Ich and QT question hypo-salinity etc.

[Mad Marine]

I have a Red Sea Reefer 350 established 7 December 2016.

Stock:
1 Flame Angel
1 Golden Pyramid Butterfly
Pair of Wild caught Percula Clowns
1 Mag Anemone
2 Bubble-tip Anemone
1 Clear Shrimp
1 Fire Shrimp
2 Urchin
1 Snails
Sps, Lps frags

Parameters:
Triton method
S.G. 1.024
Temp 78
dKH 8.5
Calcium 450
Nitrate trace
Phosphate 0.05

I have Ich in the system. The fish feed well and look happy but it's an eye sore and I don't like seeing them in this condition. I have invested in a 55 Litre cube QT. I will be moving soon and would like to quarantine the fish and leave the reef tank fallow for at least 30 days during the move, in order to kill off the life cycle of Ich. I will use the hypo-salinity method in the QT system. I have a three questions.

1) Should the fish be given a fresh water bath before going into QT?
2) Can I use live rock in QT to cycle and keep water chemistry safe or is it best just to have no live rock and use 'live' filter media taken from my sump which will go into the external canister filter for QT use?
3) Does hypo-salinity kill the bacteria on the rock and will the rock carry/harbor the parasite?

Kind regards,

MM

 

[OrionN]

See this thread;
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2041951


I don't worry about Ich in my tank.
If you have a well run tank with a good sand bed full of normal sand bed fauna, Ich will not be a problem. I routinely add fish with Ich into my tank, the Ich just died off after a few weeks.
IMO, there arecryptocaryon irritans predators in the rock and sand bed. Natural ways of controlling the parasites. In my tank the tomont and tomites are being prey upon by the sand bed fauna and eliminate from the tank.

Have a well stock sand bed is a great way of eliminating Ich from your tank.

 

[Mad Marine]

Thanks for sharing the informative thread Minh. I will treat fish in QT for 6 weeks and leave DT fallow for at least 6 weeks also.

Kind regards

MM

 

[worm5406]

OrionN what do you have in your sand bed?

I mean I have a good plethora of items in mine, I assume. I know i have spaghetti worms in there. What else do you have?

 

[geckoejon]

The recommended time period for leaving a tank fallow for ich is 72 - 76 days... I have read numerous reports about ich having up to a 72 day life cycle...

I'm treating my fish and trying to go the ich free route... just because it's not visible doesn't mean it's not in the system. I am just getting my first large tank (220g dt) going, and have numerous tangs... this is my 5th tank, and never treated before though... I know that I added tangs and had a serious issue quickly with ich...

 

[OrionN]

I have all kinds of animal in my sand bed too. I added LS from various source and some sand from the Corpus Christi Bay.
The diversity decreased a lot due to adding a CBB to my tank, but the refugium is still loaded with fauna.

Larry, do you have problem with Ich?

 

[OrionN]

......

I'm treating my fish and trying to go the ich free route... just because it's not visible doesn't mean it's not in the system. I am just getting my first large tank (220g dt) going, and have numerous tangs... this is my 5th tank, and never treated before though... I know that I added tangs and had a serious issue quickly with ich...

I know what you mean, but adding fish with Ich to my system, they act fine and the signs of Ich resolved in a few weeks, never to be seen again.
About 10 years ago, I had a disaster with my 420, a lot of my animals died, a lot of fish died. I was able to stabilized it somewhat. My stressed fish never came out with any Ich. Once I stabilized the tank, the fish that lived did fine.

While it is possible that my tank still have Ich in it, I don't see any evidence of it. Given my experiences in the past, IMO, it is highly unlikely that Ich survive for long term in my tank. I do know that my fish are fat, and various adult fishes spawned regularly in my tank.

 

[worm5406]

Larry, do you have problem with Ich?

No, never have.

I was just curious if you had any thing special in your tank substrate.

 

[OrionN]

Sand bed with diverse Fauna as a method of Ich control is a never discussed option for Ich control.

 

[geckoejon]

I know what you mean, but adding fish with Ich to my system, they act fine and the signs of Ich resolved in a few weeks, never to be seen again.
About 10 years ago, I had a disaster with my 420, a lot of my animals died, a lot of fish died. I was able to stabilized it somewhat. My stressed fish never came out with any Ich. Once I stabilized the tank, the fish that lived did fine.

While it is possible that my tank still have Ich in it, I don't see any evidence of it. Given my experiences in the past, IMO, it is highly unlikely that Ich survive for long term in my tank. I do know that my fish are fat, and various adult fishes spawned regularly in my tank.

Maybe my tank wasn't mature enough or enough diversity in the sand bed? I know that when ich popped up, I lost half my fish and my tangs were visibly covered

Maybe I should get a handful of sand from your tank to add to mine. lol I am only half joking there.,. I'm starting up a little 73g rimless for the bedroom, and hate to qt for both tanks...

Just curious, do you have any tangs?

 

[OrionN]

You need to seed your sand bed with various source if you can. Don't vacuum your sand bed. This will remove a lot of your fauna. You can stir it and if need suck some out of it (cyano, dino, or what have you) but do not do whole sale vacuum the sand.
Don't have any animal that "clean the sand bed, or shifting the sand" They are hunting the fauna. CBB seem OK, they just hunt for Medusa worms and a lot of the larger worms. CBB does not seem to be able to eat small bristle worms which are very beneficial to the sand bed and the tank.
I used to buy a pound of sand from each of the LFS live sand tank to add into my tank (after looking to make sure that they don't have flat worms or other know pathogen that I can see.
Living is Florida, i would go to one of the laguna and get a shovel full of sand in mid summer and added that to your tank. Looking at the sand bed you should see all these crustacean that moving around and live in there, various burrows in the sand.

 

[OrionN]

How did this thread ended up here in the Anemones & Clownfish forum?

 

[worm5406]

How did this thread ended up here in the Anemones & Clownfish forum?

I will assume that the 3xAnemone and Clowns was the reason for posting it here.

 

[OrionN]

I also have a lot of serpent stars and sea cucumber in the tank. They eat a lot of the detritus and bacterial in the sand and does not catch the fauna.