at 27C.
There are cases where the parasite actually lies dormant in the skin of the fish and will not emerge until it is ready, making eradication quite difficult.
The best time to kill them is when they are free swimming and looking for a host.
Treatment must be external and aimed at the free swimming stage hence the need to dose again after a few days, suitable cures are widely available.
Put the carbon in like the instructions say "wait 48 hours, do a 50% water change then put the carbon in".
Can you put the carbon behind the filter media you have now? If you throw away/ boil your filter media you will lose all your good bacteria in the filter. Is not really necessary to boil all the decor. If you leave the temperature turned up for seven days after you see the last ich spot you will have it beat.
Good luck That's true butterfly thanks. I just wanted to get started and try to cycle the tank asap. I guess I didn't want to wait that long for my new fishies.... ;D
Carol