ich issue

[joshalicialtjt]

what is the fastest, least stressful, easiest way to rid a tank of ich? no corals and basically no inverts aside from one mexican turbo and 5 blue legs. thanks so much, mainly on my coral beauty and he is gorgeous so really want to try and save him.

 

[rdmpe]

A UV unit will kill ich during the stage where it is in the water column. Run a UV unit for a month or so?

 

[joshalicialtjt]

Um ok, don't have one . . . . . any other options?

 

[lifesworksataol]

there are a ton of pages on beef central to tell you how. you need to find out why he got it in the first place. do you have all small fish? i had a very hard time with little fish (they all died). if you dont want to read all the stuff on this site then pm me your number and i will put you in touch with the right people. hopefully someone that has had luck with it will chim in. my brother had goodluck with copper in a qt tank, there are some chemicals you can buy and put into your reef, but i havent had luck with that or with lowering your salinity. good luck

 

[joshalicialtjt]

ok well no reef fish are coral beauty, gold stripe maroon, royal gramma, and one blue reef chromis. i read up on the different treatments i just was wondering which one was found to be the most effective for most people. freshwater dips and lowering salinity looked decent.

 

[dugg]

http://www.petsforum.com/personal/trevor-jones/hyposalinity.html

 

[chrisstie]

Unless you QT every single thing that ever goes into your tank EVER (corals, inverts, fish, rock, you name it ) its very likely you'll have ich unless you're running a UV sterlizer and ozone. With a sterilizer there can be some trade offs in a reef tank (I don't have personal experience but I hear it isn't good for your copepod population so if you ever wanted to have a mandarin you would have to be careful of the size of tank, rock etc)

That said, if you do plan on doing as such, you'll need to remove all fish and leave your tank fallow for 6-8 weeks I believe is the magic number. I'd go with 8 to be sure. This is to rid the parasite that may not have found a host and is waiting around in a tank. Without a host to feed on it should die off.

If you don't plan on dedicated QT, don't fret. With strong healthy fish ich usually goes dormant and doesn't bother anyone after a flare up. Without stressors in the tank (temperature swings, bad parameters, fighting, agrression, territory issues) it can remain dormant and not harm your fish. You may not see a breakout for months or even years until a fish is weakened perhaps by old age, an accidental injury, etc and even then it may or may not succumb.

Ich is out there in the wild, on many fish that come in and the goal in the home aquarium is to do the best we can to simulate that natural environment.

Cleaner gobies/shrimp can help with the external parasites. Adding garlic to the food should help boost the immune system and allow a fish to stave off ich.

There are very few actual "cures" for it - one of which is copper which you'd need to use in a seperate QT tank, the other is hyposalinity treatments which should also be done in a separate tank with ALL fish for both methods since you already have your LR and what not cycled and setup in your tank.

I wouldn't panic yet- you just added the angel and it may take a few days to figure out its territory and in the meantime if all fish are healthy and not stressed it should fade away on its own.

Best of luck with whatever method you decide to go with!

 

[dugg]

One note on hypo treatment, you have to use a refractometer to measure the salinity. A normal hydrometer is not accurate enough. For hypo to work, the salinity has to be very accurately measured.

Other then the hypo treatment, You can also get some minced garlic and feed the fish with it. Soak thier normal food in the juice also. Fish love the stuff, and most will eat garlic when they will barely eat anything else. Garlic is a natural antibiotic and while it doesn't kill ich directly, it does help the fish to be stronger and fight off the ich. I had my best luck fighting ich by feeding garlic, and wrapping the tank with towels to block thier view of any movement in the room for 2 weeks. The less stress the better.

 

[joshalicialtjt]

i like cutting off their view of things, with no corals in the tank should i cut off the lights as well?

 

[dugg]

No, don't change the lighting. With no lights on, they won't come out to eat like they need to. Just go to the grocery store and get a jar of spice world minced garlic. Be sure not to get the stuff that says packed in oil. I believe the one you want has a blue label. Feed them 3 or 4 small servings otf the garlic and thier normal food soaked in garlic per day rather than 1 or 2 bigger ones, and do a small water change every other day or so to get the water quality up to par.

If you end up doing the hypo treatment, don't do it in the display tank. The hyposalinity will kill off your bacteria and cause you to go through a cycle which will just cause even more stress.

 

[joshalicialtjt]

ok thank you