Ich in 10 ft fish only

[Palting]

Any one recommend to go Hypo salinity?

It can be done in the main DT of a fish only tank, but can be tricky. Although you say this is fish only, you have inverts and critters in your rock and substrate. A true therapeutic hyposalinity level is 1.009. This will kill all those critters and inverts, and give rise to one heck of a spike. If you are lucky and have a robust biological filter, you will only get a msaaive nitrate spike, which is no big deal in a fish only tank. But, if your biological filter cannot handle it, you will get a huge ammonia spike instead, and kill your fish.

I should know. I did it. Hyposalinity works in killing the Ich, too. Here's my llink: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1892446

 

[Tracey2]

I'm no expert but this is what worked for me. My powder brown tang had ich on and off for a year, I fed lots of nori soaked in vitamins and garlic and he now shows 0 signs of ich, this also worked for my achillies and even though he is known to be difficult he only showed mild signs of ich for a couple of months. I think your regal would be less stressed in your large display if no one is picking on her than in a QT. You could lower the salinity a little in preparation for hyposalinity if its needed, you can't lower the salinity too quickly and it might reduce stress. I do think cleaner shrimp also reduce stress and pristine water, don't skip a feeding, lots of garlic selcon and vitaming C. Good luck

 

[khaosinc]

The concept of trying to get fish out of my tank (only 10" shallower than yours) is not really practical, and I assume you have the same problem. I just ignored it and it went away. My ick magnet blue hippos will get a couple spots once in a blue moon, but thats about it now. I have yet to lose a fish to ick outside of QT (which I also gave up on)

 

[steelhead77]

cleaner shrimp do not eat ich as far as i know though i do have a couple in my "FOWLR"... and as far as steelhead's post, i understand what you are sayin, but why did that purple tang even have to go through that infestation? its unhumane... put him in a QT for a week or so, and he never even would have had to go through that... but hey, i guess he is still alive so who cares bout treatments right? ... if your fish had ich that bad, as clearly we can see it did, a little short term medication would have helped him a ton, your lucky and you got a very very hardy one... this does not make not qt'ing a good practice...

I never said not to QT BEFORE adding a fish to the DT (although it can be argued that this stresses fish and is not 100% successful at catching a disease). Once it's in there however, I think it is cruel, AND adds a LOT of stress to the fish, to chase him around trying to catch it. All I am saying (and have ever said in this forum) is to take a "wait and see" approach, that ich is not a death sentence (my Tang is evidence) and so it is not necessary to remove all fish, treat them and leave a tank fallow for 6-8 weeks just because a few spots appear. There may be a time to do that, but, IMHO, at the first signs of a few spots is not that time. I have been flamed pretty harshly for taking this (what I think to be) moderate approach.

 

[Acefspds]

Ich isnt what kills the fish usually. It turs out to be from scratching and getting infected or something. I would say No-Ich but in a 1000g tank that would cost you an arm and a leg. You could always up the temp to speed up the life cycle.

 

[reefinder]

thank you Pallobi, and steelhead why did you think it was a good idea to put put a tang in a 72 gallon tank to begin with. Even if you had plans to upgrade in tanks, its like putting the tang in temporary jail, no wonder the the purple tang got ich. Don't get me wrong I am happy he survived, but why do it in the first place. Icliao, your going to read many stories of people fighting ich off without doing much effort, but those stories are like lottery winners you only hear about the select few winners not the countless loser's.

 

[bur01014]

guess I'm another lottery winner....Actually I disagree with the above post and would turn 180 degrees to the complete opposite aspect...everyone that has a fish die of ich WILL post it....anyone that has success will likely not make a thread saying, "I BEAT ICH" people typically post problems looking for help, not successes (hence, this thread)....every tang of mine that has gotten ick, I simply feed well and keep water quality at best....they all have survived....I am not sure what people are doing to kill these fish that get ich....if the fish is eating, it will survive, no lottery here.....ich does not kill fish....stress, poor water quality, a fish purchased that wasn't eating, etc...kills.....I will NEVER QT again...way too much stress and has cost me a lot of fish that were otherwise healthy....maybe, just maybe I would QT if I had a 90 + gallon tank laying around, plus room in the house for it, an accepting wife of yet another tank, and all the time in the world to maintain two tanks.....sounds fun? also, while treating fish with copper that is highly toxic, weakens there immune system, and causes of great deal of stress to me......furthermore... after done with QT, you will find yourself putting the fish back in the tank, after going fishless for six weeks, only to get, yet again, a spec of free swimming ich in a water droplet on a newly purchased CUC ....etc...etc....etc...lol....btw, whoever said letting a fish fight off ich and go through that suffering is just nuts....Copper treatment and qt is WAY more suffering (I'd like to know how many of you that QT actually have the appropriate size tank to qt)....its like chemo...you practically have to kill the fish to kill the parasite....save the fish the stress, feed em well

 

[Ben_Im]

I say leave the fish alone. Reduce stress, feed well, and keep up your water quality.

