Powder brown tang with Ich - Hypo Help

[shluffer]

I picked up a powder brown three days ago. He has nipped at some food, but not much. He was eating in the store (not sure why he stopped)

I took a look at him this evening (he is in a QT) and he has white spots. I'm thinking Ich. I'm going to go with hypo salinity treatment. I have read up but would like to make sure that I am not doing anything wrong.

I'm going to drop the salinity in the QT from 1.25 to 1.13 over a couple of hours tonight.

Tomorrow, I'm going to lower it to 1.009. I have a refractometer to measure with.

I have matched the PH and temp for the water change. I will check params in the QT daily.

Anything else I need to do? I am keeping nuri (soaked in garlic) in the tank for the guy to eat. I'm hoping that he will start eating during the process, but my hopes are not high.

any (and all) advice is appreciated.

One thing I'm wondering, should I drop the salinity faster or slower than this?

 

[sfboarders]

You are on the right track. Get new batches of 1.009 water ready for your WC. Also check your pH twice a day. Drip cooked baking soda/RODI mixture to get pH up. I also recommend a seachem ammonia alert badge. You can use Prime or Amquel + when doing hypo. Good luck!

 

[shluffer]

Thanks for your encouragement!

I will continue to post where I am on this, if folks will continue to read it. I'm looking for feedback that I'm not completely messing this up.

I checked params this morning. Everything looks good, except my PH was at 7.8. He still does not seem to be eating.

I added a very small amount of dissolved baking soda, and did about a gallon water change.

I plan on changing about a gallon (5%) twice a day until the tank cycles. The tank was fully cycled, but I'm assuming that the bacteria will die off from the hypo. The night change will siphon the bottom (gotta get them eggs before they hatch). It should also help with food that he doesn't eat. In the morning, I just don't have time. I also plan on switching out the nuri in the afternoons. I'm going to go through more of it than usual.

 

[wooden_reefer]

I picked up a powder brown three days ago. He has nipped at some food, but not much. He was eating in the store (not sure why he stopped)

I took a look at him this evening (he is in a QT) and he has white spots. I'm thinking Ich. I'm going to go with hypo salinity treatment. I have read up but would like to make sure that I am not doing anything wrong.

I'm going to drop the salinity in the QT from 1.25 to 1.13 over a couple of hours tonight.

Tomorrow, I'm going to lower it to 1.009. I have a refractometer to measure with.

I have matched the PH and temp for the water change. I will check params in the QT daily.

Anything else I need to do? I am keeping nuri (soaked in garlic) in the tank for the guy to eat. I'm hoping that he will start eating during the process, but my hopes are not high.

any (and all) advice is appreciated.

One thing I'm wondering, should I drop the salinity faster or slower than this?

What is the history?

Did you get it for a very low price or free? If you are paying a lot for a fish, you should have planned in advance. You should have set up the Qt, which means cycling the medium for QT.

Now, if you have a large DT, you can try to rob some bacteria from the DT. You can drip return water on a sponge, for example. You cannot hope to collect enough bacteria from the DT by just placing the sponge any where in the sump. DT water has to drip over the sponge, or you can run a power filter in DT with the sponge to collect bacteria in the DT.

 

[wooden_reefer]

I never visit any LFS to browse around unless I have an active medium for QT standing by.

Otherwise there is no point in browsing any LFS for livestock.

 

[shluffer]

I'm not sure I did anything different than you would. The fish has not made it into my DT.

I keep a sponge filter in the sump of my DT (a 120 with a sump). When I set up my QT (20 gallon long) I use water from the main system and the sponge filter that was stored in the sump of the DT. I have never had any cycling issues in my QT (no amonia or nitrite spikes).

As I drop the salinity in the tank, I would expect the bacteria to die off. This should cause a cycle (a mini cycle at a minimum).

As for tank history, I'm not sure what you are looking for. Its a 20 gallon long. It is bare bottom with PVC caves. I feed nuri and pellets. Any pelets not eaten I try to net (I leave them in for a couple hours). The nuri stays for 24 hours.

I have water standing by at 1.009 for water changes (freshly mixed). I also have freshwater available for topoff. I don't get much evaporation because the QT is covered.

Is there something I should have done differently? Is this sponge filter method inadequate?

 

[shluffer]

A question about the Hypo process. How long should it be before the number of white spots decreases? Am I correct that I will not get a decrease untill I hit 1.009?

 

[wooden_reefer]

I'm not sure I did anything different than you would. The fish has not made it into my DT.

I keep a sponge filter in the sump of my DT (a 120 with a sump). When I set up my QT (20 gallon long) I use water from the main system and the sponge filter that was stored in the sump of the DT. I have never had any cycling issues in my QT (no amonia or nitrite spikes).

I ALWAYS deliberately cycle any medium intended for QT. Robbing from DT is good as a last resource but not by plan, not in advance.

You aften will have ammonia in QT if you had not deliberately cycled the medium for QT. It depends on the bioload in QT and how good you are at robbing bacteria from the DT.

Ask yourself why would a lot of nitrification bacteria live on a sponge you put in DT for 10 or whatever number of days. You have a better chance of getting enough bacteria if return water from DT drips over the sponge, FWIS.

Far superior is cycling the medium in a separate container for 5 or fewer weeks prior to getting any fish, which I always do. You can augment the nitrification activity in a medium in just two or even one week of exposure to enough ammonia. You can be confident that there will be enough for most situations, in general.

 

[sfboarders]

A question about the Hypo process. How long should it be before the number of white spots decreases? Am I correct that I will not get a decrease untill I hit 1.009?

You should see the decrease as you lower salinity. The countdown begins after you see the last white spot.

 

[shluffer]

Update:

PH: 8.2
Ammonia: 0
SG: 1.009

I have not seen the him eat yet, but he does seem to be swimming around more, and breathing easier.

I'll update tomorrow.

 

[sfboarders]

What else you trying to feed besides nori? My yellow and blue hippo love spectrum Thera a pellets, mysis shrimp, frozen formula 1, and rods food.

 

[shluffer]

sfboarders - I tried feeding mysis and pellets.

My parameters were fine this morning, and he was swimming around.

He didn't make it through the day though. I'm going to have to try and figure out what I did wrong. My first 9 fish made it from QT to DT without a loss. My last two did not. The issue could be that I'm trying to get a tang to survive the process, which may be more difficult than the other fish I have. Then again, my yellow tang survived.

Wooden-reefer, I appreciate any input you have, but would like it if you would soften your tone a little. My QT procedure (using a sponge from my sump and water from my DT) can be sourced from Steven Pro. I'm not saying that he is the end of all discusion, just that he is a source. He mentions it in an article where he is discussing marine ich. A quote from the article:

I prefer to filter the tank with sponge filters. I usually have one running but tucked away in the sump of my display tank. This way, I can keep the quarantine tank empty and packed away in the garage when it is not needed. Some people may be concerned about the sponge filter acting as a so-called "nitrate factory", but the amount of nitrate produced from a comparatively small sponge filter should be negligible. When I do need to use the quarantine tank, I merely drain some water out of the display tank into the quarantine tank, add the sponge filter and a heater (I generally target 80°- 82°F to speed up the life cycle of any parasites), and it is ready.

The article can be found at: http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-08/sp/index.php.

My next issue is cleaning out the QT, as well as the sponge filter and the heater. Is it enough to wash everything off and let it dry out, or is there something additional I need to do?

I undertsand that ich will die after a time (30 days?) if it has no host. It seems silly to me to leave a tank running empty for this purpose. Drying it out should work, unless the eggs go dormant. I'm not sure if they do.

All comments are appreciated.