# Garg! Ick...please help >_<



## Saki (Dec 27, 2005)

I've read the posts about ick and articles on the web but I'm not sure about a few things.

I bought 5 cherry barbs yesterday to cycle my tank. Now one of them has ick. (It has small white specks on it's tail, stays in the corner, and it's fins are down.)

My tank is a 10 gallon. The water has been treated for chlorine and chloramine. The temperature is always between 78-80 degrees. I added 2 tablespoons of aquarium salt before I put them in. 

Do I need to remove my carbon filter?
Should I add more salt or a different kind of salt? (I put the salt in just yesterday)
Should I do a water change and if so how much and how often?
What temperature should I work up to?
Anything else?

I know you guys get questions about ick all the time, so thank you very much for your help.


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## shev (Jan 18, 2005)

Cherry barbs arent very good for cycling a tank, especially financially speaking (at least around here). usually people add fish gradually to cycle a tank, so the intitial ammonia and nitrite spikes aren't too large for them to handle. did you add any bacteria to the tank? maybe comercial products? do you have any way to test your water for ammonia, nitrites and nitrates? this will help determine how much water to change. Your fish are stressed, clamped fins is a sign. how did you acclimate them?


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## Lydia (Feb 6, 2005)

Put the temperature up to about 84, and use Quik Cure. Yes you need to take the carbon out of your filter.


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## Saki (Dec 27, 2005)

He's acting pretty normal now, except for a little lethargy. I'm going to the store to get Quik Cure. I took the filter out and turned the heater up. I have a test kit, I'll check the levels and do a water change accordingly.

I didn't add any bacteria to the tank beforehand. I was thinking of getting some of that bio-spira but I'll have to order it online because they don't have it in stores near me. And I read that Cherry Barbs are good for cycling because they're tough lil fish. I bought mine for 3 dollars.


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## TheOldSalt (Jan 28, 2005)

"Stability" by Seachem works pretty good too, and it's a lot cheaper than Bio-Spira. Bio-Spira is great stuff and works instantly, but since you already have other problems you might as well save a few bucks, especially since you might wind up having to change a lot of water and disrupt your filters & gravel soon.


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## Saki (Dec 27, 2005)

Update: I did all the steps you guys suggested but used Rid-ich instead of Quik Cure (they didn't have it at the store). The Rid-ich nearly killed all of my fish. They were fine last night when I went to bed and this morning they were all in one corner at the top of my tank suffocating. I couldn't figure it out so I did all the tests, everything was fine. I even took a sample of water to get it tested at the pet store and she said everything was fine. I put an airstone in as a last attempt to give them more oxygen and put the carbon back in my filter to get rid of the Rid-ich -_-;. The fish with ick passed away about an hour ago. The remaining four have no sign of ick but I'm sure they will soon. One is still at the top of the tank gasping, it probably won't make it through the night. As for the other three, they are swimming around a little but most of the time they're hidden in plants and rocks.

Should I do a 100% water change and clean the gravel in hopes that the other fish won't catch ick or is it really bad to tamper with anything at this point? I didn't know fish would be depressing instead of fun.


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## Saki (Dec 27, 2005)

I decided to keep the temp up, keep the water salted, and do a 10% water change every few days, until the ick cycle is over. Hopefully they won't catch it. The remaining fish are easily stressed by any tampering and hide in the plants all day so I think a 100% water change would be too much for them at this point.


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