Well, I'm so irritated with this, that it's close to motivating me to give up.. I got a powder brown tang 2-3 months ago from the LFS. I put it directly in my QT.
I observed it for signs of ich. On the 2nd -3rd day in QT, it appeared to be covered in white spots. I didn't take any chances. I immediately implemented hypo. The spots were gone 12 hours after bringing the water down to 1.016 or so. I knew it was not the salinity that caused them to disappear. So, Proceeded with reaching hypo bringing it to 1.007-1.008. Maintained that level with calibrated refrac for 6 weeks. Around week 5 or 6, the white spots reappeared, then were gone within an hour or two. I thought I was imagining things.
The spots were dotted all over both sides of the tang. And if I blinked, they disappeared... I had no idea. I assumed it wasn't ich well, because it's been in true hypo, bordering on freshwater for over 5 weeks.
So, I went an extra week of hypo lowering the salinity to 1.006, just to be safe. At week 6, I slowly over that entire week brought the water to 1.10. Then at week 7 implemented an agressive increase out of hypo not wanting to risk damaging any internal organs. (I believe organ damage can occur at and/after 8 weeks of hyposalinity according to info I've read.)
By the end of week 7, I had managed to get the SG to 1.016 and the fish was still healthy. By end of week 8 I had SG up to 1.024. I checked temp on display and QT. Rechecked salinity. They were a match. I simply transferred the fish to the display, with no acclimation. Now, a 2 weeks after 8 week QT period. I was looking closely at my tank, with my eyes pressed up to the glass trying to find one of my fish. Well, the tang swam by and it's body was glistening with white glowy speckles probably close to a hundred or more on both sides of it's body.
I asked my wife to take a look as the fish swam by, her first impression was "Oh that's weird, it's all bumpy." The white "speckles" looked bumpy on the tang and almost symmetrically on both sides.
I don't have a good enough camera to possibly get a good shot of what this looks like up close. From a distance, you can't tell anything is there. It looks like a normal fish with gray on both sides, and the black on the fins with the orange and yellow. A normal powder brown. Within 5-6" of the fish though, it's a different story.
I find it hard to believe it's covered in ich. No other fish are showing any signs of ich. In the last 4 months of the tank's operation I haven't lost a fish to ich, that I'm aware of. I did have 2 clowns die of HLLE, and had a 3rd clown on the verge of dieing of HLLE. I put in a grounding probe, removed my carbon, and started feeding selcon enriched food and the 3rd clown survived a severe case of HLLE and is completely healed up now with no signs of ich.
So, in short? DO I need to worry about an ich infestation in my display, is this a parasite, or is it just the natural body of a powder brown to have bumpy silvery white speckles on it's body up close?
I'm not a biologist so I claim no knowledge in this area...
I observed it for signs of ich. On the 2nd -3rd day in QT, it appeared to be covered in white spots. I didn't take any chances. I immediately implemented hypo. The spots were gone 12 hours after bringing the water down to 1.016 or so. I knew it was not the salinity that caused them to disappear. So, Proceeded with reaching hypo bringing it to 1.007-1.008. Maintained that level with calibrated refrac for 6 weeks. Around week 5 or 6, the white spots reappeared, then were gone within an hour or two. I thought I was imagining things.
The spots were dotted all over both sides of the tang. And if I blinked, they disappeared... I had no idea. I assumed it wasn't ich well, because it's been in true hypo, bordering on freshwater for over 5 weeks.
So, I went an extra week of hypo lowering the salinity to 1.006, just to be safe. At week 6, I slowly over that entire week brought the water to 1.10. Then at week 7 implemented an agressive increase out of hypo not wanting to risk damaging any internal organs. (I believe organ damage can occur at and/after 8 weeks of hyposalinity according to info I've read.)
By the end of week 7, I had managed to get the SG to 1.016 and the fish was still healthy. By end of week 8 I had SG up to 1.024. I checked temp on display and QT. Rechecked salinity. They were a match. I simply transferred the fish to the display, with no acclimation. Now, a 2 weeks after 8 week QT period. I was looking closely at my tank, with my eyes pressed up to the glass trying to find one of my fish. Well, the tang swam by and it's body was glistening with white glowy speckles probably close to a hundred or more on both sides of it's body.
I asked my wife to take a look as the fish swam by, her first impression was "Oh that's weird, it's all bumpy." The white "speckles" looked bumpy on the tang and almost symmetrically on both sides.
I don't have a good enough camera to possibly get a good shot of what this looks like up close. From a distance, you can't tell anything is there. It looks like a normal fish with gray on both sides, and the black on the fins with the orange and yellow. A normal powder brown. Within 5-6" of the fish though, it's a different story.
I find it hard to believe it's covered in ich. No other fish are showing any signs of ich. In the last 4 months of the tank's operation I haven't lost a fish to ich, that I'm aware of. I did have 2 clowns die of HLLE, and had a 3rd clown on the verge of dieing of HLLE. I put in a grounding probe, removed my carbon, and started feeding selcon enriched food and the 3rd clown survived a severe case of HLLE and is completely healed up now with no signs of ich.
So, in short? DO I need to worry about an ich infestation in my display, is this a parasite, or is it just the natural body of a powder brown to have bumpy silvery white speckles on it's body up close?
I'm not a biologist so I claim no knowledge in this area...
