"ICH FREE TANK" Quest Begins

[tjay]

You know I love the tank, but I don't see how I would ever handle the work to run more than two tanks.
The two of them run me hard enough.
Still no other signs of ich in the main other than 1 spot on the fin of the nasso. It has not grown or shrunk or fell off. Having appeared within hours of it going in the main tank and not changing over the past two days I am still holding out hope that the spot is not ich.

The Nasso has definitely regained all color and is swimming around the tank like mad.
He has gotten a bit aggressive towards the copper band when it gets to close to his sleeping place. He has a little din dug out in one of the tunnels and lays on his belly in there at night.
Dang copper band is spoiled not eating the one aptasia in the tank I saved for him. The crop of feather dusters are still safe so far as well. I would have figured he would have ate them all by now.

 

[water`bug]

The Nasso has definitely regained all color and is swimming around the tank like mad. He has gotten a bit aggressive towards the copper band when it gets too close to his sleeping place. He has a little din dug out in one of the tunnels and lays on his belly in there at night.

I just hate it when yall talk about me!

 

[markcasto]

Still no other signs of ich in the main other than 1 spot on the fin of the nasso. It has not grown or shrunk or fell off. Having appeared within hours of it going in the main tank and not changing over the past two days I am still holding out hope that the spot is not ich.

Fingers crossed on that one Tjay it makes your blood boil when the spots start coming back.Now on my 4th day treating with copper based cuprazin 3 more 8ml doses to follow with one day gap between them each.So far the tangs are looking good and the salinity is now at 1.016. I hope this will be the end of the ich in the 52 gallon QT tank.The 20 gallon is still clear of ich and has been from day 1 so at least some of my fish can go back in the main tank after being empty for 8 weeks.

 

[AquAsylum]

Well, baby not on the way just yet, but in the works for the near future

Everyone looked good last night, I suppose I just need to get accustomed to being able to see them all in their sleeping state. I never knew they all slept on their sides! Appetites are up also.

Salinity at 1.012, will do the last water change this evening and then work on maintaining. Added prime last night and more stability. Treating with Maroxy for the fluffy whatever it was on the hippo, but still running carbon.

Ammonia read .25 this morning on the mardel dip strip. I will run a full blown salifert test tonight.

We keep a brute 45 gallon with RO at all times, and water changes on the 55 gallon tank aren't nearly as much trouble as on the display, so I won't mind having to do them. Strange, when I look at the tank, it really doesn't seem like a lot of fish in there. We have 15 full grown cichlids in the 90 gallon and they aren't bothered by bad water, so they tolerate the crowding just fine.

What a great Naso!

 

[plaz]

Glad to hear everyone is okay!

The "inches" of fish probably would not be so bad if the filter was completely cycled. That's the thing that has been toughest for most of us.

One more thing I was told (and did). You should feed the main tank a little each day to keep up the bug population and maintain some of the cycle now that the fish are gone. I also did a VERY SLOW ammonia drip (like 1 drop every few minutes) for a few weeks just to make sure the rocks maintained the bacteria. Then I stopped the drip did a 20% water change a couple of days before I added the fish back. All readings stayed at zero when the fish were back in.

 

[AquAsylum]

I am still feeding the tank because of the inverts- directly feeding the anemone every other day plus chromaplex for filter feeders. It should stay pretty balanced. We had a lot of sediment built up anyway, and just got some conchs to take care of it.

 

[Triggerfish]

Post QT: Week 1 Update

Post QT: Week 1 Update

Week 1

after 1 week back in display here is what is going on even though it is not ideal (although, no casualties reported to date).

5/28 - all fish removed except LMB

6/28 - added about 40# of LR from supposedly ich free tank

7/2 - angel back in display after not showing signs of infection for about 3 weeks,,however the QT he was in did have signs of the parasite on 2-3 other fish. main tank only had blenny in there for 5 weeks. hypo used for most of the duration of QT. basically, my patience ran out.

7/5 - 3 spots show up on angel in display tank - not surprised

7/8 - the outbreak appears to be very low level so far..the fish will have about 3-4 spots every am then they basically fall off by pm. fish is very active and eating, basically no issues. I am going to try some ginger root just for experimental purposes.

i plan to keep the fish in the tank if the level continues to be this low and hopefully over the next few months will be even less,,of course it could get worse,,in which case i may begin the QT process over again, avoiding all the pitfalls that occurred with QT phase 1.

