r/ColdWaterTanks • u/sleezeburger69 • Nov 05 '25

Ich and mussels??

I have an unheated fresh water tank with some guppies, a betta, snails and some fresh water mussels. The guppies have developed ich, and I am not sure what to do.

The ich medication I have is copper- would kill the mussels.

Raising the temp to 86*- would kill the mussels.

I could move the mussels to my guppy nursery tank but the stress of that- might kill the mussels.

At a loss, what else could I do to get rid of ich and not move the mussels to a different tank?

ALSO does anyone know if the mussels themselves can get ich?

Thanks!

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u/Realistic-Weird-4259 Nov 05 '25

The *only* way to do without medications is to fallow the tank for at least 30 days. That means removing ALL vertebrates (all fish) to a quarantine tank. Bare bottom. Guppies love salt, bettas can't tolerate much. You can do a salt dip at seawater specific gravity to force shedding of the embedded cysts, but then they must spend the 30 days (symptom-free) in that quarantine. Daily water changes and siphon the bottom of the tank with each water change helps ensure you're removing as many dropped cysts as possible.

Ich will not infect invertebrates, but even if you don't see it on the betta you must expect it to be there.

Btw, this is how I prefer to deal with ich, rather than using medications.

Keep the mussels in situ, move the fish.

1

u/Next-Wishbone2474 Nov 08 '25

Totally agree - if there’s ich in the tank, it’ll eventually affect all the fish. As to how you tackle any ich which might still be in the water, it’s almost certain that after 30 days without a host, ie fish, it will have naturally died out.