Is this ick on Porcupine Puffer?

[1979fishgeek]

I picked up this Porcupine on Thursday, he’s in my QT and noticed his fins have started getting what looks like fuzzy spots on them and I’m not sure if it’s ick because they are not particularly defined spots, plus his fins are a little ragged looking. Is it ick or bacterial infection?

Difficult to get a good photo as he’s fluttering about.

 

[Old Fritz]

yep that's ich. there are many treatments; some don't require meds. Such as moving the fish to a different tank or bucket everyday. The best medication in my opinion is treating with copper however if new to it it is a little daunting and you would need a copper test kit to maintain proper levels, it is also super toxic to inverts. Other medications include kordon ich attack (reef safe), seachem paragaurd (reefsafe i think), Hikari Ich-x (not reefsafe), Herbtana (reefsafe), etc there are plenty of medications you can use.

Raising the temp in your tank will shorten the ich cycle and make treating faster, and lowering your salinity can help a bit. If you want to treat with hyposalinity that is another method but I don't like messing with my salinity to be honest.

Some people recommend a freshwater dip but in most cases for ich its a rather worthless treatment, because once its on the fish you have a limited window to actually kill whats on the fish before it is immune to any treatment (essentially once the ich is on the fish it's pretty much impossible to kill unless the ich just attached itself).

One more thing you could do is if that is the only fish currently in the tank you could treat it in quarantine if you prefer to treat with something that is not reefsafe, and you could wait 6 weeks before adding it back into your dt. If you do this be sure to write down the date you can add it back sometimes people jump the gun because it feels like its been six weeks.

Ich is a fairly easy parasite to kill it just takes some time to eradicate

 

[1979fishgeek]

yep that's ich. there are many treatments; some don't require meds. Such as moving the fish to a different tank or bucket everyday. The best medication in my opinion is treating with copper however if new to it it is a little daunting and you would need a copper test kit to maintain proper levels, it is also super toxic to inverts. Other medications include kordon ich attack (reef safe), seachem paragaurd (reefsafe i think), Hikari Ich-x (not reefsafe), Herbtana (reefsafe), etc there are plenty of medications you can use.

Raising the temp in your tank will shorten the ich cycle and make treating faster, and lowering your salinity can help a bit. If you want to treat with hyposalinity that is another method but I don't like messing with my salinity to be honest.

Some people recommend a freshwater dip but in most cases for ich its a rather worthless treatment, because once its on the fish you have a limited window to actually kill whats on the fish before it is immune to any treatment (essentially once the ich is on the fish it's pretty much impossible to kill unless the ich just attached itself).

One more thing you could do is if that is the only fish currently in the tank you could treat it in quarantine if you prefer to treat with something that is not reefsafe, and you could wait 6 weeks before adding it back into your dt. If you do this be sure to write down the date you can add it back sometimes people jump the gun because it feels like its been six weeks.

Ich is a fairly easy parasite to kill it just takes some time to eradicate

Thanks for reply.

He’s in a QT with a Sailfin Tang which I picked up at the same time but has no spots yet, it’s a bare bottom QT so I’m going to use Cupermine. I’ll increase temp to 28C speed up life cycle and increase aeration.

I have copper test kit, so will put a cupermine dose of 0.25 as I know porc’s are sensitive. Hopefully will cure it. But least it’s in the QT and not in main system, setting up QT best thing I ever did!

 

[Old Fritz]

I wish I wasn't as stingy as I was when I first started getting into aquariums. I didn't have a quarantine system and just put everything right into the display tank, I would've saved a pretty penny if I would've just spent the money on a quarantine system lol. It can be a life saver. Also I have noticed porcupines are susceptible to ich. 50% of the porcupines that came into the store I worked at came in with ich, and people loved them so much they would still buy them even after informing them they had ich (we wouldn't sell them unless we knew they actually knew what they were doing), which was probably still a little irresponsible but gonna be honest it was business first.

Thanks for reply.

He’s in a QT with a Sailfin Tang which I picked up at the same time but has no spots yet, it’s a bare bottom QT so I’m going to use Cupermine. I’ll increase temp to 28C speed up life cycle and increase aeration.

I have copper test kit, so will put a cupermine dose of 0.25 as I know porc’s are sensitive. Hopefully will cure it. But least it’s in the QT and not in main system, setting up QT best thing I ever did!

 

[1979fishgeek]

I wish I wasn't as stingy as I was when I first started getting into aquariums. I didn't have a quarantine system and just put everything right into the display tank, I would've saved a pretty penny if I would've just spent the money on a quarantine system lol. It can be a life saver. Also I have noticed porcupines are susceptible to ich. 50% of the porcupines that came into the store I worked at came in with ich, and people loved them so much they would still buy them even after informing them they had ich (we wouldn't sell them unless we knew they actually knew what they were doing), which was probably still a little irresponsible but gonna be honest it was business first.