5 other fish in QT still undergoing hypo..spots still there,,maybe they are not ich and something else.. i plan on trading in 2 of the fish anyway..toby puffer(reef safe questionable) and large maroon clown( just too freakin big).
I will be adding the niger back to main tank soon..he has looked good,with the exception of one very small spot that i am not sure what it is..it just stays there,,not growing,, keeping him in hypo at this point will serve no purpose as the main tank still has the parasite present. he didnt seem bothered by the original outbreak anyway.
the 2 yellowtailed damsels will just remain in the 55 to keep the cycle going.

i wish everyone else better luck than i have had,,however,, i just couldn't hold out any longer, never mind removing my LMB and waiting an additional 2 months.
i will continue to update weekly and or if anything drastic takes place between time.
This quest will continue until it is achieved..there has been some good info put forth in this thread to date and i have learned a great deal so far. I feel i will be much more prepared if i have to do a Phase 2 QT.

I plan to stock this tank very heavily with both corals and fish so i will need to ensure that the parasite is fully eradicated prior to beginning that plan.

thanks again to all who have contributed and look forward to hearing about all your progresses as you continue your own quests as well.

 

[markcasto]

Good luck there triggerfish I have only to wait 2 more days and my main tank will have been fallow for 6 weeks.The 5 clown fish and angel fish in my 20gallon QT tank have shown no sign of ich for 6 weeks now thank goodness so I am tempted to put them back in 2 days time.The 3 regal tangs 8 chromis and 2 damsels in the 52 gallon will continue there copper treatment now on its 5th day and they all seem to ok with the ich now dropped off. They still have another 5 days of treatment to go through followed by a further 6 weeks in QT.I will keep you posted of my progress once the other fish go back.
One thing is for sure those Regal Tangs are allways the first to get it.

 

[markcasto]

Well we are now on the 6th day of copper treatment and all the fish have got a horrible skin blotch it looks like small brownish marks the size of an ant all over there bodys and some of the chromis have got ruptured spots on them.I can only guess that this must be the ich dying off and leaving scared tissue but I dont know for sure what it is.

If it is the ich dying off then there seems to be a big infection on there bodys.I also lost my lovely flame angel yesterday he just wasnt eating in the QT tank and I guess it finally got to him even though I tryed everthing with him.
6 weeks in the QT tank and then 2 days before he is due to go back he dies on me.

I am seriously thinking of keeping more corals and less fish in my tank this time round I must have lost over 120.00 pounds worth of fish during all this and yet my corals are blooming and growing like mad.

I also dont think that I want to keep any more regal tangs.They where the first to get the ich and before then I had no problems.My local fish store will not sell them because they say they have so many problems with them coming down with ich and I cant disagree with them on that one.

Oh well at least all my clown fish are doing ok big sigh...

 

[plaz]

Hi Marc,
I just wanted to say I am very sorry for your loss! This can be a very frustrating and heartbreaking hobby!

 

[markcasto]

Frustrating heartbreaking and exspensive as well.Thanks plaz I know there are people out theres whos tanks crash and everthing dies so at least I havent had that happen to me yet.

I think the most frustrating thing was being so close to having the flame angel go back in the main tank.Im going to go fishing tonight and take my mind of it all for a while.Hope everyone elses fish are ok out there.

 

[Triggerfish]

mark- that really blows man..
i think the copper will destroy the parasite during the two free floating stages,,and not while they are submerged within the fishes tissue. double check all parameters and perhaps you may want to carbon out the copper.

the loss of the flame is very troubling...you mention it wasn't eating in QT...for how long was that going on, b/f or after the start of copper?..anytime a fish changes behavior like that,,it is cause for concern...and possibly any treatments that the fish is undergoing may need to be stopped and conditions returned back to normal as soon as safely possible...
although eradicating the parasite from both tank and livestock is the major part of what we are doing here..it is vital that we ensure the fish being treated are acting and behaving normally during the entire process. easier said than done....

i hear ya on the hippos,,the good thing is that if the parasite is present in the tank they will be certain to let you know, prior to stocking up. no doubt, keeping inverts should be far less problematic and less so if not keeping sps as to not deal with the various FW and bugs.
good luck with the fish going back in soon...

