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Ich from plants?

Posted: Sun Jan 12, 2014 12:29 pm
by sskruzr
Well I'm pretty cautious about introducing new fish into my community tank. I quaranteen for at 2 weeks, sometimes longer depending on how the fish look. Well Friday I bought a bunch of plants and now this morning the bleeding heqarts have spots. I never had this happen before but can't come to any other conclusion. While not a ton of spots, that's irrelevent, I cranked the heat and am not looking the quick cure.
Two questions:
Anyone have this happen to them?
How would one prevent this? Maybe soak in chlorinated water or potassium permagenate mixture?

Have a disease-free day!

Re: Ich from plants?

Posted: Sun Jan 12, 2014 2:24 pm
by mewickham
It could certainly happen. The tomont stage of the ich parasite is off the fish, attached to substrate. A plant leaf or stem could easily suffice as substrate. I'm not sure of any way to kill the parasite in this stage. Even ich medications won't work-- they only kill in the free-swimming stages of the ich parasite. A four- to six-day quarantine, followed by a quick rinse would probably work. It would give the parasite time to move into the free-swimming stage, where it would either die from lack of host, or be rinsed away. Even better, put some ich medication in the quarantine water and kill the free-swimming parasites when they hatch out of the tomonts.