Maybe ich.... or maybe not?

[Yuuki]

I just moved Sushi into his new 5 gallon on Friday. That night, I noticed a small, white, raised bump a bit behind his eye. Just one single bump. It stayed there for say... 22-26 hours and it left behind a small dark spot right where it was on him.

The dark spot looks similar to a missing scale, only much smaller.

So, it's a little more than 48 hours after that bump disappeared and he's still bump-free at the moment. But does ich really work that quickly; only appearing for 24 hours? I'm starting to wonder whether this was ich or not, but what else could it have been?


I'm currently treating his tank with Quick Cure just in case it is ich. But how long does ich usually take to multiply and reinfect the fish?

[Magdalaine]

I've never had to deal with ich, but I've heard that one effective way to kill off the parasites once they've fallen off of the host is to raise the temperature of the tank to about 82-86 degrees to kill off the little buggers. I'd be a bit wary of medicating for something that I'm not entirely sure it is.

[Yuuki]

Heat alone won't kill it though, heat just speeds up it's life cycle, making medicine effect it faster.

It's been 4 days since it fell off now, and it hasn't reinfected him. So I'm supposing it either wasn't ich in the first place, or the Quick Cure killed it. Guess I'll never know...