"ICH FREE TANK" Quest Begins

[jeffbrig]

Just a quick update....the few remaining ich 'grains' have dropped off the achilles tang. At this point, he has a few small light blotches on his skin. They're not obvious, only visibile when he swims right up close the light at the right angle. I'm not sure if these are blemishes where the skin was damaged from the ich 'pimples', or a sign of something else. Other than that, color is great, behavior is great, he even ate nori out of my hand this weekend. We're still rock-solid at 1.009 every time I check.

Here's a pic of the tang doing his favorite thing - eating!

 

[tjay]

Also dont panic at every white spot.
We sweated a couple spots when we went back to the main, and it turned out none of them where ich.

 

[AquAsylum]

Speaking of watching spots, we've kept an eye on our hippo. I'm afraid there are only more and more spots. I'm now bracing for what seems to be the inevitable- QT round 2.

Considering that the fish are largely in good health, I'm waiting a little while before we move them, hoping that this time we can avoid a major cycle. The 55 has our new clowns and orchids in it and before the overcrowding begins, I wanted them to get the cycle moving.

About copper treatment- what filtration CAN you use? Since this is such an extreme bioload, I will need to use everything I can to keep ammonia and nitrites down.

 

[Triggerfish]

About copper treatment- what filtration CAN you use?

whatever biological filtration you have available..couple of power filters with seeded media from main tank, may be best option.

 

[jeffbrig]

Hey guys, how about another update?

Clowns - 10g QT
20 days in hyposalinity and counting. After completing brooklynella treatment (formalin dips), the small clown continued to show tail/fin erosion. We finally determined this was a secondary bacterial infection (common after brooklynella), so we did a round of Maracyn2 treatment. That included 50% water changes every other day. The fin/tail rot seems to have stopped, and he is recovering nicely. The larger clown seems to be less interested in food this week. Don't know if that's from stress, illness, or if its just being picky. The little one is eating with gusto. I'm still trying some different foods, so no worries yet.

Achilles tang - 55g QT
20 days in hyposalinity and counting. If you put food in the tank, it disappears. I think this fish has grown a good 3/4" in the month I've had him. Eating formula 1 flake, 2 pellets, and nori daily. Occasionally frozen foods as well, he'll eat anything. I've been offering him plenty of food to "fatten him up" and strengthen his immune system.

Late last week the tang showed some cloudiness and swelling in one eye. Possibly he bumped/scratched it, but I started checking the water like crazy. Ammonia was nearly .5ppm! I did an immediate 30% water change on his tank, and followed with another 50% change the next day. 50% again 2 days later. Water quality is looking great again, and the eye is almost back to normal. (Note to self: an achilles tang is NOT the fish to be cycling a new tank with)

Jeff

 

[Triggerfish]

good update Jeff.
i will be doing an update within the next 3 days... the quest has taken a slight shift in approach..more to follow.

 

[Triggerfish]

<font color=ff0000><font size=4>UPDATE </font></font>
Post ICH Period = Week 5

ICH is showing up again. level appears to be low.
The causes could be many as to why it is in the tank at this point.
Removing everything is not an option at this time.


Prior Plans to Eradicate

1. Fallow - tank fallow for 8 weeks. may have been eradicated, however more than likely reintroduced back in with livestock. Also, quite possibly by addition of infected new fish/corals - some quarantined, some not. - some SPS was not quarantined and some LPS was only scrubed at the base.

2. Metronidazole - i started this treatement with 2 low dosages. I have since stopped treating after hearing that it could wipe out my bio-filter and sps at high dosages(which may be needed to eradicate). I will begin to carbon out this evening. this med can also be fed to fish.

New Plans to Eradicate

1. Garlic - All food soaked.

2. Cleaners - shrimp/gobies. will be adding 1 goby today and more to follow. looking into getting 3 shrimps soon.

3. Kick Ich - I will more than likely attempt this product in the upcoming weeks.

4. Quarantine - I will quarantine all livestock for 5 weeks. Hopefully this will help reduce the chance of introducing a new strain.

My goal here is, if not to eradicate, at the very least keep the infestation very low allowing the livestock to remain relatively healthy. Hopefully, at the end of 10-11 months the strain will have weakened and eventually die off as the cells age.

I will no doubt, have to hold off on my heavy stocking plan until i see no evidence of the parasite for at least 2 months.

good luck to the remaining folks...

couple of recent pics of tank.

