PBT ich: more harm than good due to aggressive approach???

[DOGGIE750]

RC folks:
Few days ago PBT was covered with The ICH but still look strong. For efficiency, I was planning to remove 50% water from the QT BB 120G tank and treat all the fish with copper, remove some softies too this weekend.

Please see my thoughts below:

• PBT this AM looks good, seemed like ICH are mostly gone. I will remove most LR with softies.

• Beneficial copepods/ bristleworms aren't copper safe so I have to remove majority of LR and rearranging LR that will causing more stress.

I am afraid I would do more harm than good. Should I proceed?

•Note: ~15 Fish have another 90days in the QT to make it to the DT. For now this is their home, do I need to use a pskimmer?


Please advise.

Thank you.

 

[Louis Z]

I apologize. I do not understand. Are u keeping live rock and softies in the same QT or HT tank as the fish?

 

[Sapelo]

I'm with Louis Z. If it's a QT tank, it should not have inverts which would enable you to treat the PBT in whatever method you prefer. It sounds like your QT tank is not a true QT tank.
The reason for not keeping LR and other inverts in the QT tank is for situations exactly like this: they make treating a problem all but impossible. LR has a tendency to absorb any treatment you would apply (that's why we use it as a filtration method) which would mean that if you use say copper to treat the ICH you will then have copper in your LR. The LR will also interfere with the amount of copper you should dose since it will absorb some that will not be available for the fish.
I have no idea what size QT tank you have holding 15 fish, but if the PBT had ICH then it still has ICH and the others have been exposed and need to be treated as well.
A protein skimmer has nothing to do with how you treat ICH.
As for stressing the fish -- if it has ICH then you have a larger problem than whether or not you create stress.

If it were my tank, I'd remove EVERYTHING except the fish (and you have two choices with what you remove: pitch it or hold it fish-less for 72 days to eliminate the ICH) and do a tank transfer with all remaining fish (see STICKY on ICH treatment).
I feel almost certain that is not going to be practical with the 15 fish which leaves you with hypo or copper as your other possible treatments.

Regardless, it sounds like you QT plan is faulty. The idea of QT is to keep it as bare minimum as possible to allow for treatments without exposing Lr or inverts.

If you PBT showed ICH, the ICH is still there, will return stronger than ever, and must be dealt with appropriately.

Good luck.