How To Prevent The Spread/Reintroduction of Ick

[RossW]

How do I prevent from reintroducing ick into a tank which was previously infected?  Does ick survive outside the tank on equipment?  I am most concerned about net's, vaccum, bucket(s), etc.  Or even worse from spreading it to other tanks in the house.

[beowulf]

I would slowly increase the temp in the tank as high as you can, ie if nothing currently in the tank 90F if not as high as the fish in the tank can take.  Anything that can be removed I would clean in a light bleach solution.

[RossW]

I would slowly increase the temp in the tank as high as you can, ie if nothing currently in the tank 90F if not as high as the fish in the tank can take.  Anything that can be removed I would clean in a light bleach solution.

Thanx for the idea, don't know why I did not think of it.  Maybe cause I have this fear of introducing soap and other contaminants into the tank and bleach is about is bad as it gets.  After I disinfect, I could rinse, rinse, and rinse again 

Could you elaborate on what a "light bleach" solution is from a fish's perspective?

[Woody]

Ick is ever present in your aquarium, it is in everyone's aquarium and it lives inside of your fish. You can lessen the severity of it by adding salt and raising the temperature of the water thus killing off the parasite.
Ick is present within your fish, just their immune system is strong enough to keep them in check. The adult parasite pushes its way out of the fish, drops to the aquarium bottom, reproduces, sending out hundreds of baby parasites to attached to fish and the cycle begins all over again.
Heat will speed up the cycle and salt does two things, it kills the parasites in the water, both baby and adult, secondly it boosts the fishes natural immune system. But you must treat for a full two weeks as sometimes the eggs do not hatch right away.
When you raise the temperature of the aquarium increase the oxygenation, very important.
You should also look at why the got ick, the most common reason is some form of stress. Stress weakens their immune systems making the fish very susceptible to ick.

Hope this helps

Woody

[dan2x38]

Here is a good visial of the Ich Cycle:



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[babblefish1960]

One part bleach in mixture with twenty parts water should be sufficient to clean all of your tools. Be absolutely certain to clean well with water afterwards so as not to cause other issues with the chlorine bleach. Additionally, don't leave the nets sitting in bleach for long as this will rot the material away and render them useless.

[plecoL83]

Ich also can be found air born and it has the capability of living outside the water for some crazy amount of time, there is no way you can get rid of ich completly only prevent it from spreading and in the end killing your fish, keep the water circulating (not standing still) feed your fish well, and always quarentine new fish and you should be fine.

[fischkopp]

Potassium permanganate is often used for disinfection of tanks, accessories and even plants. Its effect comes from oxidizing organic material. It turns the water purple and will decay under sunlight, hydrogenperoxid can also be used to neutralize potassium permanganate. Another method is hydrogenperoxid directly as it also oxidizes organic material.

I use mostly vinegar to disinfect tank and accessories before starting a new setup. But it may not be 100% safe when used in commonly available concentrations.

These ways may be safer than using bleach.

[bassetluv]

I had read that ich has to be introduced to an aquarium...while it does have a dormant stage, it doesn't lie dormant indefinitely - meaning it isn't automatically in every aquarium - a fish, water, or plants/decorations, etc., has to be introduced that is infected with it...that it is not airborne...that it is a good safeguard to use separate nets and equipment for separate tanks, and/or to clean all equipment thoroughly, or let all equipment dry completely before reusing.

My fish wound up with a case of ich because of bad fishkeeping practices (by me...I wasn't taking care of my fish properly). I wound up treating them for a week with Rid-Ich, which didn't seem to do very much. Then I switched (partly because I didn't see any improvement, partly because the medication was probably stressing out my already stressed fish, and partly because I read that ich medications (malachite green and formalin) are carcinogenic. So I decided to treat them with salt instead, as well as to treat one of the causes of susceptibility, bad water parameters. A lot of people here suggested the salt treatment and cleaning up the tank. That seems to have done the job (crossing fingers), though I did wind up losing one platy and my small pleco...both were too far gone to save, and I think they might have developed secondary infections. I do know that if ich were to show up again, I'd go with the salt treatment...and from now on much better fishkeeping practices, including quarantining of any new fish, netting them from the store bag instead of adding them and the store tank's water to the aquarium, etc.

[MikeM]

I do know that if ich were to show up again, I'd go with the salt treatment.

My tank just got over its ick infection (along with columnaris, but that's another story), and Super Ick Cure at 1/2 dose for almost a week after the spots were gone seemed to do the trick.  I was going to go the salt and higher temp route, but I've heard so much conflicting information about salt and small-scaled fish like loaches.  Is any salt at all too much for them, or is there a safe salt dosage for sensitive fishes?  As you said, the medicines are toxic, and they're also hard to work with, staining basically anything they touch.

[dan2x38]

Here is a good read on "Ich". An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. I introduced 4 new fish they developed severe signs of Ich. I returned the fish it was very bad. That was a week ago so far I have been extermely lucky no other fish have any signs or showing any stress.