Ich in QT

[daplatapus]

Well, my QT has ich
I realize I may not have done a wise thing but not having an LFS around I have to have livestock shipped in so I ordered 3 fish so shipping was a bit more reasonable.. A yellow eye hole tang, a lemon peel angel and a yellow long nose butterfly fish. They all arrived last Thursday (march 8th) and have been in QT. They are together in a 30 gal tank and have all been getting along and looking fine. They've all been eating extremely well. I've been giving them Nori on a clip, and mix the food up between frozen mysis, blood worms, brine, prepackaged cubes of the this least 3 with spirolina. Sometimes I've been soaking the frozen in garlic or selcon. Well, I went down today to do my water change and the yellow long nose butterfly fish has ich. I have some Kent RX-P but I think I'm going to try hypo-salinity treatment unless someone can give me good reason not to. I've read the sticky on hypo treatment and the only thing that semi-concerns me is switching out the filter media every day. I'm running an Aquaclear 150 on that tank with a foam filter that had been sitting in my fuge and I have 3 or 4 spares but they are brand new, still in the box. I'd assume when I change out my filter I'll lose any sort of beneficial bacteria from the QT and have to do daily water changes to keep the ammonia in check.
I've read PH will be a problem. I'll be checking it and trying to maintain 8.2. Any other thoughts or suggestion for someone who's never done this before? I gotta say, this makes me nervous and I'm really bummed about it.

 

[Ford625]

I've never hypo'd before but I've read that it's less stressful for the fish. I may need to do the same also. It does sound like a pain but I want my fish to stay with me

 

[f3honda4me]

I use cupramine for ich treatment. Seems gentle on the fish.

 

[MrTuskfish]

Because of all the reported failures and the difficulty involved; I just don't think hypo is the way to go anymore. Tank-transfer or Cupramine would be my choices.

 

[daplatapus]

Hmmmm, ok. Has anyone used this Kent RX-P before? It says on the instructions that it MUST be used with a skimmer. I haven't got a skimmer for my HT and I'm wondering if it has to do with O2 exchange or what.
Like I said above, I'm not near a LFS and it would probably take over a week to get cupramine. But maybe that isn't such a big deal either.... how long do fish normally have once they start showing ich spots?

 

[Triton_Z]

I have no experience with RX-P and looking up the listed contents : Deionized water, natural plant extracts, pepper, stabilized vitamin c, stabilizers, I have my doubts on the effectiveness of the medication. It sounds like its a solution chocked full of capsaicin and vitamin C.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capsaicin

They state the skimmer is used to reduce the concentration of the "med" over time and if you cannot skim the meds' compounds out, then you have to use the "med" more as a short duration dip to avoid being toxic to the fish.

From Kent's site, assume the directions on the bottle state the same:

"This product MUST be used in conjunction with a protein skimmer! Adjust skimmer daily for good foam production! The treatment objective is to have a high concentration of KENT Marine Rx-P peak when dosed, then be reduced rapidly by the skimmer. Remove carbon filtration.

Upon ending the treatment or needing to abruptly terminate treatment due to overdosing or negative animal reaction, stop treatment, perform a major water change (>20%), and begin carbon filtration. If a quarantine or hospital aquarium is available, immediately move animals to an untreated location."

I would say since you do not have immediate access to any other treatment meds, Hypo appears to be your only choice. I agree with MrTuskFish, I do not advocate hypo given more successful and effective treatments using copper. I have not tried tank transfer yet, but given the recommendations here lately, I'm interested.

 

[daplatapus]

Yeah, I think I'm not going to use the Kent stuff. I'll drop my salinity over the next day or so to try and hold the ich at bay and order some cupramine. Hopefully everyone will be ok until then. On the positive side, they're all still eating like pigs and swimming around like they're healthy.

On another note, I had a nagging thought creep into my head last night as I was laying in bed.....
Being new to the game, when I first set up my system, I didn't QT the fish I have in my DT right now. I've never seen any evidence of ich in the DT. BUT.... I have been performing water changes on my QT with my DT water. I'm wondering now if it's possible that I have ich in the DT and have actually infected my QT from my DT. Ugh....

 

[MrTuskfish]

The Kent stuff is just another hot-pepper treatment that claims to be reef-safe. I don't think it even claims to cure ich, just control it. There is no such thing as a reef-safe ich cure. Please read the ich stickies above. IMO & IME; the only true ich cures are tank transfer, copper, possibly quinine sulfate (I just don't trust this med yet, but some good hobbyists swear by some of the quinine meds) or (not in my book anymore) hypo.
There is no way to tell how long before the ich becomes lethal---much depends on the fish and its ability to fight it off. Of course, the sooner you treat, the better. there is no guarantee that the fish will last until tomorrow. For the price of one inexpensive fish, you can have Cupramine Fed-Ex overnight; that's certainly what I'd do. Look at the tank-transfer method sticky too; I'm in the middle of using this method for the first time and really value the opinion of the sticky's author and others who have used it. The method just seems to make sense and seems fool-proof.
On your last question: If all fish have been in a QT, used DT water is usually fine for a QT. But not with fairly new fish. Ich can be "invisible" for quite a while. Also, anything wet can transfer ich from one tank to another. You don't have room for any more fish in your DT. I really see no reasonable alternative other than to cure the fish in the QT and watch the DT closely....and hope you're safe.