Ich...It killed over 50% of my fish

[Spotted Leopard]

I have recently posted that my fish looked pale. Well...I soon found out why. Apparently, fish sometimes turn pale if they have ich. So my tang was heavily infected with ich. Pretty soon, my angel got infected. After that, some blue-green chromis got infected. As a result, 5 of my 8 fish died. I tried treating them with a reef-safe product known as "Greenex." But the ich eventually killed the 5 fish. Now I only have 3 blue-green chromis fish left in my tank.

The remaining blue-greens are eating are show no signs of ich. How long should I wait until I can know for sure that the ich is gone. I know that if I leave the tank empty, it would be 1 month. But I still have fish in it. So how long should I wait now?-just in case my blue-greens have ich but are not displaying the symptoms.

 

[kevin2000]

There is no correct answer to your question.

Your show tank is infected with ich and if you leave fish within the show tank then chances are your tank will remain infected with ich - depends on the level of immunity your remaining fish have aquired against ich.

If all of your remaining fish have aquired total immunity .. then the ich within the ST will die off after a month .. however if even one fish has limited immunity then ich will remain in your ST at a low (undetectible) level and may raise its ugly head at a later date.

When you have ich you need to QT all fish and treat with either copper or hyposalinity .. and leave your ST without fish for about a month. QT all new fish purchases.

As I recall Greenex is a combo of malachite green and quinine .. which was made by Aquatronics (went out of business many yrs ago) -- spotty record in regards to ich and not something you should place in a reef tank.

Heres a link discussing ich .. within the treatment section you will see seperate links discussing how to setup a QT and treat with either copper (cupramine) or hyposalinity.

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

Hope this helps.