ICH: how to cure it, id it, understand it.

[alyssa.nugent]

Ich

Ich

So I have one fish showing signs of ich in my 65g FOWLR tank. Im kicking myself and have seriously taught myself a few lessons 1) don't buy any fish that don't come from my LFS, 2) quarantine everything. But, hindsight is 20/20. The thing is, I don't have enough room to quarantine all the fish. I got a coral beauty angle, and its the only thing showing signs of ich. I didn't see anything on the fish at the store, or in the bag on up close exam, but low and behold, the second it got under my LEDs, the thing lit up like a disco ball. I'm wondering if I should try to treat the tank (pull all my rock out and keep it in a small 10 gallon tank and some buckets and hope for the best with the snails, 1 cleaner shrimp and crabs in the small tank) or should I wait it out and see what happens. All the other fish seem to be doing fine and Im wondering if they might be resilient enough to fight it off. I also have two black oscilaris clowns, a purple goby, a blenny, and a half black angle fish (don't worry, they each have their own side of the tank, were added right about the same time and leave each other alone). help.

 

[tmz]

In both case note above. I'd remove all the fish and treat them in asseparate tank and leave the dispaly tank fishless for 72 days.

Hypo for a reef tank will kill other desireable inverts; not just corals; it will also supress the biofilter at least temporarily .

 

[Mr sea water]

Uv for me it works well,there is a but 1000l system 4x55watt commercial bank, feed with 3000l flow and 10x flow to sump.

 

[scubadan206]

What are your thoughts on chloroquin phosphate? (Spell check)
Is it an acceptable replacement for copper?
What's the easiest way to get it since it is technically a prescription eye medication?
Daniel.

 

[billsreef]

Chloroquine works quite well. Not cheap, but it's good. $45 for 25 grams, which will a go long ways for a hobbyist.

 

[Daniel62]

Hi Bill,
So long story short. 225 Dt with 55 gallon sump newly setup, 5 month. Combined fish from several tanks. None showed any signs of ICH. Newest fish in systems 1 year.

Placed all fish in new system, now several showing signs of ICH

So I want to treat with Chloroquine phos . how much and for how long would you recommend. I have done lots of reading but am getting a few different #,s

Thank you for your time. I will be ordering from your link above.

Regards Daniel

 

[billsreef]

Hi Daniel,

I've always had good results with Chloroquine dosed at 10mg/L of water volume. Keep in mind, it is lethal to inverts and in some cases interferes with the biological filter, so keep an eye on ammonia levels.

 

[Daniel62]

How long should I treat for, and then how long before I can replace my snails. Will I need to run Carbon Afterwards to remove Chloroquine. also, how long do I need to treat for?

Thank you

 

[billsreef]

Usually one dose maintained for 21 days is sufficient. A second course can be administered if needed. If you need to do any water changes during the treatment period, simply dose the replacement water to the correct level. Afterwards, a good load of fresh carbon will remove the CP.

 

[Daniel62]

thank you

 

[Daniel62]

Will someone please check my math for CP dosing.

250 gallon system = 946.352946 liters dosed at 10mg per liter, that should equal 9.46 grams of CP
Am I correct?
Thanks

 

[billsreef]

Will someone please check my math for CP dosing.

250 gallon system = 946.352946 liters dosed at 10mg per liter, that should equal 9.46 grams of CP
Am I correct?
Thanks

That would be correct. The real question, does your system actually hold 250 gallons of water, after subtracting for things like rocks etc. ?

 

[Daniel62]

The tank is 225 and the sump is 55 gallons close to half full, very little rock work, but I will look at it more closely and see how much of the rock would fill up the sump and subtract that amount. Thanks for the tip.

 

[scubadan206]

Remember you have to go by interior dimensions on your tank. Glass thickness as well as actual water height will reduce your volume by quite a lot.
Daniel.

 

[Bootlegger]

What I'm going to say is against the grain. The few times in 15 years I've had fish with ich I stopped using flake food and switched to frozen food that I combine with amino acids and vitamins. I also added some carbon and did water changes. The idea was to improve water quality while improving the health of the fish. My ich breakouts always corresponded with overfeeding (with processed food) or adding new fish too quickly, e.g. not allowing my ammonia cycle to keep up with the new load. My fish always recovered and I remained without issue for several years.

Why no processed food? I've found that the carbohydrate rich "meals" in flake or pelletized food tended to be harder on my water quality. The frozen stuff tends to be more natural and breaks down cleaner. I can't prove this - just anecdotal observations on my part.

 

[scottch]

The only thing that worked for me was letting the tank go fallow. Had 4 fish die off and had tried 'ich attack' which seemed to do nothing whatsoever.

 

[ceslane13]

Always had luck with soaking food in garlic. Had a tang get ick and after the garlic treatment for a couple weeks it never came back. Just my two cents

 

[tmz]

A couple of things:

Garlic is not effective in eradicating ich.

Nutrition is important for fish health but ich attacks healthy fish as well as sick fish. Many flake foods have high protein content and offer variety in the diet along with frozen or live foods.

 

[davandwilk]

Is it possible that copper can have no effect on ich? I have had a hippo tang in copper for 3 1/2 weeks now at .5 to .6 with cupramine. I have the seachem test kit. About every 7 days it breaks out with ich really bad and have to do a fresh water dip. Its in a quarantine tank, bare bottom with pvc pipe. I test every day to make sure the copper maintains the .5 level.

 

[billsreef]

It would be very rare.