My True Percula female had marine ich the day I bought her (over 2 years ago). I dropped her in my tank, and it went away on its own after 2-3 weeks. 2 years later, I still haven't seen another spot, even after a tank move.

I say let it fight it off on its own.

 

[Idle Moor]

I've been keeping marine fish for about 12 yrs, both in reef and fowlr settings. I obviously never treated the reef for ich, but then strangely I never had a serious outbreak in that tank - any spots on new fish just went away. Perhaps this was due to the superior health of the fish in a good reef system, or something that was disrupting the lifecycle of the parasite.

I have treated my various fowlrs both with hypo and copper when the fish got so sick they were constantly flashing, shivering, etc and looked so bad I felt I just had to do something.

The facts? I've never actually lost a fish to just ich. I have lost fish from ich and complications stemming from treatment - either copper sensitivity or reaction to hypo or disruption of the tanks ecosystem. At least I think. I don't know if this is useful info because I can't know what would have happened if I hadn't treated, or hadn't waited until the fish were in decline before I treated. You can add it to your database tho.

I have a couple of spots on a new fish I added to my current fowlr and I have decided not to treat. I am feeding multiple times per day and making the fish as strong as possible. If I end up with only my trigger, who never gets ich, so be it, I will have a tank with only an awesome trigger. This hobby gets too stressful sometimes anyway and no matter how you look at it we are doing the fish no favors.

 

[Nanz]

I will NEVER QT again

Good Luck with that

There are worse Contaminations than Ich (Cryptocaryon irritans). Always QT to be safe. Why risk disease or pests in your display tank?

You mention the size of the QT tank causing stress on the fish. How about the size of the tank it has been sitting in the LFS? How many months has the fish been the LFS tank?

Always QT to be safe and sure your fish/coral are healthy before introducing into the display tank. It also makes it easier to diagnose/treat a problem in a QT tank than it does in display tank.

 

[john32]

Yes but now the entire tank has ich. If the fish is removed, treated and then re-introduced the same thing could happen.

I guess the quesion is did the fish bring in the ich or was it already in the tank and the stress weakened its system?

I'm guessing you have a small tank, removing fish from a 10 foot tank would be very difficult if not impossible and you would stress everything in your tank trying.

 

[sslak]

I would leave them alone, feed them a lot, as long as they have no stress and they are eating, they will fight the parasite. as for hypo, i would not really recomend it, because it will stress the fish and might kill it or them....

Sana

Agreed.

I've allegidly had "Ich" in my reef for the last 5 years once or twice a year I will see a tiny spot on a fish here or there. The clowns had a couple spots on them when I moved the tank, my two recent additions have both shown one or two spots when I introduced them but have been fine since. I've never lost a fish to Ich either.

 

[bur01014]

Good Luck with that

There are worse Contaminations than Ich (Cryptocaryon irritans). Always QT to be safe. Why risk disease or pests in your display tank?

You mention the size of the QT tank causing stress on the fish. How about the size of the tank it has been sitting in the LFS? How many months has the fish been the LFS tank?

Always QT to be safe and sure your fish/coral are healthy before introducing into the display tank. It also makes it easier to diagnose/treat a problem in a QT tank than it does in display tank.

I risk disease or pests in my display tank because it is much less risk than the stress and disease of a QT, which can all be pointless when adding a CUC, since there is no safe way to treat/QT inverts....thus, disease is introduced.

This is why is it highly looked down upon when an LFS keeps their fish in copper based systems....yes, there is less disease, but their immunity is MUCH MUCH weaker (side effect of treatment), so when disease does come (yes it will, sooner or later, some form of disease will enter your tank), or stress...your disease free fish will more readily die.

