Treating ICH. Why Im always too late?

[cthetoy]

Im quarantining my Power Blue Tang fish as it has ich because of the small white spots on him. Im using the hypo method and bringing the salinity to 1.008 over the course of 2 days. However the heavy breathing condition gets worse each day and then the fish dies a few days later. I didnt even get a chance for the ICH to leave the fish body so the hypo can kill the swimming stages of ich. Was there another disease I didnt treat? This happens to most of my fish that comes down with ich over the course of years of my reef experience with trying to treat ich. Once Ich was cured with garlic in my reef tank but now garlic doesnt seem to help that much. Am I misdiagnosing ich?

Ammonia, nitrite, nitrate are all normal. Refractormeter is used for the hypo.

 

[Sk8r]

Oxygen level in qt? Tangs have a fierce oxy requirement. Coupled with the restriction of oxygen exchange due to the parasite, this might be the problem. Try everything you can to hyperoxygenate the water.

 

[cthetoy]

Hyperoxgenate? How would I do that? Im running an external filter with no carbon at about 300GPH in a 20 Gallon quarantine tank? Do I need to add airstones as well to hyperoxgenate to help with its heavy breathing?

 

[kevin2000]

Sorry for your loss.

Hypo does not kill ich on the fish or within the water column .. most people think that hyposalinity works the same as a FW treatment (ich exploding because of osmotic pressure) but that's not really true .. hypo just prevents the ich from hatching and reinfecting the fish ... its not a "quick" cure.

Rapid breathing associated with ich results from the ich destroying gill tissue as well as stress. Hypoxygenation of SW is easier said than done and I question whether it would have any meaningful impact.

Edit: An easy way to beat ich is to QT all of your fish on the front end ... I QT fish with hypo regardless of whether they show signs of ich or not. The hypo also helps relieve stress.

 

[Steven Pro]

In my experience, many Acanthurus species tangs suffer from both ich and velvet. Hyposalinity only affects ich while copper works against both.

 

[cthetoy]

Well this time around it was quite serious. The tangs I had for 5 years had no signs of ich and survived this minor wipeout. I did not quarantine my new fish (Now I will). The new fish were a Heni, and a Juvenille Imperator Angel. All the new fish died within 2 weeks of ICH because all I saw was some white spot. I dont think I had velvet because I could not see the rust colored appearance. I could be wrong. Also the Powder Blue I had for 5 years died as well as my copper band I had for 1 year. My 3 yellow tangs, Blue Tang, Clown fish, and Coral Beauty I had all for 5 years plus had no signs whatsover like if they never had ich. Its frustratring that when I see the first signs of ich thats its too late for me to treat even though I move them to a quarantine tank and use the hypo treatment.

Now whenever I get some new fish I will assume they have ich and treat them. Will hypo effect sensative fishes like Angels and such?

 

[kevin2000]

Hypo should not have an adverse impact on sensitive fish like angels and tangs.

One of your potential problems may be that your show tank has a constant low level infection of ich ... nothing so obvious as to see alot of white spots but enough to keep the ich alive, reduce the overall health of your fish, and occasionally rise during either a stress event or when the acquired ich immunity starts to fail.

I suggest you do a google search for Terry Barltlme's ich article and focus on the immunity section ... ich can aquire immunity to ich and unfortunately that immunity can vary .. if the immunity is total then ich goes away .. if the immunity is partial then ich continues to live/infect at low levels until a new fish arrives or the fish's resistance to the disease drops. Worth a bit of reading.