Ich

Question
Hello

I have a garden pond about 20' by 4' and 3' deep and live in NE England- when I bought the house last year the pond was healthy, well established  and had a well balanced ecosystem- invertebrates,pond plants, fish- mostly Comets and Shubunkins.  Stupidly I bought 6 tiny new sasara comets and then Ich arrived- now I am losing fish on a  daily basis- I had about 20 now have about 7. I am really reluctant to dose the whole pond as don't want to kill off everything else like the tadpoles, dragonfly larve etc. Should I just resign myself to the fact all the fish will die, and if sao could I leave it say 2 months and then start again with just  few fish?

Any advice welcome I am really upset about it.

So far my two largest fish (I think they might be Ghost Koi - about 8" long ) are ok

many thanks Sue  

Answer
Hi Sue,

The first thing to do is to remove your fish to a hospital tank.

Give them a salt bath; that is, place them in a solution of 3 kilograms of salt per 100 liters of water.The fish should not be kept for more than 10 minutes in such solution.
Ich need hosts in order to survive.
If they do not find it, they will die in 48 hours.
To be on the safe side, keep your fish away from the pond for 72 hours.
Keep in mind that ich will need any host creatures.
So, any snails, frogs or other animal life should be removed as well.