BTW- yes, I did mention size of QT causes stress on fish....did I mention anything about LFS tank sizes? NO....but I can now...yes small LFS holding tanks are quite stressful....the only positive aspect to them is that water quality is usually kept pristine because of the constant change over (good luck on WQ with no LR and a small HOB filter)....fish are shipped in plastic bags, and can live in plastic bags for days... doesn't mean it isn't stressful....as for fish in an LFS for several months in a small holding tank.. The fish won't last.....or it's chances are decreased....hence the reason why we should avoid having tangs in 55 gallon tanks, has it worked? yes, but your chances are decreased. I do things in this hobby that likely increase my chances for success....we all will inevidably have problems sooner or later.

 

[KafudaFish]

I'm guessing you have a small tank, removing fish from a 10 foot tank would be very difficult if not impossible and you would stress everything in your tank trying.

So you are agreeing with my post then. Noticed I stated if he did these things it would not do much good in the long run.

1. Yes it would be hard but not impossible to catch the fish.
2. My points were why remove the one fish now if it has been introduced to the system? Even if the original fish with ich is removed, QT, undergoes stress, survives and is returned unless the entire tank is treated the same issue can occur given time and especially if the fish is stressed and in a weakened state.


Yes I have a small tank now but that is besides the point. I have cared for multiple tank systems with several thousand gallons of water and hundreds of fish for re-population efforts. If a fish becomes diseased the entire system should be treated not just the fish.

 

[Stuart60611]

guess I'm another lottery winner....Actually I disagree with the above post and would turn 180 degrees to the complete opposite aspect...everyone that has a fish die of ich WILL post it....anyone that has success will likely not make a thread saying, "I BEAT ICH" people typically post problems looking for help, not successes (hence, this thread)....every tang of mine that has gotten ick, I simply feed well and keep water quality at best....they all have survived....I am not sure what people are doing to kill these fish that get ich....if the fish is eating, it will survive, no lottery here.....ich does not kill fish....stress, poor water quality, a fish purchased that wasn't eating, etc...kills.....I will NEVER QT again...way too much stress and has cost me a lot of fish that were otherwise healthy....maybe, just maybe I would QT if I had a 90 + gallon tank laying around, plus room in the house for it, an accepting wife of yet another tank, and all the time in the world to maintain two tanks.....sounds fun? also, while treating fish with copper that is highly toxic, weakens there immune system, and causes of great deal of stress to me......furthermore... after done with QT, you will find yourself putting the fish back in the tank, after going fishless for six weeks, only to get, yet again, a spec of free swimming ich in a water droplet on a newly purchased CUC ....etc...etc....etc...lol....btw, whoever said letting a fish fight off ich and go through that suffering is just nuts....Copper treatment and qt is WAY more suffering (I'd like to know how many of you that QT actually have the appropriate size tank to qt)....its like chemo...you practically have to kill the fish to kill the parasite....save the fish the stress, feed em well

This is absolutely and unequivocally untrue. Crypt can and does kill fish. The most common way crypt kills fish is the parasite attaches in mass to the gills. The parasite while feeding does damage to the gills causing the fish to die. In this context, fish do not die from a secondary infection or complications from crypt, but the death of the fish is proximately caused by the crypt parasite damaging the gills. The increased respiration that is sometimes seen with fish infected with crypt is generally indication that the crypt parasite is negatively affecting the gills. Also, I have treated many fish with cupramine. If done correctly, virtually all fish tolerate the treatment very well, behaive normally, and eat throughout treatment. Your assertion that the use of copper nearly kill the fish is plainly untrue. Numerous people here have done so without a problem. Most people kill their fish in quarantine by not having adequate qurantine facilities, mature biological filter in quarantine, and misapplication of medicine (adding too much cupramine too fast). If you have a large enough quarantine, mature biological filter in quarantine, stay on top of ammonia and do water changes, and properly dose medicine you will rarely, if ever, loose fish in quarantine unless you purchase a very sick fish. People who try to quarantine fish in very small systems that were just set up usually run into trouble. People think that it is difficult or expensive to have a large quarantine. This is also untrue. You can purchase a plastic tub at walmart to hold about 100 gallons of water for well under $50.00. All you need is a small filter and you are good to go. Total cost well under $100.00. Moreover, you can store the tub out of the way very easily when not in use. All you need to do is keep your filter sponge for quarantine in your display at all times. To immediately set up the quarantine with a mature biological filter all you need to do is fill the tub with tank water and use the sponge which is fully mature with filtering bacteria. Not difficult, expensive, or involve taking up a lot of space. No good reason not to do so. Provided you have a large enough quarantine, all fish will benefit from being in quarantine, rather than being placed directly in the display, even when they do not have any parasite or disease. Quarantine gives the fish time to feed and live in complete peace without any stress from other fish. Remember, when you purchase a fish it has gone through quite a trip and a great deal of stress between being taken from the ocean and geting to your home. Moreover, during this period, most fish have not been fed well. Quarantine gives you a chance to fatten up the fish in a quiet calm surounding so that it can more easily compete for food with your other fish once added to the display. Moreover, whenever you add a new fish to the display many fish already living in the display will interpret the new fish as an intruder and show aggession toward the new arrival. As such, it can often be important the the new arrival is well fed, fattened up, and in good condition before you expose the new arrival to this aggression from existing fish in your display, or the new arrival may not be strong enough to handle the aggression. If you approach it right, there is absolutely no valid reason not to quarantine fish, and fish will benefit from it and rarely, if ever, die in quarantine.

