how do i cure ICK?????

[Farid0926]

i have heard alot of opinions and alot of different ways that i have tried but not succeded. i wanna know if someone knows a forsure way of curing ICK???:headwally::headwally::headwally::headwally::headwally:

 

[jimbo78]

Remove fish from tank, treat them with hypo salinity in a qt tank for 6-10 weeks while leaving your display fishless the whole time. Then qt every new purchase for at least 4 weeks and treat if you see any signs of ick.

 

[Paul B]

You can "clean" fish of ich in about a day, but you need at least 10 days to cure them.
A mixture of copper and quinicrine hydrocloride will do it, guaranteed, no question about it, I guarantee it. I used this many times in LFSs and even wholesalers.
You asked.

 

[Biggar]

For our tank, they cure themselves. We found the stress of changing anything stressed them more than anything and made it worse.

Feed them healthy mixture of foods and try soaking some of it in reef garlic product once a week.

We also feel the UV sterilizer helps. Make sure you put the right flow through the UV. For us, its about 150 GPH.

Some species of ick may be more resilient than others

Good Luck.

 

[gatoralum69]

Selcom and garlic dipped foods worked for me. Although if you have reef tank kick ich is also good, but although reef safe still could affect some corals.

 

[DRThompson]

IME - kick ick WILL affect corals (LPS and SPS), Softies (polyps/leathers) seem to be ok with it. IMO - Kick ick will NOT cure it. Even if you remove your fish and get rid of the ich you could easily re-infest your tank again hiding on the next piece of live rock or coral you purchase. It's probably one of the MAIN reasons for turnover in this hobby.

Here is one of the "gold standard" articles on it
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-10/sp/feature/index.php

 

[spieszak]

The stickies in the disease forum will take you through the life cycle of the parasite and proven treatment methods. You basically have to treat ALL fish, using hypo, copper, or tank transfer and leave your display fallow. Once you've read them, posting any questions you have IN the disease forum will likely get you the quickest results. HTH

 

[DgenR8]

Some fish do not respond well to copper treatment. IMO, hyposalinity is a far better option. Hyposalinity, like copper, can NOT be applied in a reef tank.
Kick Ich will NOT work, so whether or not it can be used in a reef is not relevant.
There is no simple solution, and the best weapon to use in beating Ich is knowledge. Start here; <b><font size="2"><a href="http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-08/sp/index.php">Marine Ich/Cryptocaryon irritans</a></font></b><br>
</br>
.

 

[mrx66699]

+1 ....if you want some advice and see a setup in full swing of hypo ....i have a 300 gal with 38 large tangs, angels, wrasses, triggers, anthias, clowns, and gobies all on 6th week in hypo ....all done in the DT getting ready to move them in a month or so to a new 540 setup......the first three weeks were a touch and go nightmear but at about 2 1/2 weeks things were back to normal and appetites were off the chart and are still like they havent been fed in a week .....I only lost a yellow coris wrasse and one bellus angel who died before the hypo started from ick......and to answer biggar statement above NO the tank doesn't cure itself.....yes they can live with it in the DT but its only a matter of time before one of those little things you are doing keeping it in check goes off just a little and then its epidemic time for the contents.....I was one of those just letting them naturally deal with it and one slight change and BAM it was on like no tomorrow building up numbers and starting to effect fish that were otherwise never showing a sign ....luckily im very passionate about my fish and i was going to do whatever cost or labor it took to WIN and I did ....it took 3 separate 70 gal water changes a day for 10 days to offset the amount of ammonia in the system from all the die off from the hypo....a QT wasn't an option as I have 38 lg fish where would I QT that many fish and what filtration system would house them in hypo ....I had nothing established ....so I let the tank cycle with them in it as I knew it would happen from the die off .....all it would be was a matter of keeping the ammonia in check until the bio could catch back up and now the system has full filtration and its at .09 and everyone is doing wonderful .....no ammonia and NO ICK.....and thank to some reassurance from Bill and Roger I stuck with the course and everything pulled through even though it looked like death warmed over for about a week lol

