thats it for me for a while.........

ODShaun

Member
I'm about right here of buying fishes, my tank has been up and running 7 months, all my corals doing well except for fishes. Jus t cant seem to keep fishes alive, i had or should i say "have" ich in my tank. I had a purple tang that brought ich to my tank, so i qt all my fishes and got rid of the purple tang. I know what to do to get rid of ich. "QT"... Im just really venting, im just tired of buying and killing fishes.. Over time i'v had about maybe 15 fishes purchased ( not all in at the same time), one dies buy another..All i have left is a scooter blenny one true percula, and a midas blenny. the clown and midas dont look so great. cant catch the midas to qt... If these guys dont make it, thats it, im done buying fishes for a while...I think the scooter blenny dosent get ich, true or false? If so I should buy a whole school of blennies.. thanks for reading people.....:eek2: :rollface: :confused: :mad2:
 
well my fish had ich but it all went away on it's own. No idea but i just feed a good balance diet i guess. I think it's like a common cold. If you're week it'll kill you.
 
What do you feed and how often? Most fish are pretty resilient and can overcome sickness with some good feedings and good water quality. You also have to keep your qt filtered real good because ammonia can build up in them easy. Just set up your qt and keep a chromis in there just to keep some kind of bioload going.
 
when i re-did my QT with seachem cupermine, all my chromisis died within a day. I have 10 gal QT, as the bottle said, i only put in a capfull to start.
 
If you've never caught all your fish and removed them to a QT tank to be treated for ich, then you'll always have some ich present in your main tank. Even if you treat most of your fish in QT and put them back into your main tank which had a fish in it, all the treated fish will eventually be reinfested with ich.

You need to remove ALL fish to QT, treat as needed and let the main tank run empty of fish for 2 months. Then start reintroducing fish and you'll most likely have a lot healthier system going.
 
You also need to be spot on with that copper treatment. Need a test kit and make sure it's in the proper range before you put any fish in there. Then as you do water changes in your QT, be sure the new water that's going in has the proper copper dose before adding it. You don't just want to pour copper into a system with fish in it.
 
if your having that much problems with ich in your display just dont add anymore fish for atleast a month. the ich disease needs to find a host in order to reproduce. if the disease cant find a host the free swimming stage will die in a couple days. then the waiting game starts, to make sure the disease is completely gone you have to make sure all the stages are dead including eggs, the free swimming stage and the parasite (which is on the fish). its very common to see no apparent signs of ich on your fish but in reality there could be a ton of eggs still left to hatch. so thats why you should not add any new fish for atleast a month or two, just to make sure that all eggs have hatched and the free swimmers have died from not being able to find a host. hope this helps
 
Here are a couple tricks Ive been told to use in the past. I cant vouch from experience if they work or not but The people who told me claimed they worked.

1. Aparrently ich doesnt like higher temps, therefore raising the temp a couple degrees (provided its not already realy high) should help.

2. Cleaner shrimp will physically remove them if its hungry and the fish arent scared of him.

3. Copper treatments are a short term remedy. Yes it will kill the ich but it comes back. Instead focus on raising the fishes imune systems. Some people swear that using chemicals to kill ich actually harm the fish, not in a direct way but it allows them to rely on the chemicals therefore thier imune systems never actually get stronger because they allways have someone (metaphoricaly) fighting their battles for them.

4.probably one of the best reasons to get a uv sterilizer is for the eradication of free swimming (larval) ich. It will kill it before it ever touches the fish. lowering your fishes chances of getting ich in the 1st place.

5. Garlic works wonders, I personaly have seen it get real finicky eaters chowing down. Squeeze some cloves over their prepared food or buy some food with it already in it will not only get them to eat a little more but should help raise thier imune systems.

6. The main reason people tell you to keep the water quality in check isnt because ich doesnt like good water, its because it helps place less stress on the fish. Imagine trying to fight a cold in a room filled with cigarette smoke. Less stress= happier and most likely better immune system

Theres another trick, something to do with your lighting periods in your tank lengthening or shortening them I cant remember. I probably shouldnt have even mentioned it.

I personally had only 1 (knock on wood) experience with ich. It was in a large predator tank I had with a clown trigger. I sure as heck didnt wanna lose that fish.

