Ich first thing to do?

So I saw my poweder blue hoving low to the sand, and he has is fins up.

He has ich and I was just going to keep him eating like everyone reccomended. It got extremely bad over night yesterday he was eating swimming today he is at the bottom. he really isnt breathing heavy I dont think but he also is not eating today.

Should I just leave him or take him out fw dip? go get some sort of medication at the lfs? I have never had ich in any of my tanks. and I know pbt are ich magnets. he was qt for 2.5 months before i put him in the tank and he has been battling ich about a week.

 

i have freshwaterdipped a few fish with good results.... you may want to quarantine him again and medicate to rid of the ich.. thats at least what i have always done to rid of the ich ... instead if throwing the meds in the whole tank

 

What medication would you suggest? do you suggest doing a FW dip now or will that just stress him more?

 

ill have to check back with you .. im currently at work.. i belive its called icgh away and you only use a little bit .. it measures with the cap on the bottle... its white with a reddish pink label. IMO give him a quick fresh water dip and the quarantine him... keep a keen eye on him and view his progression... if the ich doesnt look like its getting any better i would medicate ... leave him in quarantine until the ich is gone .. because a freshwater dipping may only be a temp fix... thats what i did with my puffer, they are prone to ich... he hasnt had it since! ( a good visual inspection before releasing him back into the tank otherwise you could be back at it in a week or so

 

If he is eating and only symptom is spots I would just keep feeding him. Personally I would not do a dip if you can not return him to a QT. It does not kill all the parasites, you will stress him and then return to an environment with ich to become re-infected, thus more stress.

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In my opinion if you are going to keep tangs you should either have a QT running or have one ready to set up. Any tiny amount of stress and they will succumb to this opportunistic parasite again.

 

good advice! i had a sailfin that would get it once in a while when my foxface stressed him out... he wouldnt eat... i had to supplement him with garlic algae until it was all gone... then i released him back into the tank..

 

QT is still set up but I have at least 200lbs of rock I would have to tear down the tank to get him out.

Wont that stress him too much? he already freaks when you walk up to the tank.

I guess that is what I have to do though he is obviously not going to kick it on his own.

What do you suggest in qt hypo?

 

Also is there a reason his fins are up like that?

 

Corailline is right a dip won't help if your tank has ich present in there when you put him back after QT and will only further stress him. Personally, I'd try to boost the immune defense of the fish with some supplements like selcon solution, no promise to work, but can only help.

I know a lot of others may give me flak for this, but I'm assuming you don't have a UV? Have you ever thought about getting one? I can't say mine works for sure, but I've never had any fish diseases either (besides lateral line). Ive read and been told UVs can kill ich if ran at a low enough flow with wattage above 15W.