Need Advice. Ich in reef tank

[joebo1717]

I developed a case of ich in my reef tank last week. To date I have been dosing Melafix for 7 days. My fish appear to be healthy (eating, no trouble breathing, normal behavior) but I still have the white spots. My main concern is this developing into something more deadly to fish like velvet. The inhabatints of my tank are 7 fire fish, 2 clowns (female has it the worst of all), kole tang, tommini tang, 2 leopard wrasse, melanarus wrasse, marine beta. The tangs do have the spots but everything else looks pretty good.

2/16 will be 14 days since last w/c. Here are the options I see.

Option 1 run carbon followed by a w/c and then run my skimmer for a few days and pick up the melafix after that if I don't see improvements.

Option 2 would be no w/c and keep the melafix on until everything is gone.

Option 3 would be w/c but no skimmer and continue with the
melafix.

Option 4...open to suggestions

Please tell me what you think would be the best route. I have sps and lps in my tank so hardline meds are out of the question. I have not ruled out the option of removing the fish and treating them in qt but I would rather not at this point.

 

[snulma1]

I would try and pull all of your fish out of your tank, and place into a QT tank and treat there, with either hyposalinity or copper. While leaving your display tank fallow for about a month.

That is the only definite way to rid yourself of ich, all the other additives aren't guaranteed.

 

[xraydoc]

If you truly have ich you will need to quarantine all fish and treat with hyposalinity and/or copper. I would leave your diplay fish free for about 6 weeks to be safe. Subsequently, the only prevention is strict quarantine procedure for new additions.

 

[ahullsb]

I see two options. One is to band aid the situation, and the other is get rid of it for good. Hyposalinity or running copper in a qt tank are the only proven ways to get rid of it, like snulma1 said. You could use a large garbage can to treat them. If you leave them in the tank I'd imagine this will just be a reoccurring problem for you.

 

[rustybucket145]

Pick up some garlic gel tabs at the local grocery store or pharmacy, pop them on some fish food and let it soak in. Feed this to your fish for a couple of weeks at every feeding. Ich will dissapear off the fish in less than a week. Continue soaking every other feeding for two more weeks (1 month total treatment) Ich gone.

I don't know how to scientifically explain it other than, it works. I've seen it happen several times with my own eyes. Even in situations where several fish had already died from the ich. Garlic started, all fish fine in a week.

 

[shawnkfl]

garlic does help. i've been using it to try to help with ich. it doesn't rid the tank from it though. it supresses it pretty well due to it making the fish eat better, therefore healthier to combat the ich. as soon as i stopped dosing food with it, the ich came right back again. now all of my fish ae in QT so i can get the ich completely out of my system. it sucked having to tear all of my rock out to catch them all, but an ich free tank will be worth it in the end.