 

[guyguerra]

Hey triggerfish, sorry to hear that you are still battling it. I've been following this thread and see you've done a lot of work on this. I was in your shoes a year ago and hope never to see it again. I have moved two groups of fish into my new 230 gall tank now. The first group came from my old tank, which is where I battled Ich for 4 months. They were clean when I put them in the new tank. Then I QT'd a Coris Wrasse and two jawfish for 4 weeks and they were clean, so in they went. My 230 seems Ich free and all fish are looking great. Three days ago I bought a Kole Tang, 4 fire gobies and a Coral Beauty and put them in my empty 50 gallon QT. Sure enough, the very next day the tang, pigmy angle and 1 goby showed Ich spots. Thank God I put them in the QT. I started Cupramine yesterday and will keep the dosage up and wait until six weeks after the last spot is gone before I consider putting them in my 230 tank. I really do believe we can have Ich free tanks, it takes QT, attention and LUCK. I have added corals directly into my tank, and a ghost eel (since they don't carry Ich), but this even worries me. What if a Tomont (if I have the stage names correct, I've forgotten each stages name) is attached to the coral or the rock it's attached too? This seems to be pert of the luck portion. I can't see putting corals in a fallow tank for 8 weeks, plus running a fish QT. The attention part for me now is to not cross contaminate my tanks. I've almost done a stupid thing already by using the same utensils for feeding the tanks, but luckily caught myself. I'll keep up on this thread. Guy

 

[xvinnyax]

Trigger what a beautiful tank!..

I have been reading this thread for ever and after page 24 I noticed that no one has mentioned this one product. I have just ordered it to help with my break out of itch. It comes in monday and I will post my results. I will post the products ad below for review.
--------------------------------------------------------
Chem-Marin Stop Parasite 32 oz.

For an aquarium that contains corals or invertebrates. Stop Parasite is made from many different agents. One speeds up the fishes natural slime coat, causing the parasites to detach themselves. Another attracts parasites as a non-nutritional food source. Others speed up appetite and build the immune system. It will not harm the internal organs of the fish. 8 oz.

Recommended Purchase Size (for a 5-day treatment):

8oz. for 30-55 gallons
16oz. for 75-100 gallons
32oz. for 125-300 gallons
------------------------------------------------------

Can use it in your display tank, I have been doing fresh water dips and QT for now but I don't have a big enough sick tank, only a 10 gal one for long term QT of multiple fish. So before I go out and buy another bigger tank I will see where this product leads me..

If anyone has heard any bad things let me know before I use it on Monday. I searched around and found nothing on it.

 

[Triggerfish]

Guy - thanks for the input.. things are holding steady..no increase in the small population yet.

see that's the thing with adding anything directly to your system that came from anything with fish. the cycst can attach to anything hard, you can scrub LPS, snails and such- but not SPS.
hard to think that a small 2" frag could harbor ich cycst, unlikely but possible..perhaps that's where the 'luck' factor comes into play.

the largest risks, by far, i believe are from fish and liverock that came from system containing fish. i'm still QT 2 large rocks for 5 weeks.

yeah,,ya got to be careful about using anything from one tank to another ,,even your hand.
good luck..sounds like you're staying on the safe/right track.
[br]

xvinn- thanks very much for the comments-
you can certainly attempt to try and eradicate directly in the main tank by adding 'reef safe' products.. it's worth a shot as long as your fish are not in dire need for immediate attention.

not familiar with what you posted..i think kick ich is most popular and it does seem that more folks report effectivness than not.
the ones that say it does not work, either have never tried it or did not use the product appropriately.
who knows, it may work for some strains and not others..

good luck with the product and look forward to hearing the results.

 

[plaz]

Aqua and Triggerfish,
I'm very sorry to hear you have to start again!!! I know that is frustrating. Aqua, sorry if we pushed you toward adding them back too quickly - it just sounded like they were not going to make it in the QT.

I tried 2 rounds of Kick Ich with Garlic and Metrondaloze (sp?) in their food before going the QT route. It didn't hurt anything. Seemed to help while I was doing it. The ich came right back, so in the end I had accomplished nothing except spending alot of money. Hope it works better for someone else.

I have some frags in QT now. I know what you mean about 2 QTs. I won't be buying any new fish until the frags are out. Patience Iis hard, but I learned my lesson on this one. We seem to have gotten lucky once... now will try to be ultra careful. If you read the threads, there seem to be many, many people who QT just their fish and wonder why the ich comes back. The experts say it can come in on LR, corals, snails, water column.... everything needs to be quarantined unless you are extremely lucky, time after time!

 

[guyguerra]

Plaz, I might have missed a post of yours in this long thread, Did you add a coral that brought Ich into your tank? If so, I will QT those also, which means 8 weeks as it really is a fallow tank situation. I'm very curious about this. I don't want to count on luck.
Triigerfish, your tank is gorgeous! Thanks for the pics.
Guy

 

[plaz]

Hi Guy,
I had luck after going fallow & QT to get rid of ich (no ich when Tangs were returned - but lost some in QT because I didn't understand enough/have enough cycled media). I have been very careful since then and plan on adding NOTHING (not even a snail) without QT in the hopes I will never have to go through that again. So far, several months have gone by and no ich at all has showed up (even with 2 Hippos and a temp drop when electricity went out)... knock wood!

