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hi guys,i noticed today that my blue acaras have a mild dose of ick,well i got some ickaway today from my lfs,and i have already given them the first dose,but on the bottle it dosent say how often to dose,it just says no more than 1 dose a week,so how will i no when to re-dose the tank,or weather the 1 dose is enuff,ive been very lucky so far,in all the time ive had fish they have never had ick b4,but i hate not knowing about these things.and ive always gotten great advice from everyone on this site,so here i am.thanx guys

If it says 1 dose a week then go with that,
however i would also recommend upping the temps to 85F/29c slowly to speed the ick life cycle along, and make sure you are not running with carbon.

Gibson SG you know you want one!!

ok great,as always thanx for the advice and speedy reply.just one more thing,ive noticed that alot of fish meds say NOT to use active carbon while you are treating your fish,why do they say this.does the carbon absorb the meds and make them useless?

does the carbon absorb the meds and make them useless

Yes carbon absorbs the meds. It doesn't exactly make them useless, it just makes them alot less effective. So if you have some carbon in your filter, take it out. Otherwise it will take alot longer to get rid of the ich, and it will take alot more $$$.

*Kristin*

cool,thanx for that,i dont use carbon in this tank.just one more thing,when do you think the shaking and srcaping against things will stop,i only started treatment yesterday,thanx guys.

The ich cysts (spots) take a few days (3-5 depending on temperature) to fall off, this is actually part of the ich life cycle and the point in time where most people end up failing on treatment. They see the cycsts have "gone" and so either stop treatment or think that they didn't need to perform treatment at all.

Unfortunatly this is the stage where the ich actually responds to medication and is right before the ich reproduces. Ich takes at least a week with medications in the water to be killed outright. If some fish started showing signs of ich after the others you'll most likely want to do a second round of medication. Do a partial water change according to the directions and give another dose of meds. Be sure to keep an eye on ammonia after the first three days as some ich medications have a habit of messing with the biofilter. Increase surface agitation not only to offset the raise in temp but also to increase oxygenation.

Raising the temp a degree or two a day as was suggested is a good idea since you're dosing with meds because it's made the ich nice and happy and more than willing to drop off and reproduce...how little they know it's only to meet their DOOOOM !

^_^

great thanx heaps,ive upt my temp,so now ill wait and see,jeez i hate parasites.since my blueys have had ick they havent been themselfs,it sounds funny but i watch them that much i can pretty much tell as soon as something is off.its almost as if they are sad or going to cry.anyway thanx again guys