Garlic Really Seems To Work!!!

J

jbhumphreys

Guest
Soaking your food in garlic really seems to work! I started feeding my fish brine shrimp soaked in garlic oil from my local grocery store a few days ago. My Hippo Tang, which I bought a few weeks ago and did not quarantine, had come down with ich. After realizing how stupid I had been I went out and got myself a 29 gallon Quarantine/Hospital tank and set it up. I had planned to move all of my fish over this weekend and begin Hyposalinity. This morning I observed that there is no longer any sign of ich on my Hippo or any of the other fish. Looks like the garlic really works!!! I plan to continue using the garlic soaked food several times per week from now on.
Question, should I go ahead and treat all my fish in the hospital tank with Hyposalinity or wait and see if I notice another outbreak. I am planning on switching my Crushed Coral substrate for Sand in the next 3 to 4 weeks, so I will be moving the fish over to the quarantine tank then. If I don't move them now should I treat them with Hyposalinity then just to be safe?
Thanks in advance for all your advise. I feel so lucky to have found this board. I would have never known about the garlic!
 
fishfood

fishfood

Member
I would still go with hypo. I would bet that within the next 2-4 weeks you will see ick back on your fish. From the time frame of them they probably are still alive in the substrate and will soon be seeking hosts again. I'm not sure about icks exact life cycle but from reading messages in the disease and treatment forum garlic will not kill Ick it just helps prevent it and only mild cases at that. I lost all but one of my fish to ick just over a month ago and I had tried garlic but it did nothing. The lone surviver was just put back in the main tank about 3 or 4 days ago.
 
N

notaquaman

Guest
Ick or 'white spots' has a life cycle to it and infects the tank too. This is because mature ick parasites, will drop off the fish to the bottom of the tank and continue their life cycle. That means they can breed and then the juv. ick para. can reinfect fish, etc...
Should use copper for at least 21 days in your tank to treat it for Fish only. A fresh water dip might help infected fish since the para. osmosis means they actually explode in freash water.
 
jacrmill

jacrmill

Member
as stated i wouldnt do a freshwater dip and put the fish back in the tank that already has ick. maybe im wrong because i seem to be disagreeing with most of the other people who posed on this, but i would wait if i were you. while im sure you still have some ick in your tank, im sure i probably do too. in my opinion if your fish can live with whats in there with out being bothered i would let it go. and by the way i think the life cycle of ick is about 3 weeks. so if you do go that route make sure to treat the Q tank and keep your show tank empty for at least 3 weeks.
 
fshhub

fshhub

Active Member
garlic may help, bu ti would not say it works great, or is a cure all, i use it, but i do not rely on it as a cure all, a Qtank and hypo s the best medicine , i only use garlic as a possible preventative
HTH
 
karlas

karlas

Member
another thing that will help with ick is cleaner shrimp. they will help (not prevent it) by picking ick right off of the fish. also they pick up any extra food that hits the bottom and add some nice color to the tank.
 
fishfood

fishfood

Member
I don't see why you don't just set up the qt now and let it cycle and then move the fish over in say 1 or 2 weeks. Since you want to take them out anyway to change to sand. That way you could keep then in the qt and go with hypo. Hell they may get stressed out from moving them anyway and the ick may show up as soon as you put them back in the main tank if it is not eliminated. So start now and a week or 2 after you change the substrate you should be able to put them back in the main tank.
 
J

jbhumphreys

Guest
OK, I trust Mr. Tang so I have moved all my fish over to the 29 gallon hospital tank and filled it with 2/3's show tank water and 1/3 new water. I have raised the temperature to 81 degrees and I am slowly lowering the salinity. It may take several days. I moved some of my dead corals decorations over to the hospital tank to provide hiding places for the fish and hopefully a little more bacteria. I placed a canister filter with biomedia on my main tank to seed it for about a week, then I plan to move it to the hospital tank. Will maintian water quality through water changes because I doubt the hospital tank will have an effective bio system in place to handle the fish load. I will keep the fish in the hopital tank for 1 month and then move them back to my main tank after I have gradually raised their salinity back to that of the main tank.
Anybody have any thought, ideas, improvements that they would like to send my way?
Thanks for everyones posts.
 
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