I got complacent and learnt a expensive lesson with a velvet wipeout once, so QT everything now. I think sadly it’s impractical for aquatic business to quarantine every bit of stock that comes in, I’d read before buying Porcupine they are very prone to ich, just hoping that the low levels of copper the Puffer can tolerate can kill the ick!

 

[nkarisny]

yep that's ich. there are many treatments; some don't require meds. Such as moving the fish to a different tank or bucket everyday. The best medication in my opinion is treating with copper however if new to it it is a little daunting and you would need a copper test kit to maintain proper levels, it is also super toxic to inverts. Other medications include kordon ich attack (reef safe), seachem paragaurd (reefsafe i think), Hikari Ich-x (not reefsafe), Herbtana (reefsafe), etc there are plenty of medications you can use.

Raising the temp in your tank will shorten the ich cycle and make treating faster, and lowering your salinity can help a bit. If you want to treat with hyposalinity that is another method but I don't like messing with my salinity to be honest.

Some people recommend a freshwater dip but in most cases for ich its a rather worthless treatment, because once its on the fish you have a limited window to actually kill whats on the fish before it is immune to any treatment (essentially once the ich is on the fish it's pretty much impossible to kill unless the ich just attached itself).

One more thing you could do is if that is the only fish currently in the tank you could treat it in quarantine if you prefer to treat with something that is not reefsafe, and you could wait 6 weeks before adding it back into your dt. If you do this be sure to write down the date you can add it back sometimes people jump the gun because it feels like its been six weeks.

Ich is a fairly easy parasite to kill it just takes some time to eradicate

puffer cant be treated w cooper

 

[nkarisny]

I wish I wasn't as stingy as I was when I first started getting into aquariums. I didn't have a quarantine system and just put everything right into the display tank, I would've saved a pretty penny if I would've just spent the money on a quarantine system lol. It can be a life saver. Also I have noticed porcupines are susceptible to ich. 50% of the porcupines that came into the store I worked at came in with ich, and people loved them so much they would still buy them even after informing them they had ich (we wouldn't sell them unless we knew they actually knew what they were doing), which was probably still a little irresponsible but gonna be honest it was business first.

it would have to be 86

 

[Old Fritz]

puffer cant be treated w cooper

They can be you just have to up the copper levels slower. I've kept puffers in copper with no issues

 

[nkarisny]

They can be you just have to up the copper levels slower. I've kept puffers in copper with no issues

really how big of tank bc i love this fish

 

[nkarisny]

They can be you just have to up the copper levels slower. I've kept puffers in copper with no issues

help

 

[cltmoore]

yep that's ich. there are many treatments; some don't require meds. Such as moving the fish to a different tank or bucket everyday. The best medication in my opinion is treating with copper however if new to it it is a little daunting and you would need a copper test kit to maintain proper levels, it is also super toxic to inverts. Other medications include kordon ich attack (reef safe), seachem paragaurd (reefsafe i think), Hikari Ich-x (not reefsafe), Herbtana (reefsafe), etc there are plenty of medications you can use.

Raising the temp in your tank will shorten the ich cycle and make treating faster, and lowering your salinity can help a bit. If you want to treat with hyposalinity that is another method but I don't like messing with my salinity to be honest.

Some people recommend a freshwater dip but in most cases for ich its a rather worthless treatment, because once its on the fish you have a limited window to actually kill whats on the fish before it is immune to any treatment (essentially once the ich is on the fish it's pretty much impossible to kill unless the ich just attached itself).

One more thing you could do is if that is the only fish currently in the tank you could treat it in quarantine if you prefer to treat with something that is not reefsafe, and you could wait 6 weeks before adding it back into your dt. If you do this be sure to write down the date you can add it back sometimes people jump the gun because it feels like its been six weeks.

Ich is a fairly easy parasite to kill it just takes some time to eradicate

Copper
will eat the skin off the puffer. Found out the hard way

 

[jasonrusso]

Copper
will eat the skin off the puffer. Found out the hard way

Chloroquine Phosphate for porcupines

 

[erp]

Chloroquine Phosphate for porcupines

I have a blue spotted puffer with the same thing in a 90g with a clown and live rock and sand. Should I quarantine the fish and treat them with that chloroquine and let the tank sit for a month?

