I found out that my 10 gallon has some fish with ich. Now, I just found this out, no time to go to the store for anything, and work all day/night everyday except sunday. All I could find in my cupboards was some fine grind french mediterranean sea salt. Ingredients listed; sea salt, magnesium oxide, and yellow prussiate. Now, is this the same as table salt? Will it do anything for my tank? I just added a heater to the tank (not sure if it works, really old but orange light on), I dont use heater because of socal weather. The 10 gallon has a powerhead on it, and only 3 fish seem affected by the ich (so far).
Ich and salt
- Thread starter MarlboroMan
- Start date
You can reach in and grab the heater to check for warmth 
As for that salt.... I don't know.. But Walmart is open all night and i believe has API in the fish section..
As for that salt.... I don't know.. But Walmart is open all night and i believe has API in the fish section..It's the same temperature as the water, not very warm at all. Maybe I should raise the temp. As for the walmart, they're not open 24 hours here, and the closest one is like 45-60 minutes away. Damn, maybe I could pick some up really early in the morning...So whats good for Ich? I don't want to spend money on something if salt or patience will do the trick.
Not sure what fish you have or what temp your tank is but I have used heat 85 degrees or so, water changes, extra air to rid fish of ich. Works every time , no meds.
I've had good luck using plain table salt to treat ich. I mix the salt in a bucket then siphon it into the tank using airline tubing. I use 2 teaspoons per gallon. Last time I had to treat, it took almost a week for all the ich spots to disappear, and I treated for 2 weeks after the last signs were gone. That was a year ago, haven't seen it since. Do you have a salt shaker? Might be enough in there to start off the treatment, if its only for 10gal.
Freshwater Ich can't survive a salinity 3ppm and above, anything under 3 is tolerable to the protozoa, sea water is @35ppm. Turning up the heat speeds its life cycle, which is a good thing. When ich is visable on the fish, or dorment in the substrate it is unaffected by treatment, you need to kill it when it is "freeswimming" , and trying to find and attach itself to the fish, which is why you speed its "dorment, to freeswimming, to paracitic lifecycle. I usually ad rock salt gradually to a HOB filter a couple handfuls at a time, and raise my temp to 90'F(also gradually), you must keep this up for about a week to allow all dorment cysts to hatch and die or ich can return. .
So.....what some of you are saying is that any kind of salt works, because ich die in high salinity (when free swimming), so I'm assuming maybe the fish might not like certain salt....I'm gonna add the salt anyways. Thanks for the replies.