Help with Ich - hypo not cutting it

law086

law086

Premium Member
The good news - my fish are all in a quarantine tank.

The bad news - they've been hypo'ed for about a month, and I just had another *major* outbreak.

I have around seven fish in a 40 gallon quarantine tank. Hypo doesn't seem to be cutting it. I'm looking for suggestions on what to do next. They're currently in hypo at about 1.009 / 1.008. I'm debating raising salinity back to 1.025 and using Cupramine.

Any suggestions? Should I just ride out this outbreak and start the six week clock over?
 
What are you using to measure salinity? Hopefully a good refractometer.
There are strains of c. irritans that are resistant to hyposalinity and this could be what you're seeing. If you're at true hyposalinity, there shouldn't be a major outbreak. If this isn't working then copper treatment is your next best option IMO. What type of fish do you have?
 
Jerry - thanks for the thoughts.

I should have mentioned, I'm using a refractometer to measure salinity. I'm sure I may have let the salinity slip above 1.009 shortly due to evaporation, but I'm sure not much above. Surely not enough to lead to a full on outbreak.

For fish, I have two clowns, two tangs (yellow, hippo) a goby, wrasse, one large angel and one dwarf angel.

Ya'll think I should raise salinity and go with copper?

Thanks!
Ron
 
law086,

You may know this, but fish need to be returned to full salinity VERY slowly, over days or even a week in this case if you want to go to 1.025. The hypo is probably helping keep the Cryptocaryon in check - going up in salinity slowly will reduce the effectiveness of the hypo giving the cryptocaryon a better foothold, yet it will be difficult to start a copper treatment until you've stopped changing the S.G.
How about this as an idea? Take the S.G. up to around 1.016 over 48 hours and then start the copper treatment at that point. Once the fish are cured (hoping that they are of course) then you could finish taking the fish up to full S.G.

JHemdal


p.s. - I've had problems treating some species of dwarf angel with copper (flames in particular)
 
JHemdal - thanks for the feedback, I do realize that salinity must be raised slowly, thanks.

Do you have any theories as to why a hyposalinity treatment is being ineffective? Do you have any thoughts to lowering the salinity below 1.008? I'm not sure how hard on the fish that would be.

I guess you're comfortable that copper is stable enough at a moderate salinity level as 1.016?

My dwarf angel is a coral beauty. I hope he'll be OK!
 
law086,

I rarely use hypo any more, but when I did, I followed the original study by Chueng that indicates a more moderate specific gravity of 1.0125. I know people here on RC are taking it to 1.009, and then some are going to 1.008, but in my opinion this is risky with some fish (basslets, anthias and dwarf angels among them) and I would never advocate any lower unless the species was known to be euryhaline like batfish or something.

Yes, I would rather see the S.G. at 1.020 in terms of carbonate buffering, but like I said, there is a risk in taking too long to go to 1.020, so I was thinking 1.016 would work o.k.

JHemdal
 
Hypo if done properly and strict attention paid to salinity will kill the ich. Bring your salinity to 1.009 and then put a mark on the outside of the tank at that water level. Top off with fresh water to that line a couple/few times a days and you should have 1.009 24/7.
 
Freed - I just find it hard to believe that salinity slipping slightly would lead to a full out re-infestation like this.
 
Good question - I actually don't have anything to calibrate. Every so often, I measure the salinity of RO water and verify it's reading zero.

Is that an effective method? If not, what would you recommend?
 
I had an ich outbreak and used hyposalinity to get rid of it. I only had two fish at the time and they both made it through the treatment. The fish were an Atlantic Blue Tang and a Cherub Fish or Argi Pygmy Angel. Hypo was harder on the Tang than the pygmy angel. When reducing the salinity I struggled to get the salinity down in the 90g fish only tank and it took me about 2 weeks. Fortunately for me the fish continued to eat and outlasted the ich. I noticed that all of the ich died off dramatically at s.g. 1.012, including some red flat worms that were in the tank. I dropped the s.g. to 1.010 and kept it there for six weeks at which point I started raising the s.g. to 1.020 where I keep it at since it is not a reef.

I have treated my pygmy angel with copper and it tolerated it like a champ and hasn't had any issues.

My little guy is a tough son of a gun as it looked like it was on the edge of death with velvet and I moved him into a qt with copper and withing the next few days he started eating again. I had heard that if a fish had visible signs of velvet that it was pretty much a goner, but this little guy lends credence to the saying, "If it doesn't kill you, it will make you stronger."

Come to think of it, this little guy is a bucket of trouble. When my wife and I returned from vacation, we couldn't find him and after a couple days we found him tooling around in the overflow. Sorry to get off topic. Aquarium keeping is a great hobby.

Che
 
There is also a chance it's not crypto, marine velvet comes to mind that is resistant in some cases to hypo. Calibrating your refractometer is essential to keeping a good read. I didn't calibrate correctly and I was off by almost .005 SG which isn't at all bad when measuring regular salinity but when dealing with strict guidelines it's alot.
 
RO water will not give you an accurate calibration. Your refracto will be off by one or two hundredths.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12227210#post12227210 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by law086
Good question - I actually don't have anything to calibrate. Every so often, I measure the salinity of RO water and verify it's reading zero.

Is that an effective method? If not, what would you recommend?
Click to expand...
to calibrate your hydrometer you need to take TWO measurements, not one. if you only take one measurement, a line of any slope could pass through that data point. to calibrate a hydrometer and determine its responsiveness (slope of the calibration curve) you need a minimum of two test points, the farther apart the better.
 
There are stickies above with all kinds of parasites and best methods of treatment. If it is velvet and it's not your refractometer. Eliminate all possiblities before changing too much because you'll change more than one thing and not know which one worked.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12228104#post12228104 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by paulamrein
Eliminate all possiblities before changing too much because you'll change more than one thing and not know which one worked.
Click to expand...

i guess there are two ways to look at this: as a scientific experiment or as a therapeutic intervention.

you could do a scientific experiment, controlling all the variables so that the responsible mode of therapy is clearly identified. doing that leaves you with two possible endpoints: treatment success and treatment failure. doing it that way allows you to clearly identify whether or not the therapy was effective. knowing which therapy didn't work isn't particularly helpful if the outcome of the experiment is a clearly identified, failed mode of therapy and a dead fish.

OTOH you can be less scientifically rigorous, allow multiple variables to be in play at the same time, and cure the patient. although this approach compromises your ability to identify which treatment is actually responsible for the cure, the endpoint of successful therapy and a cured patient seems more desirable.
 
But, if it has to repeat on another fish at another time, you won't be able to reproduce the exact combination of variables. I prefer to piggy back on those smarter than me and do what others are doing let the fish die in their tanks from the mistakes and I get the benefits of the success. It's the American way, if not the human way :)
 
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