Ich? Is it too late?

[MiaAndJasper]

I have a female white opal betta fish named Everest. For the past week she has been very lethargic and hasn't been eating very much. The tips of her tail have a little bit of blood on them and she has white spots on her tail and body. Is this ich?? I have been treating the tank with an ich treatment but she is still lethargic. Am I too late to save her?

Thank you in advance!

 

[GaryE]

If it is ich, it isn't a bad case. It is very hard to tell from the photos.

Are you sure it's blood, and not pigmentation coming in?

 

[TNG]

If it’s ich, it’s the very early stage of it.

Betta that’s severely infected with ich will hide at the bottom of the tank, will dash to the top to get a gulp of air then drop back to the bottom.

What is the rock in the second photo? If it’s holey rock it can increase GH and pH of your water to a level much higher than what your betta needs. I’d check the quality of the water.

If you need to do a large water change, check the pH of your tank and your water supply first. If the pH difference is too high it might just kill the fish after you do a large water change.

 

[anewbie]

I'm not sure there is an issue here. Yes i see a few white dots - i would monitor for a while (a week?) and if it gets worse update the thread with an updated picture. A good med is kordon or hitachi ick med (they are pretty close to the same) and will work on most common white dot parasite (there are several in addition to ick). HOWEVER treating fish that is not sick or with the wrong med is stressfuli (bad) for the fish. Naturally while the med are bad if they are sick sometime the bad med is better than no treatment at all.

 

[fishorama]

It's very hard to see white dots on a mostly white fish. I do see some, & its fins seem frayed too.

Tell us about your water changing & testing results please, especially nitrate, nitrite & ammonia. & while you wait, change some water & vacuum, often! Daily if you can.

I'm "old school" & would use malachite green (but not with inverts you want to keep. It's a copper based med; not invert safe). Methylene blue has some issues to using it but might be my second choice.