I tried raising the temp I dont know if that had anything to do with my success and I gave him a freshwater bath for 5 mins a day. The ich will detach itself from the fishes body while in the fresh water(not all the ich but a lot). If you try this I recomend using a different batch of fresh RO water for each bath. Also you may want to match the ph with that in your tank as well as the temp to eliminate any shock or stress to the fish itself. Oh, and he lived.

Dont give up Ive had a few friends lose interest in the hobby due to losing battles with ich. I think the real key is understanding the ichs lifecycle and requirements and of course as always proper nutrition, proper nutrition, proper nutrion.
 
I've never seen anywhere that ich doesnt like higher temps, but raising a tank temperature is suggested when treating for ich because higher temperatures = faster life span on the ich. The only part of the ich lifespan you're killing off are the free swimming tomites, so the quicker you can get them to that stage, the faster you can have the ich destroyed.
 
Some fish develop an immunity to ich. Copper and hypo are the only proven methods to killing ich. Velvet isn't affected by hypo, only copper so make sure it is ich if you use hypo. UV does not kill enough to reduce the ich population in a single tank to be affective. UV is only affective at keeping ich from transfering ich from one tank to another (provided flow and UV lamp are matched.) That is what many wholesalers use UV.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13072168#post13072168 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Sabre38
Here are a couple tricks Ive been told to use in the past. I cant vouch from experience if they work or not but The people who told me claimed they worked.

1. Aparrently ich doesnt like higher temps, therefore raising the temp a couple degrees (provided its not already realy high) should help.

2. Cleaner shrimp will physically remove them if its hungry and the fish arent scared of him.

3. Copper treatments are a short term remedy. Yes it will kill the ich but it comes back. Instead focus on raising the fishes imune systems. Some people swear that using chemicals to kill ich actually harm the fish, not in a direct way but it allows them to rely on the chemicals therefore thier imune systems never actually get stronger because they allways have someone (metaphoricaly) fighting their battles for them.

4.probably one of the best reasons to get a uv sterilizer is for the eradication of free swimming (larval) ich. It will kill it before it ever touches the fish. lowering your fishes chances of getting ich in the 1st place.

5. Garlic works wonders, I personaly have seen it get real finicky eaters chowing down. Squeeze some cloves over their prepared food or buy some food with it already in it will not only get them to eat a little more but should help raise thier imune systems.

6. The main reason people tell you to keep the water quality in check isnt because ich doesnt like good water, its because it helps place less stress on the fish. Imagine trying to fight a cold in a room filled with cigarette smoke. Less stress= happier and most likely better immune system

Theres another trick, something to do with your lighting periods in your tank lengthening or shortening them I cant remember. I probably shouldnt have even mentioned it.

I personally had only 1 (knock on wood) experience with ich. It was in a large predator tank I had with a clown trigger. I sure as heck didnt wanna lose that fish.

I tried raising the temp I dont know if that had anything to do with my success and I gave him a freshwater bath for 5 mins a day. The ich will detach itself from the fishes body while in the fresh water(not all the ich but a lot). If you try this I recomend using a different batch of fresh RO water for each bath. Also you may want to match the ph with that in your tank as well as the temp to eliminate any shock or stress to the fish itself. Oh, and he lived.

Dont give up Ive had a few friends lose interest in the hobby due to losing battles with ich. I think the real key is understanding the ichs lifecycle and requirements and of course as always proper nutrition, proper nutrition, proper nutrion.

Wow, quite incorrect on many points:

1) Ich does really well in higher temperature because it helps them speed up their life cycle so that they can reproduce faster. However, raising the temp when doing copper or hypo is good for us because it'll push them into their free swimming stage faster, making them vulnerable to getting killed by copper and hypo.

2) Cleaner shrimp cannot remove ich that is on your fish

3) Copper is very effective in completely eradicating ich parasites. But make sure you treat the fish for long enough.

4) UV can kill some, but not all free-swimming parasites

5) Garlic is like vitamins for humans. Vitamins alone are not enough to treat serious illnesses in humans

6) I agree

Ich will not detach when dipped in freshwater. The parasites are buried under the skin and are protected. If your fish had Velvet, then freshwater dips will help remove SOME of the parasites, but most times NOT all of them.

Copper and hyposalinity all the way!
 
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