Is it ich?

[Hellic]

I purchased a red firefish 2 days ago and noticed around 5 or 6 white dots on him today. However, when i got home several hours later he only had one white dot left. I'm certain he did not have them yesterday. It was my understanding that ich will show on the fish for days or maybe longer. But could it have such a rapid fall off? Or would it more likely be tiny bubbles? Thanks! I would post a pic but since he only has one left i doubt it would do much good.

 

[Supa]

I purchased a red firefish 2 days ago and noticed around 5 or 6 white dots on him today. However, when i got home several hours later he only had one white dot left. I'm certain he did not have them yesterday. It was my understanding that ich will show on the fish for days or maybe longer. But could it have such a rapid fall off? Or would it more likely be tiny bubbles? Thanks! I would post a pic but since he only has one left i doubt it would do much good.

Ich does fall off multiply and reattach to the sick/weak fish. If your bare bottom, vacuum the bottom daily may have to dose copper or coupermine.

 

[blaxsun]

You'll have to post a few images or a short video for someone to make an educated guess.

 

[Supa]

Dosing copper isn’t safe for inverts and such. So dose in QT and carefully watch the copper levels and ammonia levels etc

 

[Hellic]

Heres a picture of him currently. I was actually able to get a decent picture so ill post it for yall.

 

[Supa]

I’m not certain it’s hard to see maybe @Jay Hemdal can help

 

[Hellic]

It's the dot in the middle but yes its hard to see since its on the whiter side of his body. You'll have to zoom in most likely.

 

[Supa]

I see one spot on the side of his body and one father back towards the red. And maybe one on the fin directly above that. I would QT and start with feeding garlic guard and watch over the next few days to see if they fall off…. If they grow good bit larger in size it most likely isn’t ich

 

[Hellic]

Ill keep my eyes on it. I put him in a bare bottom qt tank when i brought him home lol. Problem is i also bought snails from the same store and they went into the DT. Hopefully theres no transference from the snails if it is ich.

 

[Supa]

Ill keep my eyes on it. I put him in a bare bottom qt tank when i brought him home lol. Problem is i also bought snails from the same store and they went into the DT. Hopefully theres no transference from the snails if it is ich.

You should be ok with the snails I would like to think. If it is ich and you have bare bottom you can do daily water changes vacuum the glass real good daily for 2 weeks or so and maybe have a chance to beat it without harsh copper treatment. If the fish seems better after 2 weeks I would stilll keep him there until 30 days more. I’m not an expert just an opinion. If dots multiply take action quickly i would say.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

I purchased a red firefish 2 days ago and noticed around 5 or 6 white dots on him today. However, when i got home several hours later he only had one white dot left. I'm certain he did not have them yesterday. It was my understanding that ich will show on the fish for days or maybe longer. But could it have such a rapid fall off? Or would it more likely be tiny bubbles? Thanks! I would post a pic but since he only has one left i doubt it would do much good.

Random white spots on fish is always a challenge to diagnose. Sometimes they are nothing, other times they are the start of marine ich. The life cycle of ich is such that at first, all of the trophonts living on the fish's skin are the same relative age. That means, they tend to all drop off at the same time to become tomonts. Then, those tomonts release the infective tomites/theronts and the infection cycles back around and the fish get new spots. Eventually, if the disease progresses, these life cycles become more out of sync and the fish develop spots all of the time and the number of spots increases and then the fish start to die.

I would wait to see if the spots return - and then decide about a treatment.

Jay

 

[Hellic]

I decided to treat proactively starting today. I am planning to have a flame angelfish as one of my next purchases and don't want to risk it contracting ich from this fish.

Interestingly enough I added 1ml of fritz coppersafe to my QT tank today and checked it with my api test kit. I didn't think to test for copper before dosing. I assumed it would be nothing because i use rodi (0 TDS) with reef crystals.

Anyway after dosing 1ml into about 8 gallons of water, I was already showing readings of 1ppm. Could that be right? I wouldn't think it could be that high from only 1ml of coppersafe. The recommended dose is 5ml per 4 gallons of water. Any thoughts?

 

[Hellic]

After re-testing my QT hours later, the copper level was what I originally expected it to be from such a small dose. Maybe I didn't give the copper enough circulation time before testing. Anyway, ignore my last post; all is well.