 

[bur01014]

This is absolutely and unequivocally untrue. Crypt can and does kill fish. The most common way crypt kills fish is the parasite attaches in mass to the gills. The parasite while feeding does damage to the gills causing the fish to die. In this context, fish do not die from a secondary infection or complications from crypt, but the death of the fish is proximately caused by the crypt parasite damaging the gills. The increased respiration that is sometimes seen with fish infected with crypt is generally indication that the crypt parasite is negatively affecting the gills. Also, I have treated many fish with cupramine. If done correctly, virtually all fish tolerate the treatment very well, behaive normally, and eat throughout treatment. Your assertion that the use of copper nearly kill the fish is plainly untrue. Numerous people here have done so without a problem. Most people kill their fish in quarantine by not having adequate qurantine facilities, mature biological filter in quarantine, and misapplication of medicine (adding too much cupramine too fast). If you have a large enough quarantine, mature biological filter in quarantine, stay on top of ammonia and do water changes, and properly dose medicine you will rarely, if ever, loose fish in quarantine unless you purchase a very sick fish.

Your proper QT introduction sounds like a lot of IFs....once again, which is the greater risk? QT (A proper one) or Reduce Stress and Feed well.....neither are a 100% guarantee.....I've done both and will do the later, having had greater success with it.

 

[Sharpie_]

Alot of people tend to forget about the entire sport of 'fishing' I have helped catch several tangs from large tanks with the use of a small barbless fly fishing hook and hand line. This method reduces the hassle for you and stress of being chased with a net, it also stops the fish from cutting itself up on rocks while trying to escape.

The one note I will make is that one should be careful not to allow the fish to eat the hook, use one of appropriate size and always use a tug method as soon as the fish is biting.

 

[Stuart60611]

Your proper QT introduction sounds like a lot of IFs....once again, which is the greater risk? QT (A proper one) or Reduce Stress and Feed well.....neither are a 100% guarantee.....I've done both and will do the later, having had greater success with it.

No "ifs" about it. You can control having a large enough quarantine tank. You can control whether the biological filter in the qurantine tank is mature. You can control whether you properly change quarantine tank water and properly dose any medicine used. Nothing needs to be left to chance and can be accomplished correctly with certainty.

 

[bur01014]

No "ifs' about it. You can control having a large enough quarantine tank. You can control whether the biological filter in the qurantine tank is mature. You can control whether you properly change quarantine tank water and properly dose any medicine used. Nothing needs to be left to chance and can be accomplished correctly with certainty.

Nothing in this hobby is certain....there would be no argument then...

Not talking about chance here....talking about all your "if" statments...

If you have a large enough QT ....75 gallon +
If you have large enough cycled media
If you change water frequently
If you dose properly (lucklily cupramine is safer than other copper treatments)

These are all factors that play into the success of a QT....they are big "IFs" because rarely have I seen any reefer that has successfully and continually met all of these requirements....yes you have CONTROL, but I beg to differ than any human being is perfect at what they try to control....again, a lot of Ifs...

 

[Idle Moor]

Has anyone else shared my observation of ich not taking hold in a full SPS reef system? I did a quick search but didn't find any relevant threads. I kept the reef for over 8 yrs, never quarantined, and never had a serious ich outbreak. There were certainly a few spots now and then on newly introduced fish, so I wasn't simply lucky in always getting ich-free fish, but it never caught fire. What would the various camps in this debate conclude from this I wonder?