 

[markcasto]

More bad news...last night when I was fishing my wife called me on my mobile very distraught because the regal tangs where on there sides.I couldnt get home till gone past 2 in the morning as I was on a night fishing trip and when I got home they where both dead.There bodys where covered in brown blotches and two of the chromis had died as well they were covered in white spot and blotches.So now all I have left is my 4 clown fish my maroon clown and 6 chromis and 2 yellow tailed damsels.I put the clown fish back in the main tank last night and happily they are all doing very well.I feel awful about the two big tangs they where such lovely fish.

I am going to put the rest of the fish in the 20 gallon, completely strip down the 52 gallon tank and disinfect it.I thought it was all going to be ok up until this week how wrong I was.

I have decided never to buy another regal tang again my fish shop owner who I was chatting with today agreed with me that they are along with powder blues the worst fish for catching ich and he wont sell them because of this.

The flame angel was in the 20 gallon tank and there was never any ich in there for the full 6 weeks and it was not treated with any thing.I think he just had not eaten for properly for 6 weeks and was weakend buy it.

It is worth considering having gone through all this, the types of fish we stock in our tanks and there resistance to infections.I am not going to stock so many fish now as my corals are a lot less hassle to care for. Well apart from my main tank exsploding I dont think any thing more can possible go wrong, this has been a very depressing 6 weeks indeed.

 

[AquAsylum]

Mark, I'm so sorry for this downward turn of events. I hope that your expierence with the regal/hippo isn't indicative of mine.

Our hippo finally seems clear this morning, has resumed bright blue coloring and all is well but for a little fin damage.

Salinity hit 1.009/14ppt yesterday, and ammonia has slowly climbed to .50. I will do a water change today. I can already tell that my battle with water quality will center on pH.

We have no obvious spots on any of our fish, although there are still some questionable spots that may just be discoloration from bugs that have since detached.

 

[leebca]

Mark,

How much copper were you using? How did you monitor its concentration during treatment? What copper medication were you using, again?

Thanks.

 

[cduran02]

I feel you markcastro, its very difficult to deal with all the things that can go wrong with fish. I wont be adding any more fishes for at least another 3 1/2 months (thats not including the 8 week of QT the new fish will get).

Im still trying to figure out how Im going to handle the feeding of my harlequin, the conclusion (at least for now) is that Im going to set up (with live sand, rocks, a piece of coral, etc.) a 10 gal tank just for the shrimp. Maybe get it a little tank mate like a snail to keep the tank clean.

 

[markcasto]

cduran-I used exactly the said amount given for the tank size and no more also tested and was within the correct limit.looking at the fish I belive it was the ich that killed them rather then the copper.I was using waterlifes cuprazin which I have used in the past and had no problems with treating my clown fish 2 years ago but this time things didnt work out.
Laura- I watched my ph with a ph monitor that I got on ebay it varied a little ever time I did a water change but putting some baking soda about half a teaspoon in a bucket of ro water kept it at the right levels.You may find as I did that the spots will drop off and the tang will get his colour back and look in good health this is just the ich droppin off ready for the next attack.I would go the full 6 weeks after you see no more spots on the fish and when you do start raising the salinity up again do it very slowly and watch your fish closely if you see just one spot of ich I would take it back down to 1.009 again.I think that if I had done that the ich would not have got such a hold on the fish again.Well that was my experince of it any way.
Good luck with your efforts hope you have better luck then I did and watch that ammonia levels closely.
All the best.

 

[markcasto]

Sorry that was leebca asking about the copper wasnt it.
To recap I used 8ml of cuprazin for each dose and monitored with a copper test kit note it was the tangs that died on me the chromis that died was badly effected by white spot. These fish had been through a tough time already battling with ammonia and many water changes it was very hard to keep stable water conditions in a tank that did not have a ready set up bio filter.

I do hope if any one has been following this thread and has not got some foam filter material in there main tank in case you have to get a tank set up for QT that you will do so now it will save you a lot of grief in the long run.

 

[leebca]

Mark,

What copper test kit were you using and what was the range you were reading from the kit. Thanks.

 

[Triggerfish]

wow,,what a fiasco that turned out to be...sorry to hear...damn,,wonder what was going on with those brown patches. copper poisoining??
i don't know,,everything appeared fine there untill you raised the sg and then dosed with copper,,then boom..

maybe Lee has some idea what the heck may have been going on....?

glad to hear the other fish are back in and settled...