I believe my original ich was introduced with a Hippo from Inland Aquatics (they advised not to QT because of the stress... bad advice)! I have known several people who quarantined only fish and all had ich or something bad introduced. It only makes sense - it is a tiny parasite, bad timing in the life cycle could cause it to be introduced from anything (read Steven Pro, etc. - all the experts seem to agree). I also know someone who got redbugs and was surprised because he only added a small leather frag and thought the "acro" bugs would only be brought in by other acros since they host on them (same concept).
Best of luck!

 

[guyguerra]

I'll never have another Hippo tang because I am convinced they are so prone to Ich that they will put any tank in jeopardy. It would be a lot of work (though I tend to agree with you) to QT everything. Here's an example: I have my QT with a group of fish that are 2 weeks into a six week QT session, now I decide to add a couple of cleaner shrimp. I'd have to wait 4 weeks to get the shrimp. Now if you wait, then put the shrimp (or coral) in QT, you can't do anything with fish for another 6 weeks as they might introduce Ich, which would then force you to set up a third tank to move the fish to for treatment, and leave the shrimp/coral fallow for 8 weeks. If you ran a third tank to fallow all corals and invertebrates you could do it, but I couldn't put in the time to have a main display, a coral QT and a fish QT and maintain all water parameters and equipment. Have you tried to do this yet? I like the thought, and don't want Ich, but QT'ing corals seems like a lot of work.

 

[plaz]

I have had 3 QT tanks running at one time before (when I had to take out all the fish). It was really hard! QT is a pain. I just try to plan out everything carefully now - stopped doing impulse buys. To me it is still worth it (the thought of tearing everything down again is too unthinkable).

For cleaner shrimp, rock, snails, coral, etc. I QT for 32 days (should be cover the worst case scenario according to the cycle). Fish I do 6 - 8 weeks.

You probably won't have as many problems if you stay away from Tangs - They are my favorite, so I got a large tank just to have them and keep them comfortable. However, small fish are great too! I would still try to figure out how to QT though... if you really want to be pest free (it is nice not to worry about releasing red bugs, etc. into the tank - QT gives you a chance to observe).

Ask one of the experts - it may be okay to add the cleaners to the main tank (without shipping water of course), as long as you keep it fallow 32 days after.

 

[AquAsylum]

Hey, guys. Sorry I've been absent, but after my last post, I never did take the plunge and put all of the fish back in QT to try copper. We are giving it a shot with Kick Ich, and frankly, I was embarrassed to admit that here! Now that I see you have been talking about it, I'll let you know what it has done for us....

The hippo had been the only one showing signs of ich after we put all of the fish back in the display after a complete, full regimen of hypo. Plaz was right- the tangs probably wouldn't have made it if we left everyone in QT. Considering that we had new fish in QT, the bioload just would have been too much, and I wanted the tangs to at least be healthy if we were going back to really stressful conditions.

So, I had some Kick Ich sitting around (never used it after reading that it was hocus pocus) and thought it was worth a shot. Yesterday finished our first 14 day treatment. The ich has not worsened. While the hippo still has some spots, it does not seem as bad as it was initially. The only other fish that may have gotten some spots is one of the gobies- he has some faded coloration, but I never saw white spots on him. The HLLE is all but gone, and the fish all act quite happy and healthy. I'm going to immediately do a second 2 week treatment and see what happens.

I'm also thinking like Trigger in that maybe we'll just hit that one year point where the parasite life cycle just stops. Wouldn't that be nice??

Off to board up for Wilma...

 

[guyguerra]

Laura, good luck with Wilma, we live in Naples, and I've got a generator and enough gas to keep power on the fridge, lights, fans and tanks for 3 days. I live on the water so might have to move inland, but will start up the generator and hook it up to the tank before I leave, then get back asap.
Plaz, I thought more about what you've said and I am going to change to QT'ing everything that goes in my display. The tank is virtually done, but I am adding a few more fish and will want to add some more corals, but I can take my time. I'll still stay with one QT, but I'll alternate between a fish load, then a coral/invert load.

 

[AquAsylum]

Guy- looks like she's headed your way. Let us know how you fare....

Has anyone heard of anyone doing the Kent Marine RxP treatment? I just read the whole Kent Marine description for it and it sounds pretty tough. Since we don't have corals, I'm thinking it might be a good option for us. We do have live rock,worms, and some conchs, but that's the extend of our non-fish life.

 

[plaz]

Best of luck to everyone in Wilma's path!
You will all be in our thoughts!!!

 

[Bon Money]

Hey everyone, I have heard that mandarine fishes are immune to ich because they have slimier coats than other fish. I've had ich for 5 weeks now and it is still visible on the walls of the tank. I am starting to lose my patience with looking at a fishless tank and since I was going to get a mandarine soon anyway I might just go for it.

My roommate has ich in his tank and he kept his mandarine in and he's doing fine. So does his mandarine just have a better immune system or is the myth really true?