Ammonia Safe.
Nitrate 20
Nitrite 0
Hardness 300
Alkalinity 300
Ph 8.4
Ph out of tap 7.2
Tank Size 10 gallons about 8 weeks been running.
Filter name and size Whisper 5-15
Once a week 50% water changes
3 fish in the tank, two 2 inches and one 1 inches
Water conditioner prime
No medications yet
NO new fish
Tetra Fin Flakes, peas, broccoli, tubifex, freeze-dried bloodworms, frozen bloodworms, cucumbers, Wardley crumbles, algae wafers, romaine lettuce is what I feed him.
I found grains of salt on him.... I think is ick, so I need help on how to cure.
He's banging himself against the walls, swimming frantically. by the way he's in a hospital tank right now...

How big is the q tank? To be honest you need to treat all the fish and the tank so theres no point in quarantining him.
Is the tank heated at all?
Adding salt will kill the parasites and heating to 82f will quicken the cycle and kill them as well.
Add aquarium salt at a teaspoon per gallon, three times, twelve hours apart. You will need to leave it like that for 2 weeks.

Also a point to note as well, your tank is overstocked and as such the fish will always be stressed and thats when you see diseases such as ich.

Post back soon

We are going to need the results of the ammonia and nitrites as well.

Hehe, I just came back from the LFS and I bought some Jungle Ick Guard that says clears ick fast and I just dumped it in the quarantine....not the 10 gallon. The horrible thing is.... he's a common...I know I need a bigger size and all but I can't afford it right now... so like how long will it take for it to heal if I only put the med in and all??? Would I put it in the 10 galon as well?? The qt is 10 gallons too I think... yea I'm pretty sure it is.

The nitrite was 0 and the ammonia it said safe on my little chart...

I do not know the difference between your qt 10 gallon tank and your regular 10 gallon tank - but I am hoping the qt tank has a good filter running on it too and it, too, is cycled.

If this is the case, splitting your fish into different tanks is the best thing possible. Put one 2 incher in by himself, and the other larger one with the smaller one. This will give the greatest amount of water volume per fish possible. As commons, these fish really need at least 20 gallons apiece. As small as they are, they may be able to survive in 10 gallons apiece, but 3 in a 10 gallon tank simply will not work.

Any time a fish is stressed, the water is less than perfect, etc, opportunistic parasites and diseases will surface. Ich is just such a problem. Ich can lay dormant in the gravel in a tank for months to years, popping out and attacking any time a fish has problems. If the water gets too cold or too warm, the ammonia levels climb, the nitrate is high, the nitrites are not zero. Any stress can set off the opportunistic ich.\

To treat the ich that is attacking at this time, you will have an easier time if you attack it in a slightly different way.

The best thing you can do is to get a larger tub - as big as you can - at least 20 gallons. Move all the fish to the tub with the filter(s). Treat the ich in the tub - treating ALL three fish. Even if they are not showing the tell-tale spots, ich can be infesting a fish - a fish can die of ich and never show the spots. The spots are the parasite under the skin of the fish. You can only kill the parasites when they are free swimming in the water.

So, move the fish to 100% clean, new water - at leats 20 gallons. Move the cycled filter(s) with them. Dump ALL the water and everything from the two 10 gallon tanks. Boil the gravel. Clean the tanks. Reset them all. Then, when the ich is controled in the bare bottomed tub, you can move one larger fish in one 10 gallon by itself and the two other fish into the other 10. This will give them the most water volume you can.

Look to getting a larger tank as soon as possible. Larger water volume, better filtration will make keeping these fish MUCH easier and will allow them to avoid stress problems with ich and other diseases.

Wow, thanks for all that info, unfortunately, I can not find a larger tank, and I may just increase the volume of water in the 10 gallon qt, as it will hold 20 gallons, it's just that I filled it up only half way. I do not think my mother will find it very pleasant that fish's poop will boil in her pot that we eat in...no offense, but I don't think that's such a good idea, and with the meds I think that it's going to the ick parasites in the gravel anyways, I will need advice on how long the ick guard will take, and will I need to keep the 2 fish in the 10 gallon forever? or just until the ick is over??? Daryl thanks so much and everyone too...


Ps: Daryl, no, unfortunately... the qt was a tub that I just bought so it hasn't even been a week cycled, but the 10 gallon tank has so....

The way you are doing this is a sure recipe for reintroducing the ich. Please find a way to do what the ladies are telling you - clean out the main, boil the gravel etc. As long as there are fish in there if you indeed have ich, the spores will live to infect another day. To completely get rid of ich, a tank has to have NO FISH it it for 6 to 8 weeks. The meds will definitely NOT kill the dormant stage of ich.

If you really cannot get a larger tank, you might want to consider getting another home for one or two of your fish. For what you have, you need 40 gallons, bare minimum, and no, 10 gallons just will never do. You are going to continually run into illness problems.

I don't mean to be harsh, but those are the facts, as best I know them.

Best of luck

Dave

I don't think I can get a tank, because I just bought mine like a 8 weeks ago, and I don't think my mom would think buying another tank for my 4 african dwarf frogs, pleco, commet, and 2 fancies, even though I present my facts. I don't have much room in my house either for it. Sorry guys, but I think I saw somewhere that ick always exists in the tank. So, I still strongly believe that boiling and all that will still cause the ick parasites to resist. If I start over, then wouldn't that also be saying goodbye to the good bacteria? sorry for being so darn stubborn, but before I go out there and jam my gravel into a pot and boil them, I need to know if this is really necessary.

I'd be interested in knowing the source of what you read.

Personally, I'd treat the whole tank with potassium permanganate, then bleach, then a nice dry in the sun and start from scratch after boiling all my gravel. This is the recommended way of disinfecting a tank, and no, I do not believe ich will survive this treatment. Now, if you go moving fish in there before they have 6-8 weeks of ich freedom, you will indeed reintroduce ich.

However, as overstocked as you are, ich is likely to be the least of your problems.

good luck
Dave

Dave, I know that I have both heard and read that about ick always existing in the tank but in a dormant stage and then it strikes a weak or stressed fish too, but there seems to be no scientific data to back that up. It seems that there is some controversy surrounding this issue within the fish community. So I am not surprised this person may have picked that info up, but I still think that your advice of disinfecting the tank is a good idea, although I am far from being an expert. When the pm system is working again I can pm you some links that actually say that ich lives in every aquarium, but again there is no scientific data to back it up that i know of.

This was an interesting article by Shelly Wittig I found that touches on the subject...scroll down to the part that is titled How Do I Prevent It? http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/ich.php