 

[Philly guy]

I have been fighting ich in my tank for over 8 months. About 4 months ago I finally got fed up and took all the rock out of my tank and transferred all the fish that were left into a quarantine tank. The fish I had left were not showing any signs of ich as they had probably developed a temporay immunity to the disease but any fish I added would develop ich within 2-3 days and be dead within a week after that. I left the main tank fallow for 2 months and about 4 weeks before the fallow period was up I purchased a couple of fish and placed them in a second quarantine tank. I took no chances and treated with copper as a precaution. I wanted new fish to be the first ones back in the main display tank as like I said my old fish seemd to have developed an immunity to the disease. When I finally added the new fish into the tank I transferred my old fish from the one quarantine tank to the one that had copper in the water, and left them there for 10-12 days then placed them back in the main tank. Everything was fine for about 6 weeks until one night I noticed my banner fish was covered in ich. Fortunately he doesn't know how to hide in the rocks when a net is put in the tank (dumb blonde syndrome) and I was able to catch him without tearing down the tank. So far nobody else is showing signs but I am watching carefully. I don't know why he developed ich and the only theory I have come up with so far is that my desjardins tang has chased him on occasion and possibly was stressing him out. This has me believing that no matter what you do the parasite inherently lives in the fish and can come out at any time.

 

[silver17jo]

if its not to bad I try to just get some taster food and feed little amounts over periods of the day not exceeding what I would normally put in on a daily bases. this allows the fish to eat and stay active. if serious amounts of ich are showing Id take them out and place in a quarantine tank you can use copper for treatment.......( dont use anything that touches that tank for anything else once copper has contaminated it though. nets rock pvc ect)

 

[mrx66699]

be careful when contemplating all the advise and with quick decisions to jump to QT using copper .....as Larry said a lot of fish do not respond well to copper and it can also have long term effects on some more sensitive fish even killing some .......hypo is the safest least stressful of the two and amounts to just about the same amount of total QT time ....also it cant be stressed enough how important it is to fully understand the life cycle process of the ick parasite.....

 

[Philly guy]

Make sure that it is ich and not marine velvet (odinium). They can look similar on infected fish but I read that hyposalinity will not work on marine velvet.

 

[Waterhouse]

I just introduced an achilles tang into my tank a couple weeks ago. In turn, coming with the baggage of "ICH". Since than I have lost multiple fish secondary to the disease. I attempted that "reef safe herbtana treatment". Yeeeaahhhhh....... didn't work or help. Down fall is your skimmer is off through out the whole treatment and I also observed some detrimental changes to my corals. This is me just sharing my recent experience. Secondary to my extensive rock work it is impossible to QT fish. Any options?? Thanks

 

[JLopez]

I lost 18 fish to Ick a few years back. I had every fish I wanted except for a blue tang, and when I finally got one, the Ick kicked in within a few days. A freind had told me that as long as the fish were eating, they would beat it - and they were eating like normal. I started feeding them twice a day to keep them strong - or so I thought. I woke up one morning (about 2 weeks after first signs of Ick) and half my fish were dead. Next day they were all gone except for ONE clown that survived the plague.

Follow the advice above and treat with hyposalinity.

 

[bolo7735]

In my experience if you have equipment to seprate your fish for quarantine then that is your best option. For people who don't you usually have to rid out the Ick. You will lose some fish in the process as it is frustrating and expensive. I personally think hobbyist need to be more responsible what fish they buy and the condition they are in. What I mean by that is some fish don't get along or dominating alpha fish that will hurt or stress new fish. Knowing this will save you headaches. Also, buy fish from shop who knows about fishes and take great care to keep them healthy. If you take great care of your coral as you do with fishes you will have less Ick issues. I hope this helps.