Filtering Ich/pathogens?

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kallmond

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Oct 21, 2009
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Hanover, PA
An outburst of Ich in my smallest tank this morning got me thinking about pathogen filtration.

According to wikipedia, the Ichthyophthirius multifiliis "theront, which is approximately 40-50 micrometres" could be filtered out by a cheap kitchen sink water filter.

I know a bunch of people use filters to catch big stuff, but I've never heard of anyone using a small micron filter on their sump/return.

Is it a flow rate issue? Is there something I'm missing? Someone smarter than me fill me in on why its better to dose my fish with potentially lethal chemicals to remove a 40 - 50 micron pathogen?
 
Trying to filter out ich I feel is kind of pointless and an unneeded hassle. Prevention is the best thing to do, keep up on water quality/changes and make sure your tank is heated properly.

I hate putting meds in my show tanks, do you have a quarantine? If not salt and high temps can often solve ich without meds.
 
I agree that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. But its too late for prevention. For the record, this tank hasn't had any changes, new fish, plants, anything for over 3 months. I have no idea where this outbreak came from. Its (thus far) the only tank with any symptoms.

I do quarantine. I do at least weekly water changes to all 3 main tanks.

I've only ever had 1 other outbreak, about 6 years ago. I treated with salt and hot water, cleared it right up.

I know its kind of silly, but the fish I'm most worried about saving is my 2 year old son's goldfish "Dorothy" (Elmo's fish is named Dorothy) The little guy really loves this fish. He says "nite nite Eeeshy" every night before we turn out the tank light and he goes to sleep.

I did a pretty massive water-change and salted the 'fresh' water this morning.

I happen to own a water filter and a workable pump, so I think I'm going to give it a try for a couple of days and see what happens.
 
Parasites by nature live on & feed on a host. Their spawning process has a 'free floating' stage and this is when filtration may be an option...

UV lights are well known to be a way to kill parasites in this stage...

To physically filter out the parasites, you will need to learn what size they are at the "egg" stage and use media small enough to filter it out at that point.
 
kallmond;3625970; said:
theront, which is approximately 40-50 micrometres"
Click to expand...

Thats the free-floating (and infective) stage. Once you can see the white dots, they're more like 500 - 800 micrometers (or microns). A brita filter pitcher (or almost any cheap-o faucet filter) is a 1 micron filter.
 
kallmond;3626184; said:
Thats the free-floating (and infective) stage. Once you can see the white dots, they're more like 500 - 800 micrometers (or microns). A brita filter pitcher (or almost any cheap-o faucet filter) is a 1 micron filter.
Click to expand...


There are "micron pads" or "micron cartridges" sold for some filters. So I would imagine if they were adequate for removing parasites the manufacturers would boast this quality. Since they do not I am tempted to assume there is a flaw in the theory...

But at a glance, I don't see the possible flaw...

Since UV lights are well documented to remove parasitic infections, this verifies that it's possible to remove them by interupting their free floating stage...

So wether killing them (UV) or collecting them (micron filter) either way should prevent them from finding a host. Without a host they will die in the media (I would think) fairly quickly.

Naturally if you are considering using micron rated media in your sump, you will need to make sure you clean it very frequently. Naturally the finer the material the slower the water will flow through it. I think the Brita Trickle Filters that you suggest are 1 micron is a good example of that. They are sooooo slow...

Yet, if the lil bugs are 40~50 microns... I would think a 20 micron filter would be what you are looking for, not a 1 micron... which would allow much better flow.

I would still want an overflow route designed into the sump for those times when the fine media does get clogged.


I have no clue how this will actually work out for you, though I'm interested... But working off of the numbers you supplied, it sounds like you might be on to something...
 
If your fish can handle 87 degree water, you can kill almost all strains of ich. It should take 3-4 for it to clear up. What happens is the high temperature will prevent the ich from switch from one stage of its life cycle to another.

The only exception is some strains found in warmer clients like Florida may be able to handle the higher temps. Still worth a go. And as said before, aquarium salt helps wonders.

I was able to clear up my tank in 3 days. My Oscar went from being covered nearly solidly good as new in that time.
 
UV , plus heat is a great option that works quite well.
Diatom is another + if its feasible.
When treating ick I usually do a 50% water change every day as well. (Though its been over a year crosses fingers)
 
I have a diatom filter which will remove ichthysporidium theronts. It has a flow rate around 3-400 gph. Back in the day it was generally accepted that this was the best method of controlling an outbreak.

I would go that root and bump the temperature (species tolerance level not withstanding) rather than add chemicals to my tank
 
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