Looks like ich, but doesn't act like it...What is it?

[jarice1978]

Hello,
I purchased 3 firefish gobys a little over a month ago and put them into a quarantine tank. I noticed right away that one of the fish had what looked like about 5 or 6 small white spots on it but the other 2 did not. I thought I would wait a week or so and see if the spots went away. A week turned into 2 and then 3 and then 4. The fish still has the exact same spots in the same exact places. No more or no less. The other two fishes have never had a spot.

My understanding of ich is that it has a cycle. It attaches to the fish for a while and then drops off after a couple weeks to reproduce or something like that. So the effect would be that you see spots on your fish one week and then you dont the next. And then they come back again. That's why you keep a fish in quarintine for three or four weeks. This is so you can watch your fish as it has a chance to go through a whole cycle just in case you purchased the fish when it had no visble spots....

Anyway that is the way I understood it. So does this mean that the fish has ich? Can it be something else? It has been about 5 weeks and the fish seems totally healthy and the other 2 fish have not shown any signs at all.


Let me know what you think it is.


Thanks,


Joe

 

[ChurchBoy]

Some fish's immune system is stronger than others therefore ich might not affect them. You firefish may have ich or another type of parasite. If you can catch him and treat him separate, unless you are willing to treat the whole tank, his chances of survival might be better.

 

[ronjeremy]

it's not ich if the spots haven't disappeared...have the spots grown at all??? do they have an actual 3D shape, or are they colorations on the fish??