Hello everyone i have a little problem with my fish
i just noticed one of my clown and one of my cromis have white spots
i dont have a QT because limited space,so im here for your help with this ich i do have a 20g tall tank i can use i guess im going to put it in the guest room
so what you guys use to get rid of it,thanks everybody
Trust me I know where you are coming from with having limited space and for me money as well. I didn't have a QT either. But I ended up getting a dwarf angel that brought in both fluke and ich! I wasn't happy. I tried feeding well and also tried some "reef safe" organic ich cure which just helped to bring out a outbreak of cyano. The angel I was able to catch and gave to an LFS to treat and ended up trading it in for another fish. Not long later some of my other fish ended up showing ich so I ended up getting all the fish out and into a QT.
If you are in the position of a bad outbreak it's probably too late to go the maintain a healthy tank route but best to start now anyways. If you just started seeing a few spots then you might be okay. Get your water quality stable (what is good water quality is debatable but stable is a key). Feed a variety of foods and feed well (kind of makes getting a stable environment difficult.) Make sure the fish are getting proper nutrients and fats.
If the outbreak is really bad I'd do whatever it takes to get a QT tank going. Get a cheap ruber made container, small HOB filter, and small heater. I found a great deal on a 20g tank, stand, hob filter, and light from Goodwill for $30. Find a spot to put it. Be inventive. I first set mine up in the middle of a room. Wife wasn't happy. I now have it in a spare bathroom (wife still isn't thrilled). Put the container on top of a table or chair or something. I put in some PVC pipes and structure for the fish to hid in and around.
I'd get something to help aid in bacteria growth like seachem stability. I used that to get my nitrification jump started and seemed to work well for me. I also changed water every day for a week and it was fine after that.
Then choose if you want to go the route of hyposalinity or copper. I went copper with seachem's copramine as it was reported to be easier on the fish and easier to get in an effective "zone" and still actually work. I was scared with hypo I'd not be able to keep it at the right salinity levels and with regular copper meds as well. I also used prazipro at the same time as a just in case because I had flukes in my tank as well before I had ich show up.
My clowns looked to be in the worse shape and I did a freshwater dip just before I put them in the QT and that seemed to help them a lot. Most all of the white spots that were on them fell off. For the freshwater dip I filled a small bowl with ro/di water, put it in the microwave to get it up to tank temp, added in some baking soda and tested the pH till the pH was up to tank level as well. Then just put one clown in at a time for 5m each. Then put them right into the QT after that.
I also didn't treat the QT for the first week while I was doing water changes and just getting the fish used to their new environment and made sure they were feeding well before I started the meds. I did that for 8 weeks and left the main tank with no fish in it. Everyone survived and acted normal the entire time. They're all back in the main tank and seem happy and haven't seen any problems since then.
