Blue tang rubbing himself on my substraight

[Sgt Jonny Cat]

Hi all...I just noticed my blue tang rubbing himself on my sand at the bottom of the tank. I dont see any white spots on him, and he is eating alot as usual. I also have 2 clowns, a royal gramma and a red fire shrimp in the tank. They all seem normal.

This week I added a ruby red scooter blenny to the tank, and he has dissapeared after 2 days. I cant fins him. I rearranged my live rock looking for him, only to not find him anywhere. Could this have stressed my blue tang out?

Should I remove him into QT now even though he is eating? Or is there a medication I can use in my display tank? Please help, I'm new here (6 months) and this is my first experience with a fish sickness...

 

[MitchSutherland]

Just because you don't see the white spots doesn't mean they're not there. Stress could be from adding new fish, moving live rock around, or a nitrate spike from dead fish. Some people just deal with ich in their tank. Most of the time you can power feed through it with vitamins. If you set a QT, then you must take all your fish out and treat with hypo salinity, copper, or CP(worked for me). CP is chloroquine phosphate. A light sensitive medication so no lights in the tank. You may order it here http://kmaintl.com/product-category/misc . 30 days typically. The tank must go fallow for 72 days. Fallow means no fish. Adding fish directly to your Display will get you ich. Scooter Benny is the cause. Or it could've been there all along. Leave shrimp in DT. Feed him occasionally.

 

[Spar]

depending on the number of fish you have (as you would need to remove ALL of the fish), a more simple QT method is the Tank Transfer Method (TTM). It is the most effective method by far, and only takes 12 days to rid the fish of ich. you would still need to keep your DT fallow for 72+ days to allow any ich cysts to hatch and die.

any future fish you will want to QT with intentions to rid ich as well. and anything wet you add going forward (snails, live rock, shrimp, nems, macro algae, etc, etc, etc) will need to be QT'ed in a fishless tank for 72+ days before moving over to the DT.

 

[Newsmyrna80]

/\ Agree with Spar. Given that all you have seen is the fish flashing it could be velvet, brook or flukes. I would get a hospital tank ready and have necessary meds on hand.
Have you checked your ammonia level? With a decaying fish unless you have a well established tank ammonia levels can rise causing the fish to scratch.
A 55 gallon is not going to be big enough to establish a copepod population to sustain a dragonet. If you added a refugium, chaeto and once in a while supplemented pods you may be able to sustain one.
I also highly recommend getting into the habit of quarantining everything wet. Cliff has a solid process and it's also what I use as well.