Lost beneficial bacteria in QT

[Injdog]

I have had 3 fish in a 10 gallon QT tank for a month. 2 occelaris clownfish and a midas blenny. I had an ich outbreak and lost a royal gramma in my DT. The clownfish and midas blenny showed no signs of ich. I treated with cupramine at .5 for 2 weeks. Everything was going ok. I had no ammonia but did have low nitrite and nitrate readings throughout. Whenever Nitrite got above .5 i did a 50% water change. I noticed detritus in the bottom of the aquaclear filter so I cleaned it out and changed out the sponge filter on Sunday. Sponge filter was new. Big mistake because now I have ammonia, nitrite and nitrate readings. Im doing 50% changes twice a day. I notice the midas blenny flashing. I am now using stability in the tank after every water change. Im sure there is no more copper in the system after a ton of water changes. I also put my peppermint shrimp in there wed after I caught him eating polyps from my frogspwn. I've read some people swear by dr tims one and only so I am going to pick some up with a bottle of prime as well today after work. I see no signs of ich, but guessing the flashing is from he ammonia levels. Breathing seems fine. Salinity is always at 1.025. Should I lower that due to ammonia levels? I have been feeding sparingly with food soaked in selcon and garlic.

Is 1 month fallow enough to rid the DT of ich? I'm contemplating moving them back to the DT until I build enough beneficial bacteria in the QT again. I have had another sponge in the DT since monday, but I read it needs to be in there weeks for it to have enough bacteria in it. Any advice would be appreciated. I just dread walking into the house to find 3 dead fish.

Anmonia levels get as high as .5 nitrites .5 nitrates 10 before I do a water change. Seems like water changes dont lower them enough as id like is why im doing 2 a day. I dont have a RODI so I am using RO water from the glacier kiosk at kroger. I will be gone the week of Thanksgiving so I need to make a decision in a week and a half. Thanks for any help you can provide.

 

[sde1500]

72 days for fallow period. Also I don't think stability clears ammonia, I'd suggest something like Amquel for that.

 

[rfurst]

Ok so... it seems like you have a couple of things going on and you may be mixing up the ich issues with water chemistry issues.

So first, if you saw ich on one fish, the tank is infested and all fish have to be removed whether they are symptomatic or not. Once removed into a QT tank they can be treated (fresh water dip and then usually some form of copper sulfate solution). Do not treat your DT with copper... very bad for inverts. Also, make sure you monitor copper level in QT since too much can be toxic to some fish. The life cycle of the parasite is about one month so all fish need to stay in QT with treatment for the full life cycle.

without any fish in the DT (inverts can stay) there is no longer a host for the parasite so, given the one month life-cycle, if yo let the tank run fallow a month you should be rid of the buggers.

see next post for reply about chemistry ..

 

[rfurst]

The high levels of ammonia, nitrite and nitrate are unrelated to the ich itself. They are produced as part of the nitrogen cycle that converts waste and dead stuff into something harmless. In a normally functioning tank with adequate biological filtration the ammonia nitrite and nitrate can be managed. if the readings are high it is because there is not enough filtration to keep up with the nitrogen cycle and more waste and dead stuff in your tank increases the rate that those chemicals are produced.

any amount of ammonia or nitrite is toxic. if you are seeing it, get your fish out of there.

if you put your inverts in the QT while the copper is present...to bad for the invert.


Selcon has nothing to do any of this and and garlic is widely debated as to its efficacy.
Your salinity at 1.025 is fine and unrelated to either issue in any event.