First time fight with ich--need help

[FishHick]

After just saying how well my first tank marine tank has been doing, one of my clown fish developed ich. At least that is what I am pretty sure it is. He has tiny white specks covering his body, and his eyes. He quit eating and was swimming aimlessly in a circle in the tank today. I removed him and he is now in a rubbermaid tub with a heater and a powerhead. Because of my newbie ignorance, I dont have a quarantine tank set up.

What do I need and how can I quickly set one up? Do I need to quarantine my other fish who is healthy looking with no spots or anything? I only have the two clownfish. I plan on treating by hyposalinity.

 

[discus010]

Clownfish do not do well with freshwater dips.

Cleaner shrimps are known to eat ich.

 

[Steven Pro]

To be sure you rid yourself of this parasite, you must remove and treat all the fish using either copper, hyposalinity, or tank transfer (the only proven treatments).

You can setup a quarantine tank quickly using Marineland's Bio-Spira. See here for more information on quarantine,
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-10/sp/feature/index.htm

I am unaware of any gut content information on cleaner shrimp. But, I have seen several studies on other cleaner animals (wrasses and gobies) and both have been shown to eat almost exclusively gnathid isopods, not ich.

 

[FishHick]

Thanks for the replies, and the website really helped. My fish died this morning :-(. But my other fish is still healthy. I have a quarantine tank now and am going to get it going because I will want to get another fish at some point. I am going to wait at least 4 weeks though, to make sure my other fish stays healthy. And I will quarantine any new ones for sure!

I have a question on the lighting. Since I will only be putting fish in the quarantine tank, can I use flourescent lights designed for freshwater fish? I already have a hood and light left over from my freshwater tank...

Thanks again!

 

[Steven Pro]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8429556#post8429556 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by FishHick
I have a question on the lighting. Since I will only be putting fish in the quarantine tank, can I use flourescent lights designed for freshwater fish? I already have a hood and light left over from my freshwater tank...

That will work fine.