# White Spot



## Jacko24 (Jan 9, 2012)

Recently white spot has broken out in my tank, I upped my temp to 30 degrees and I bought some interpet white spot remover and it didnt do anything! went back to my LFS yesterday and asked in there and was told to try some waterlife as it was stronger, inperpet was 45micro grams per liter agaisnt the waterlife's 545micro grams!!!

so i dosed with the watelife yesterday but it seems to be too little too late as all 4 of my clown loaches have died :2wallbang:

My tetras, barbs and plecos seem unaffected, how long should i leave it before getting more loaches?

also why bother selling a product that doesnt contain enough active ingredient to do anything!:censor:


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## Cleopatra the Royal (Nov 29, 2008)

Melafix is probably the best stuff to use, but use it at half dose (due to plecs / loaches). The active ingredient in anti white spot treatment is Malachite Green, which is highly harmful to all scaleless fish (ie your loaches and catfish). The catfish may have been OK as the scutes act as scales to an extent, and loaches tend to be particularly prone to white spot anyhow. I wouldn't add any more fish at all, let alone loaches until you have the problem sorted. Good luck!


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## GlassWalker (Jun 15, 2011)

Interpet anti-whitespot does work, and I have used it myself. I don't have waterlife to compare, but Interpet's have 47mg of malachite green per 100ml, or 470mg per L. Assuming the figure for waterlife's is correct, there's not much difference in concentration. That difference may be balanced out anyway by dosage rates.

Also that isn't the only active ingredient, and different manufacturers use different combinations.

From the first time white spot was noticed, how long was it before temps were raised and medication started? Also did you clear out the previous medication before starting the new one? If you there is a risk of adverse reactions or overdosing.

Personally I've not used the raised temperatures since it would be out of the comfort zone for most of my fish. While it helps speed up the life cycle of white spot, it isn't exactly slow at typical tropical tank temperatures anyway. Alternatively to use heat to kill white spot directly, it needs to be even hotter still, although I don't recall the exact figure.


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## wilkinss77 (Sep 23, 2008)

ws3 is usually considered the best white spot cure.


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## Bengal (May 14, 2013)

I wouldn't even consider adding more to your community, until this fungi has been vito'd.

If you can separate the non-scaled fish and non-effected, to a temp tank (a plastic box with a heater and filter will do) and continue to treat the infected tank, it may be a lot easier.

Do you quarantine your new fish, when you get them? or place them in your main tank, straight away?

You can wack up the temp to 32c and add a bit of epsom salt, keeping it up for 10 -12 days straight and it should rid the white spot. You can also add treatments into this. Could even use table salt.

Remember though, if you are using treatments, take the carbon out of the filter. If you're just raising them temp with salt, you can keep it in.

Once the white spot is gone, leave it about 5 weeks, before adding to your community


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## Cleopatra the Royal (Nov 29, 2008)

GlassWalker said:


> Interpet anti-whitespot does work, and I have used it myself. I don't have waterlife to compare, but Interpet's have 47mg of malachite green per 100ml, or 470mg per L. Assuming the figure for waterlife's is correct, there's not much difference in concentration. That difference may be balanced out anyway by dosage rates.
> 
> Also that isn't the only active ingredient, and different manufacturers use different combinations.
> 
> ...


I'd say that it is still a pretty slow life cycle considering its still a month at 24oc, and most treatments only recommend usage for a week (bearing in mind it only 'kills' the white spot when it is not on a host. The 30oc speeds the cycle up to around a week for the treatments to work.


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## GlassWalker (Jun 15, 2011)

I couldn't give a reference right now, but I understood the life cycle to be a matter of days at tropical tank temps, around 25C say. Certainly a week was enough to shift occurrences of white spot using Interpet #6 first time, and eSHa another without increasing temps. Before you ask, this was a different tank that was freshly set up so wasn't a recurrence. I thought a ich lifecycle of a month was in the realms of coldwater species.


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