Ozone benefits to combating Ick?

[lemadl]

Guys,

I had ick in one of my tanks, (95 wave tank, reef setup) 3 months ago. Man it was hell. I had to decide if my fish were more important to me than my corals and inverts. I decided to sacrifice my fish over the others.

That thought lasted 1 hour. I therefore decided to strip down my reef, and extracted my fish....man what a nightmare. Luckly all my corals and inverts faired well.

I thought of treating my fish while in the reef tank, but took a friends advice and removed them. The logic sounded great....extract the fish, keep the reef "fish free" for 8 weeks. Then put all the treated fish back in.

Well despite my best efforts, to not stress the fish, the catching, transport to the QT tank, new confinements, stressed the fish to the point of no return. Despite everything I did, they did not make it.

So it appeared the very attempt to remedy the Ick outbreak aided in the demise of my fish. I know people have experienced this as well, as I doubt I am the lone soul that "experienced" this disaster. The cost is one thing, but to lose the fish was heart breaking.

2 days ago I was talking to a guy that has kept reef and FOWLR tanks for over 20 years. He has had several outrbreaks in his tanks over the years, but NEVER removed the fish. He did frequent water changes, improved flow, fed Garlic, kept chemistry parameters perfect, etc. 95% of his stock survived.

I am sure removing the fish to a QT is obviously smart, but does carry with it its own set of risks.

He mentioned to me that he "believes" Ozone may also help in killing the water borne parasites, thereby limiting their numbers in his tank.

Based on my limited reading and less knowledge on the beneficial effect of Ozone in the Ick parasite, I am hoping someone could provide insight or experience with Ozone.

He also said that "every" tank housing fish, with live rock has the parasite (if the rock came from the ocean), which was the case in my tank). He said the trick is to keep their numbers in check, and not provide them with ideal conditions to multiply out of control.

Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to be as thorough as I could.

Thanks so much for reading this, and possibly replying with your experiences on Ozone and our enemy for life.......Ick!!!

 

[Rondelet]

Having installed and operated a couple different ozone systems at a commercial salmon hatchery, I can provide some insight. Ozone will significantly reduce numbers of the infectious stages of the parasite - but will not eliminate them. Many commercial facilities use ozone to reduce the infectious burden in their systems. It's also great when used in protein skimming. However, such systems are very expensive, are used to manage very high value stock at higher than normal densities, and have lots of expertise running them. The biggest risk you have with ozone is if it gets into your system - and at some point it will. When this happens, it will probably kill some (or possible all) of your fish and inverts. If you ask just about any hatchery manager with ozone experience, they will probably relate a story about killing fish with it. Because the cost, risks and expertise required for running ozone systems, I think there are much better, and cheaper, ways to managing ich in systems maintained by hobbyists. Further, don't forget that ozone is non-selective and kills just about everything it comes into contact with. Thus, it will also take out a lot of beneficial organisms (beneficial to your corals and fish) that might be colonising your system/water column. Seems to me, using ozone to manage ich would be analogous to delivering pizzas with a tractor/tailor rig.

The presence/absence of ich in fish tanks is a hotly debated issue. My personal view is that fish can live with ich and that outbreaks are more indicative of other issue going on with the system causing a lot of stress in the fish. While it may be present on liverock, if you quarantine the rock in the absence of fish host for a suitable period of time (cf 8 weeks), the parasite will essentially die out. I think fish are a more risky source, since even after quarantine they could be harbouring very low levels of the parasite. Quarantine with prophylactic treatment will reduce this risk significantly, but depending on the treatment protocol will not eliminate it 100%.