Clown Loaches / ICH symptems

[ChrisH]

Hi All..

My clown loaches have started showing signs of ICH, and I have started treatement for whitespot. However I have heard rumours that this can be easily mis-diagnosed as something else.

My Water parameters are fine (amonia 0, nitrite 0, nitrate 7). Is there anything else I should be treating for?

Thanks..

 

[Never2Bknown]

There is only one other disease that I know that can be mistaken for ich known as knot or pimple disease. However, this is VERY rare in aquaria, and there's nothing to be done about it anyway. The rumor of diseases that can be mistaken for ich is one I have not heard and is, as far as I know, false.
Thus, I highly doubt that you have any need to treat your fish for anything other than just ich, so I wouldn't worry about it.

 

[jhelen]

Hi

Do you know anything else about this knot/pimple disease

I think one of my fish might have it

 

[Never2Bknown]

Knot or pimple disease is caused by sporozoans, a type of protozoan characterized by the production of spores. There are a few different types that can be found in the skin: Myxobolus exiguus found in carps, M. dispar in bleak, Alburnus lucidus and M. oviformus in dace Leuciscus rutilus and Glugea anomala in sticklebacks and other fishes, and Henneguya species.

As far as I know, there are no methods of curing infected fishes because the drugs cannot be administered in such concentrations as would be necessary to kill the parasites in the body of the fish without killing the fish itself. However, I could be wrong about this, so feel free to look.

Nevertheless, it is more likely that you simply have a particularly stubborn case of ich, though I may be wrong about that too.

 

[jhelen]

I thought it was ich, but it has been there for 5 weeks..

and I have treated...the other fish who had it are fine

 

[csmason1]

My parrotfish from the lfs developed what looks like a pimple on his forehead, actually two of them. They merged into one larger pimple, and then burst about a week later. A white stringy thing came out--very pretty. It was gone a day later, and now he has a smaller version of the pimple on his forehead. He has NO signs of ich, and it looks nothing like the pics I've seen of ich all over the fins and gills of fish. So your fish could have the same thing my guy has; he's alone in my 10 gal quarantine. He's not quite big enough for the big boys in the 180 gal yet anyway--and this will only make sure that he'll be waiting a while longer.