White Spot Help

[conorod]

I have a tank with neon tetra, amano shrimp and nerite snails.
Today I noticed a number of white spots on the fins (and a small few on the skin) of my neon tetra. This seems to have come on relatively quickly as I did not notice them before.

Unfortunately I do not have another tank to separate out the amano shrimp or snails, so am limited to treatment options that will not harm them. I was advised to get NT Labs White Spot & Fungus but won't be able to get it until 2 days from now (due to coronavirus restrictions I can't travel to the shop that has it, and I can't find anywhere closer that has a shrimp-safe treatment).

In the meantime is there anything else I can/should do? The shop I called recommended increasing the temperature (~28 celsius), but it was my understanding that this was done to get the parasite to a stage where the treatment can work on it. So should I wait until I actually have the medication to do this, or should I increase the temperature now?

 

[ClownLurch]

....back to the surface with this one. Help reqd here.

 

[eatyourpeas]

@Colin_T

 

[Salts155R]

I’m not sure on the shrimp side of things but the best treatment is to raise the temperature to 30c/86f and hold it there for 2weeks or a week after the last spot has gone.
@Colin_T will no doubt be along shortly to confirm if this is possible with the shrimp and snails but there are guides to follow when using this heat treatment. Big water change, rinse filter media in a bucket of old tank water (only if filter has been running for more than 6-8 weeks, if not skip this stage)
Refill with de-chlorinated water, raise the temp to 30c/86f ( do not set this from the heaters, keep an eye on thermometers.
I’ll post the link in a few seconds.

@essjay may know about the shrimp

it’s to late to isolate the fish as it’s now in the tank and would cause more stress moving them during an outbreak of ICH.

I’m currently doing the same treatment in my tank

 

[Salts155R]

What is ICH?

This is a common question that is often asked, what is ich and how is it recognisable and what causes it? The real term is ICHTHYOPHTHIRIASIS. OR commonly known as white spot. It is an extremely comon parasite that affects aquarium fish. It is highly infectious and potentially lethal and...

www.fishforums.net

 

[Essjay]

I think the shrimps and snails will be OK. It's only for a couple of weeks and my shrimps and snails cope with the occasional summer heatwave.

 

[Salts155R]

I think the shrimps and snails will be OK. It's only for a couple of weeks and my shrimps and snails cope with the occasional summer heatwave.

Shrimp and snails I have no idea on.. Heatwave a heatwave down here is torrential rain

 

[Essjay]

I assumed the OP was in the UK or Ireland since they mentioned NT Labs medication, and we do get the odd spell in summer around 30 deg C

 

[Salts155R]

I assumed the OP was in the UK or Ireland since they mentioned NT Labs medication, and we do get the odd spell in summer around 30 deg C

I’ve been noticing a lot of NT labs stuff creeping up on the shelves, Cornwall is always last for the new stuff.

hope @conorod has success with his ICH

 

[conorod]

Thanks everyone for the advice! Hopefully I caught it early enough, doesn't look too bad yet.
This might be a stupid question but should I disinfect/wash things like my gravel vacuum/nets/etc.? Can ich survive on these?

 

[Salts155R]

Thanks everyone for the advice! Hopefully I caught it early enough, doesn't look too bad yet.
This might be a stupid question but should I disinfect/wash things like my gravel vacuum/nets/etc.? Can ich survive on these?

if you can before you turn up the temperature use a gravel vac to clean the gravel, as for washing and disinfecting the temperature will kill off the parasite but it’s important to make sure you don’t turn down the heat to early.
Follow my post I’m doing, it’s all information that I’ve found on here as I’m also a novice with this but I’m trying to help everyone like me

ICH even after a 4 week quarantine

Good evenin/morning guys and girls. so after adding my new fish the other day from their quarantine tank, I now have an outbreak of ICH in my tank :S I’ve been reading lots of posts on here and I believe it was one from @Colin_T that stuck as he seems to know his shizzle. 70% water change done...

www.fishforums.net

I’ll be doing a day by day as well as the information I’ve already listed

 

[Essjay]

Leaving nets, gravel vac etc to dry completely between uses should kill any parasites. Assuming you are in the northern hemisphere, leaving them outside in the sun isn't an option at this time of year but if you can, leave them somewhere warm to dry out.

 

[conorod]

So just a quick follow-up question on this (appreciate all the help btw, saved me a lot of headache trying to figure all this out).
I did a full treatment as directed and the white spot cleared up very well. I did lose one fish which, in addition to the white spot, seemed to have significant fin rot. However after treatment & large water changes, it has been about a week now with no sign of white spots/fin rot or any other issues.

My question is, I was actually about to get some new fish (neon tetra) on the day that I first noticed the issue. Now that it seems to have cleared up (about 1 week with no issues), am I safe to add new fish or would you recommend waiting a certain bit longer to be safe?

 

[Colin_T]

You should always wait at least one month before adding new fish to a tank after a disease outbreak or a fish has died. This lets everything settle down and makes sure no other issues occur before the new fish are added.