Fight with stubborn Ich

[svejil]

I have been battling a pretty bad infestation of Ich in my main DT for about two weeks now. I have a 12" Emperor Angel, 5" Chevron, 6" Orange Shoulder, and 8" Miniatus Grouper.

I have read many writings from Terry B., regarding hyposalinity, which I am following as much as possible. I am treating in main display, I have no inverts, but I do have LR, and sand. I hear the nitrifying bacterial will not be affected however small "critters" in the live rock, and sand may not survive at 14ppt. I have been testing for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, and ph. Ph has stayed steady at 8.2, all other parameters are in line.

I brought the salinity down over the span of a week, and just last night I hit the 14ppt measured with a calibrated (with distilled water) ATC refractometer..

Question: my large Emperor is struggling, more so after the last drop to 14ppt than before, and his eyes are very swollen and cloudy. Could the ich infecting the eyes create blindness, or trouble seeing? Could the swollen eyes be a secondary bacterial infection?

When I feed the other fish, the angel looks like he might want to eat, but then almost like he can't find the food.

I am hoping now that the tank is at 14ppt, I will start seeing some results, however if anyone knows how long it should take before improvement, please let me know. I know of the different stages, and right now the white spot that is visible on the fish seem very high, so maybe the free swimming stage is happening, or near happening, but not sure.

Any help or guidance is greatly appreciated....especially with the Emperor / swollen eyes, and feeding. BTW I feed PE Mysis soaked in garlic and Selcon, as well as New Life Spectrum pellet, and nori.

Thanks,

Steven

 

[Jacob D]

Hi Steven. Sorry to hear about your ich problems. I wish I could be more help regarding the angel. Cloudy eyes can potentially be a bacterial infection.

Lowering your salinity to 14ppt is the right thing to do for proper hypo - but it will impact your biological filtration. You can monitor daily, or you can just start doing daily water changes which isn't a bad idea during an ich outbreak anyway (especially if you happen to have a bare bottom tank that you can vacuum). Keep feeding those foods, if the fish are eating that's a good sign.


Have some patience and you should start seeing results soon. The most important thing now is to keep the fish as stress free as possible and keep that water quality pristine.

 

[bertoni]

[welcome]

I'd continue to lower the SG. The fish probably could tolerate a drop to 1.009 in a few hours, but the filtration might suffer. I'd have some Amquel and a lot of water for changes on hand, if you try a rapid drop. Hard to say. You might not be able to save the Emperor.