First signs of ich?

[Spar]

garlic is good if you need to entice a fish to eat, such as medicated food. back in my pre-QT days, ich would show up on queue every time i added a new fish. fish would be so irritated from the ich that their eating behaviors would change. garlic at least helped keep them strong(ish) to fight through the outbreak, but obviously wasn't a cure by any means.

that said, it just isn't/wasn't fair to the fish to put them through that all the time. this is why i changed my ways to have a strict QT (with intent to eradicate ich) regime. this hobby is borderline on the ethics topic anyway, so may as well do our part to at least give as pleasant of a life as possible for our aquatic pets.

 

[krzyphsygy]

garlic is good if you need to entice a fish to eat, such as medicated food. back in my pre-QT days, ich would show up on queue every time i added a new fish. fish would be so irritated from the ich that their eating behaviors would change. garlic at least helped keep them strong(ish) to fight through the outbreak, but obviously wasn't a cure by any means.

that said, it just isn't/wasn't fair to the fish to put them through that all the time. this is why i changed my ways to have a strict QT (with intent to eradicate ich) regime. this hobby is borderline on the ethics topic anyway, so may as well do our part to at least give as pleasant of a life as possible for our aquatic pets.

So do you treat every fish for ich? If so what methods do you use?

 

[Spar]

yes, i treat everything for ich. fish i just use TTM (have used hypo and copper in the past, but like TTM tons better). for non-fish i just do 12 weeks fallow treatment to allow cysts to hatch and die.

as far as i know my DT is ich'less.

i also treat all new fish for flukes, just in case. PraziPro.

 

[krzyphsygy]

yes, i treat everything for ich. fish i just use TTM (have used hypo and copper in the past, but like TTM tons better). for non-fish i just do 12 weeks fallow treatment to allow cysts to hatch and die.

as far as i know my DT is ich'less.

i also treat all new fish for flukes, just in case. PraziPro.

Can you explain your TTM? have you ever used it with fish that had ich and eliminated the issue? Thanks

 

[Spar]

yes, several times. a couple bad cases even.

Here are a couple good posts:
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2388428
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1996525

Basically the point is to play the ich life cycle against itself. We know that at some point in the first 4-9 days of putting a fish in a tank that the parasites will jump off the fish and form cysts (called Tomites) on a hard structure in the tank, such as the glass, heaters, airstones, PVC hiding places, etc. These cysts take at least 72 hours to hatch and become infectious parasites again.

So, if you completely transfer (meaning new tank, new equipment, etc) a fish from one tank to another every 72 hours (3 days), you will leave behind these cysts. You do this 4 times @ 3-day increments, or 6 times @ 2-day increments, totaling 12 days. Given what we know about the life cycle, Ich will be gone permanently.

Cleaning the tank and letting it air dry will kill the cysts. And will be ready to house the fish the next round.

 

[Lucky Lefty]

Great info!