# Whitespot



## gerlewis (9 Aug 2009)

Hi guys, my rummys have whitespot,  but none of my lapeyes or my mosquitos bizzarely.
I also have a snail and 5 red tiger shrimps.

I have turned the temp up to 31 degrees. Should I be doing anything else, like adding salt, or buying meds? 
(can shrimp tolerate salt?)

Any help or advice will be greatly appreciated

Ger


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## Superman (9 Aug 2009)

I've never had whitespot, I'm sure there's loads of information on Google.
I would of thought the best thing to do is a water change and get some treatment in there.
If you have a hospital tank to QT them then that's even better.


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## LeTigra (9 Aug 2009)

Although if you do treat with meds take care that whatever treatment you use is suitable for your inverts


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## gerlewis (9 Aug 2009)

Well, according to online instructions ramping the temp up to 31 is the first step to take. So ive done that, Im also going to do 20% water changes daily and will head down to to lfs in the morning for some meds.

If anyone has better advice please let me know

Ger


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## Tunafish (9 Aug 2009)

Best thing to use is protozin, although invert wise, you may want to move them to another tank until the problems gone. Increasing the temp's good, but not enough, especially with white spot, an organism which is always present in one or more locations in the aquarium and is potentially pathogenic to fish. Also get some water changes done over the next few days whilst treating them. Finally don't forget that once you've treated the whitespot, to follow the instructions with protozin to continue it's use to stop the unhatched parasites which will still be there and can easily take hold of a weakend fish after illness, and keep up with more regular water changes.


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## Ed Seeley (9 Aug 2009)

I've treated whitespot in tanks with heat and salt and on my koi with just salt and it works great.  I would use this approach personally over other medications every day - and I have tried them in the past with very mixed success.


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## gerlewis (9 Aug 2009)

thanks guys,
would the inverts etc be ok with the salt?
also, if I did move the shrimp to another body of water, would it matter that it would be un heated and un-filtered?

finally, is 2 tsp per gallon really what people do, as that sounds a lot of salt, 50 tea spoons!

One rummy nose is just staying under the amazon sword now and not moving, oh boy, its a shame 

Ger


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## gerlewis (10 Aug 2009)

update: all the colour is draining out of my shrimps, could this be temp related? Im worried im about to lose them


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## Ed Seeley (10 Aug 2009)

No idea with the inverts to be honest, except for knowing that young amanos live in salt water so maybe the adults can tolerate it???  Maybe someone else will be able to help with that?

As to dosing levels I tend to work on 0.5oz salt per gallon.  I'm not sure what that equates to in teaspoons.  For a 40gallon tank you'll need 20oz.  I have treated my koi with 0.75oz per gallon and know people have used 1oz per gallon so the actual dose doesn't seem critical.  However the more salt you add the more oxygen you need to add to the water.

When adding the salt don't do it all in one go but add half one day and then the rest 12 hours later.  If the fish aren't improving you can add another dose of the same amount a day later and you will be up to 0.75oz per gallon then.

How big is the tank?  25 gallons?  If so you'll need 12.5oz of salt split into 6.25oz portions to be added 12 hours apart.  Keep a close eye on your fish and do a 50% water change if they get too stressed.  (By doing 50% changes you will still be able to easily keep track of the salt level as a 50% WC will halve the salt level!  There's no easy way to monitor salt levels without a salt meter.)


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## mattyc (10 Aug 2009)

sorry to hear about your fish, by far the best way it to remove the effected fish and put them in a hospital tank, this can be any large container. do a series of 50% water changes on the origional tank to prevent the spred of the problem to other fish. treat the other fish in their hospital tank and do a daily water chage. 

for my hospital tank i use a grey plastic container (which was used for books) like these but from tesco with a air stone and air pump. this means you can put in a known amount of water making the doasing easier.


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## Ed Seeley (10 Aug 2009)

Usually I'd agree with the removal of the fish and treating in a QT but for whitespot I think you would be better to treat the tank.  The parasite spreads quickly and fish do not always show the characteristic white spots if they are infected.  A skin scrape can reveal parasites on fish that look to have no white spots.  By treating the whole tank (especially if using a relatively none-aggressive treatment like salt and heat) you can reduce/remove the parasites on all the stock rather than just the worst effected.

Bear in mind also that if you remove fish and successfully treat them they then have to go back into the tank where the problem was and this will be a stressful event that could lower their immunity and leave them open to the parasites again.

I'd only remove fish with whitespot to treat if their condition was so bad that they were suffering from the attentions of the other tank mates or had other secondary problems that also needed treating in the intensely monitored situation of a QT.

However a quarantine tank would be ideal to remove the inverts while treating the main tank so it would be good to set one up.  (In fact it's always good to have one ready to set up, even if you don't actually use it to quarantine every new purchase.  Mine has saved many a fish over the years.)


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## gerlewis (11 Aug 2009)

Well the latest news is as follows:

Monday morning I went to my LFS (maidenhead Aq) as my shrimps had gone VERY pale, they suggested turning the temp back to 27 and adding interpet whitespot treatment, which I did.

yesterday evening my Rummys had gone WHITE, all the colour from nose and tail had faded away to a very pale pink at best, also they were very inactive. I feared the worst when I came down stairs this morning.

Today, the rummys & shrimp are back to full colour, but the white spots are still on the fish (one of the lampeyes too).
The treatment is supposed to take the best part of a week though, so too early to tell.

Im hoping the paleness of the rummys was stress from all the temp changes, and not whitespot related.

Ger


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## Tunafish (16 Aug 2009)

Good stuff, sounds like they're on the mend!, as has been suggested salt is good to use, especially in ponds, however from working in the aquatics trade for several years and have dealt with numerous cases of imported fish contracting whitespot from stress/low immunity, I've always found that treatments such as interpet and protozin will save fish far quicker and more often than not.


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