# Treating Scaleless Fish



## brittanyb157 (Feb 24, 2009)

I have 2 glass catfish (lost one recently) and one appears to have a fungus? Correct me if I am wrong. They are little pin-head sized white, almost fuzzy looking white spots, there are two of them about in the middle of its body. At first I hardly noticed the one, but they've gotten bigger since then. Assuming it was a fungus and knowing that it is harder to treat scaleless fish, I stuck with melafix and pimafix which I have been adding to the tank for about a week now. I see no improvement.

Is there something else I can use that is safe for these fish? I am not a fish expert, so correct me if my diagnosis is wrong. It appears to be acting normal aside from those couple spots.


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## Superedwin (Jan 19, 2009)

Well IME first isolate the fish and put it in a tank with a heater( bump up the temp more maybe around 80degrees) and filter. Then get aquarium salt and add it by how much it said you should. Then turn off the lights and let him/her heal(maybe around 2-3weeks, but it depends just heck everyday) I did this with my cory who had some kind of fungus or sickness and after i did this he/she is now all happy and healthy!


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## brittanyb157 (Feb 24, 2009)

The only problem with that is that I don't have a seperate tank for him, so I won't be able to move him. I see a couple more tiny spots on him. I am going to do a big water change tomorrow and add some salt. How much should I use considering this is a scaleless fish, aren't you supposed to not use as much because they are more sensitive?

My apologies, I'm new to fish illness!


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## mistergreen (Dec 9, 2006)

might as well treat the whole tank. what the fish has is probably spread throughout the tank already.

it's tough, pictures might help us see better. But run off to the local fish store and buy meds for cottony growth. You usually dose 1/2 of what is recommended for scaleless fish.


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## aschaal03 (Feb 2, 2009)

DO NOT add salt to a tank with scaleless fish. They do not tolerate ANY salt at all. 
It sounds like you have an outbreak of Ich. In this case you want to slowly raise your temperature to 84 degrees(1 degree about every 12 hours). Keep it that high until 3-5 days after symptoms disappear.

Remove any Carbon filtration you are using. You will want to treat with a product that includes malachite green and formalin. A good/common medication that includes both of these is Rid-Ich. You will want to use 1/2 the dose that would be used on regular (scaled) fish. Watch the fish very carefully for the next few hours for any signs of stress. If they start acting stressed, do a quick water change. Next time only dose 1/4 of the recommended dosage. Be sure to keep dosing for 3-5 days after the spots disappear as the fungus could still be in the water.

I should note that malachite green is usually deadly for invertebrates. If you have shrimp or snails you want to save, be sure to move them somewhere else before medicating.

If you do increase the temperature, make sure you have an airstone or good surface agitation as the increased temperature and the formalin in the medication both lower oxygen levels in the water.


**edit: if you can find these, Kordon's Ich Attack, Prevent Ich and Rid Fungus are herbal alternatives which are said to work as well as rid ich. I have not tried these, but they are supposed to be perfectly safe for scaleless fish and inverts, and do not require water changes in between doses.


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## brittanyb157 (Feb 24, 2009)

Okay, thanks so much. I'll run to the fish store tomorrow, I had to work all weekend. :icon_eek:

If it is Ich how long would it take for the symptoms to begin showing up on the rest of the fish? Because This fish has had this for a little while and everyone else is fine. Just curious.


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## aschaal03 (Feb 2, 2009)

If the fish has a healthy immune system they can fight off the ich. They have to be pretty infested for you to be able to see spots on them. It is likely that some of the other fish have the ich in their gills and you just don't know it. So treating the whole tank is a good idea in this case. 
The ich spots you see drop off of the fish and fall to the bottom of the tank. When it's life cycle is over (about 3 days) it sends out thousands of spores into the water, which will eventually attach onto a host. If the fish it attaches to has a healthy/strong immune system, it will kill the ich. If not, the ich is able to reproduce and keep putting more and more spores into the water. The higher the temperature of the water, the more quickly the ich goes through it's life cycle, and the faster the medicine can kill it (medicines only kill ich that is free floating, which lasts ~3 days). 85+ degrees ich can no longer reproduce.

http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/disease/p/ich.htm
you can read all about it in that link.


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## lauraleellbp (Feb 3, 2008)

With scaleless fish I personally cut dosages in half, but then treat for 2x as long as recommended.

IME it seems to work better than just 1/2 dosage for the recommended treatment time...

Just be sure to keep up the water quality during that time, which can make maintaining the correct dosage a little tricky...


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## kid creole (Dec 25, 2008)

brittanyb157 said:


> Okay, thanks so much. I'll run to the fish store tomorrow, I had to work all weekend. :icon_eek:
> 
> If it is Ich how long would it take for the symptoms to begin showing up on the rest of the fish? Because This fish has had this for a little while and everyone else is fine. Just curious.


I can tell you that it isn't ich, merely by the fact that you haven't said, "Oh my god, my fish that had a couple of spots now is covered head to toe in spots."

Treat it as a fungus. If this isn't a new tank, you should have some serious questions about your biological filtration. What is the temperature on the tank? It should be at least 80° right now to treat either problem.


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## aschaal03 (Feb 2, 2009)

The treatment for fungus is pretty much identical to the treatment for ich, so just keep doing what you're doing. Malachite Green is the main medication used to treat fungus, and that is in the rid-ich I suggested.

Keep us updated on how it's going!


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