 

[jasonrusso]

I have a blue spotted puffer with the same thing in a 90g with a clown and live rock and sand. Should I quarantine the fish and treat them with that chloroquine and let the tank sit for a month?

Ick or velvet? Either way, I personally recommend treating it with Chloroquine Phosphate (50mg/gal) for 28-30 days and leaving the tank fallow for at least 60 days.

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Chloroquine is difficult to source right now. Coppersafe is fine to use with puffers.
Jay

 

[jasonrusso]

Chloroquine is difficult to source right now. Coppersafe is fine to use with puffers.
Jay

Chloroquine was working great for me for years and years, until I foolishly started listening to people who said to stop using it and observing. Then I started having problems. Now I'm using it again to clean up the velvet problems I was having and it's working great again. Only my eel refuses to eat in CP likely because of the taste of CP. Thankfully they can go a long time without eating.

50mg/g for 28-30 days, 2 doses of GC at the end of the treatment. Dosed water changes while monitoring ammonia. Suddenly there is all this talk about biofilms and CP eating bacteria. I never encountered any problems.

I do have to disagree with you about the copper and puffers. They may not die in copper safe, but I truly believe that Chloroquine is the preferred treatment if possible. I believe that Chloroquine is the preferred treatment for all fish that tolerate it over copper. I think that copper is a poison and you just hope that the parasite dies before the fish. That can't be good for any animal long term.


You can find it here. 100G will last forever if you store it right.

Chloroquine Phosphate

 

[Jay Hemdal Verified Community Expert]

Chloroquine was working great for me for years and years, until I foolishly started listening to people who said to stop using it and observing. Then I started having problems. Now I'm using it again to clean up the velvet problems I was having and it's working great again. Only my eel refuses to eat in CP likely because of the taste of CP. Thankfully they can go a long time without eating.

50mg/g for 28-30 days, 2 doses of GC at the end of the treatment. Dosed water changes while monitoring ammonia. Suddenly there is all this talk about biofilms and CP eating bacteria. I never encountered any problems.

I do have to disagree with you about the copper and puffers. They may not die in copper safe, but I truly believe that Chloroquine is the preferred treatment if possible. I believe that Chloroquine is the preferred treatment for all fish that tolerate it over copper. I think that copper is a poison and you just hope that the parasite dies before the fish. That can't be good for any animal long term.


You can find it here. 100G will last forever if you store it right.

Chloroquine Phosphate

I understand your opinion, but the issue isn't with coppersafe. I've used it on hundreds of puffers and porcupine fish with zero adverse effects. I actually had a one-eyed porcupine fish that resided in a quarantine system and got dosed with coppersafe every time there was a new batch of fish coming in.

The issues with coppersafe stem from:

- not dosing it soon enough (people worry about using it and that causes them to wait too long before trying it)
- taking too long to get to a full dose (some weird advice out there about taking days to ramp up the dose)
- not measuring it accurately (people need to use the HR Hanna checker for best results)
- Using it with reducing agents like ammonia removers (Not proven except for with Cupramine)
- Conflating toxicity from ionic copper with all copper meds (people hear copper is bad and then extend that to all copper products)

I stopped using chloroquine back around 2016 when I began seeing mortality issues that I couldn't explain. I even had a UV spectrophotometer that allowed me to accurately measure the dose I was giving. Trouble is, it has later been found that bacteria breaks down chloroquine just like it does praziquantel. However, the metabolites from that still test on the UV spec, so there is no way except using HPLC to measure how much active chloroquine is in the tank.

The FDA sent cease and desist letters to all on-line aquarium medication suppliers telling them to stop selling Chloroquine. I have not heard that this letter ever got rescinded. That means that anyone selling it now either didn't get the letter, or isn't following it.

Jay

 

[The Ginga Ninja]

I picked up this Porcupine on Thursday, he’s in my QT and noticed his fins have started getting what looks like fuzzy spots on them and I’m not sure if it’s ick because they are not particularly defined spots, plus his fins are a little ragged looking. Is it ick or bacterial infection?

Difficult to get a good photo as he’s fluttering about.

Could be ich, could also be Lymphocistis (look that up) which is harmless. The good news is, a puffer who eats, is almost always likely to pull through even if it is ich. Sometimes when the spots are on just the fins, it's just stress spots or Lymphocistis:

 

[1979fishgeek]

Could be ich, could also be Lymphocistis (look that up) which is harmless. The good news is, a puffer who eats, is almost always likely to pull through even if it is ich. Sometimes when the spots are on just the fins, it's just stress spots or Lymphocistis:

Thanks for replying, this is a very old post. Porky made a full recovery from white spot in the QT tank. Think this post goes back 5 years now, time does fly!