Let's talk Ich & Clownfish

[ali1]

1. Can clownfish get ich? I'm seeing mixed articles about blackspots on clownfish being the reaction to coral stings and others think it's unique to clownfish instead of the white dots

2. if clownfish can get ich, is it blackspots or the same white spots like the rest of the fish? i've never really seen clownfish with white dots and scratching.

3. if clownfish can't get ich, can they still be the carrier of the host- meaning if a host is living in a tank with only clownfish, can they continue reproducing and or will ich die?

4. if you have a pair of clownfish with black spotsin a tank with corals for over 8months, is it safe to say ich is not present?

looking for facts or personal experiences with these two.

 

[ThRoewer]

1. yes
2. same white spots
3. see 1.
4. no

 

[snorvich]

Exactly

 

[ali1]

so I guess the next question would be how do you know you don't have ich if your tank has been idling with corals/fish for 1 year with no visible spots?

Do you buy a $5 fish.. drop it in.. and wait 60days for spots to show up?

 

[Mishri]

well first you'd have to make certain that fish didn't bring ich with it. which can be tough to do, even if you were to attempt to treat the fish with cp, ttm, cupramine, hypo it's possible ich will somehow survive one or more of those methods.

Right now I'm considering a CP/TTM combo... using both methods at once should be pretty solid I think.


But, rather than introducing a new fish to an environment that might have ich, it would be better to do a treatment in a hospital tank with the fish, leave your tank fallow for 90 days.. then re-introduce.

Otherwise you can gamble, buy a new fish and do a proper QT and see if anything happens when you add it.

I'll be putting my existing fish through TTM/CP treatment prior to adding them to my 300 gallon. my fish in my 75 gallon already have undergone cupramine once, and CP twice (re-infected the tank recently from a new fish in a different tank, exposed them to water from it).. So-this is how I know my maroon clown in my 40 gallon had ich even though it never showed white spots.. I cleaned my tanks using the same equipment without letting it dry, cleaned my 40g first, I had no new additions to my 75g in over a year.. my tang soon showed signs of ich(first week he was twitching a lot and looked irritated, 2nd week white spots visible). I usually don't clean both tanks on the same day.. this was a first.


-That's the problem with ich, it can live in the water/substrate, your fish can live with it in their gills for years and never show signs.. then usually something happens, your fish's immune system takes a hit, and suddenly it erupts and wipes out the tank.