# PLEASE READ: Experience with treating Betta ich



## Ferdy (Mar 7, 2011)

Hi group,

I wanted to share my experience with my blue-green crowntail betta and the poor little fellows fight with a severe case of ich.

A little history first:

I've had this gorgeous fish for about 6 months, and he is housed in a 1 gallon tank with an undergravel filter and no heater. If you keep bettas, then you probably know the one I'm talking about---it's sold by a major retailer online for less than ten dollars, which includes light, cover, air pump, airline tubing, bubble stone and UG filter. All you need to add is the betta, some gravel, and some small decorations if you like.

I cycled the tank with a zebra danio and used Prime to detox the ammonia along with nearly daily 25% water changes. Tank cycled in about 5 weeks. Removed the danio to my community tank and added Lester, the crowntail---a really beautiful fish---you can see my other posts in the Betta section for his photo.

Anyway, once a month, I would remove Lester and clean the tank. Obviously, it is impossible to properly vacuum the gravel in such a small tank with a regular sized aquarium vacuum, I've yet to find a minature vacuum, and the regular sized one would drain the tank in less than 10 seconds---so, the way that I would clean the gravel would be to rinse it in dechlorinated water until the waste and mulm was gone, refill the tank with dechlor water and Prime, replace the fish, and monitor closely for any ammonia over the next few days, ready to treat with Prime if any showed--(which never happened, by the way---the gravel cleaning always kept the BB intact.)

Well, this past month, I'm going about my regular monthly cleaning as usual, and a couple of days after, Lester has come down with ich!! He was completely covered in tiny white dots, especelly on his pretty fins, a sure sign of ich. I have no idea how this could have happened---I have read many, many technical articles about ich and how it comes, goes, life cycle, etc. Everything says it does not "live" in every aquarium, waiting to attack a stressed fish---it MUST be introduced into the tank. So, I have absolutely no clue as to how it got there--but this somewhat of a digression---he has it, let's get on with treating it.

Since this small tank has no heater (ambient temp---around 73 degrees F), I had only 2 choices---salt or ich treating chemicals. As stated before, research shows that heat is first choice treatment for fish that can stand it (to speed up the life cycle at 80+ F or kill it outright at 92+ F), heat and salt, or no heat or salt with just chemicals. I chose the chemical route since I didn't have a heater, and most sources say that, used properly, chemicals are generally fairly safe and will definitely eradicate the ich.

So, I began treatment with Quick Cure, which is a malachite green/formulin combination which is highly recommended by several forums and websites as one of the safest and most effective products. I dosed as directed, following the instructions to the letter, being careful not to underdose or overdose. After a few days, poor Lester is still covered with ich, and it looking VERY bad---with open lesions where the parasites had dropped off---signs of other infections setting in (cotton mouth and fin rot)--presumably from the stress of the ich---inflamed gills, lying listless and motionless on the bottom other than gasping. Obviously, this treatment is not working, actually it's killing him and he's not going to make it, so I began to think about alternatives and how I can save him. He didn't eat for 8 straight days. 

Suddenly, it I had an idea. A heating pad! I got it down from the closet, did a back to back 75% water change to get rid of most of the Quick Cure, then added 1 teaspoon of aquarium salt, a dose of Prime, and watched his reaction to the salt. He actually perked up a bit, so I went ahead and added a 2nd and final teaspoon, plus 1/2 ml of Melafix, watched him perk up a little more, and placed the heating pad under the tank, set it to its lowest setting, and monitored the thermomemter and his reaction to the heat. The heat steadily climbed from 73 up to 92 F over the course of about 16 hours---still watching Lester for distress. He seemed to be tolerating it well, but I wasn't comfortable at 92 F, so I placed one layer of a kitchen towel between the bowl and the pad, which reduced the temp by 2 degrees, down to 90, and a second towel reduced the heat down to 86 degrees, which is where I wanted to be. Now, all I can do is watch him carefully, pray and hope he's OK in the morning.

Morning comes, and I'm scared to look in the tank---but to my surprise, Lester is up and about, swimming around, and greeting my like he used to before when I approached the tank, and VERY hungry!!! I fed him a little, which he ate, and then continued to swim around and act normally. Mind you, he is still looking VERY bad, his beautiful fins shredded, and columnaris all around his mouth and still speckles of ich on his pectorals and caudal fins and the open lesions. 

I then decided to remove a layer of towel and stabilized the temp right at 91 degrees F. He didn't seem to mind a bit, an actually perked up even more! I added a second dose of Melafix and a first dose of Pimafix, and continued the heat and dosing 1/2ml each Mela/Pimafix daily, and after the 3rd day of this treatment , the ich finally disappeared. I continued for a total of 10 days, with no water changes, then stopped the Mela/Pima, slowly reduced the temp back to normal, and did concurrent 50% daily water changes for 3 days to reduce the salt content.

Lester is still looking like he went through hell and back (which he did), and I doubt if his fins will ever recover to their prior glory, but he is still alive and at least acting healthy if not looking so, and greeting me with his usual enthusiasm every morning.

What to take out of this? That is for you to decide. I will not postulate an opinion in regards to what works best and what doesn't when it comes to treating a sick fish, just convey my experiences. And, for those of you who have tiny little tanks with no room for heaters, you may want to try Ferdy's "heating pad method" if you need to warm up your tanks! 

Thanks for letting me share my story. Hopefully Lester will give me a few more good months of love and enjoyment---I still care for that little fish, even though now he looks like he went through a war zone----;-)


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