White spots and treatment

König Löwe · Post by **König Löwe** » 28 Jan 2003, 17:56

I bought six cories on an auction a few days ago, four big and well fed C. concolor and two C. caudimaculatus. When i got them in their quarantine-tank, i noticed that one of the concolors had a whie spot of some sort between the first and second ray of the dorsal fin, and i *think* i have seen a few spots on the other concolors two, and i am really worried that they all may be infected.

What should i do? I have heard that catfish is very sensitive to ich-medicine, because it contains a chemical (malachite green?) or something like that. If i remember correctly, one way of curing this disease is cranking up the tempereature to 30 or more celcius. I managed to get my heater up to 28, but it seems theres something wrong with the dial-thingy, so i can't get it any higher...

BTW, i have borrowed some "Punktol" from JBL from a friend. This is a ich-medicine, afaik. I won't use it unless i get a "clearence" from you.

sincerely

Worried Löwe

STINGRAY · Post by **STINGRAY** » 28 Jan 2003, 21:31

HI WE HAVE FREQUENTLY USED A SUBSTANCE CALLED WS3 THAT IS BASED ON MALACHITE GREEN AND ACRIFLAVINE. SO I CAN'T SEE ANY PROBLEM PROVIDING YOU MANTAIN GOOD AERATION AND KEEP THE TEMP HIGHER. GOOD LUCK.

Bathos · Post by **Bathos** » 29 Jan 2003, 20:09

i have used aquarium salt with my cories when they had ich. others have had bad experiences with salt, so i would be cautious about trying it in your case. i think the key is to add the salt gradually, no more than 1tsp salt per gallon per day. i believe i added 1/2 teaspoon salt per gallon in the morning and 1/2 teaspoon salt per gallon in the evening every day for 5 days. i then let the tank stay at that salt concentration for another 2 or 3 days. i removed the salt gradually through 25% water changes every other day. i like this solution because it allows you to easily add the same amount of medication (in this case, salt) to the new water when doing water changes. again, some people have had trouble with salt. my C. trilineatus were fine with it, never missed a beat, but they were also used to very hard water with a high pH. i'm guessing those with softer, more acidic water might have more of a problem, though i could easily be wrong.
-Liz

Caol_ila · Post by **Caol_ila** » 30 Jan 2003, 19:40

hi!

@bathos are you sure that a slow treatment will work against ich? I see it this way you pour in an ammount of salt to change osmosis conditions in the tank so the tiny ichtyo organism cant react to it as the bigger fish can...imho youd want this to happen in a quicker timeframe than 5 days. Ive had a good impression of punktol by jbl as my corys and L's took the treament well...i underdosed though at 75-80% if i remeber right.

Bathos · Post by **Bathos** » 31 Jan 2003, 13:44

it worked for me. that's all i can say. the fish weren't covered with ich. they were flashing and i could see a few white granuals on their fins, maybe 8-10 per fish for the more heavily invested ones. i'm pretty observant when it comes to my fish. at any rate, they got worse for 2 days after i started treating, then started getting better on the third day and were completely better by the seventh day. i did not raise the temp during this treatment, but have no doubt that this would speed the process. at any rate, i didn't loose any fish and none even showed signs of stress. that's why i recommend it. the salinity seems to change fast enough to get rid of the ich, but not so fast the fish are super-stressed by it.
-Liz