Added fish with Ich to DT

[dabeling]

Second post. Long time lurker. 1 year in with a pretty successful tank so far.

I know I will likely get lambasted for this but I'm slightly drunk and thought I would share - my LFS - the only one I trust in Austin - is owned by an old Texan who is basically a dick and happy to tell you when your wrong and happy to tell you that you can't buy a certain coral or fish because it's not right.

We all know LFS's are often wrong often and want to sell you the fish. Anyway, I bought a purple tang that has Ich. It's visible.

The LFS says every fish has it in the wild and when diving you can see it. He says often the hypo Salinity at most fish stores reduces it. He doesn't hypo since its an easier transition to most Of his customers Dts. Anyway, regardless of his reasoning I bought it.

PS - I used to QT but it was a pain in the butt and I had a fish die after transferring to the QT.

So my LFS who has a beautiful (probably 400 gallon tank) says he doesn't believe in QT and moving a fish to a small tank with no live rock and not enough room to hide is not a good idea - not to mention the swings in nitrates, ammonia, etc. if you plan to proactively treat with cupramine (which is what I was doing). And then moving them again to a DT is stressful and Ich takes advantage of stress. He has been reefing for 15 plus years and knows a lot IMO. But I do know the majority of successful reefers QT, at least on the forums.

This was music to my ears.

Log story short. I bought the purple tang and a yellow tang (yellow has no visible signs of Ich) and after a brief acclimation, let them go.

I'm on day 2.

There is a bit of new tang fighting but other than that things seem fine. I only have the two new tangs, a few wrasse, a Blenny, and a goby and a clown. Both tangs are eating and getting along fine with the other fish.

What are my chances of surviving with all fish being fine?

My purple tang has white dots - i would say about 20 visible dots.

 

[twilliard]

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/two-methodoligies-to-keep-a-reef-tank.226995/unread
Is a good read
Now back to the ich!
I too have had a fish in the past with ich in the dt. When in good health went away never to appear on any other fish.
You can pull and qt but up to you.
Chances of survival.. feed well with a good diverse food and may pull right out of it

 

[shoelaceike]

+1 feed well, soak food and get a cleaner shrimp.

 

[Humblefish]

@dabeling I think this article is perfect for you: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/ich-eradication-vs-ich-management.188775/

 

[jujuman16]

@dabeling I think this article is perfect for you: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/ich-eradication-vs-ich-management.188775/

The link on this post pretty much nails it.

Second post. Long time lurker. 1 year in with a pretty successful tank so far.

I know I will likely get lambasted for this but I'm slightly drunk and thought I would share - my LFS - the only one I trust in Austin - is owned by an old Texan who is basically a dick and happy to tell you when your wrong and happy to tell you that you can't buy a certain coral or fish because it's not right.

We all know LFS's are often wrong often and want to sell you the fish. Anyway, I bought a purple tang that has Ich. It's visible.

The LFS says every fish has it in the wild and when diving you can see it. He says often the hypo Salinity at most fish stores reduces it. He doesn't hypo since its an easier transition to most Of his customers Dts. Anyway, regardless of his reasoning I bought it.

PS - I used to QT but it was a pain in the *** and I had a fish die after transferring to the QT.

So my LFS who has a beautiful (probably 400 gallon tank) says he doesn't believe in QT and moving a fish to a small tank with no live rock and not enough room to hide is not a good idea - not to mention the swings in nitrates, ammonia, etc. if you plan to proactively treat with cupramine (which is what I was doing). And then moving them again to a DT is stressful and Ich takes advantage of stress. He has been reefing for 15 plus years and knows a lot IMO. But I do know the majority of successful reefers QT, at least on the forums.

This was music to my ears.

Log story short. I bought the purple tang and a yellow tang (yellow has no visible signs of Ich) and after a brief acclimation, let them go.

I'm on day 2.

There is a bit of new tang fighting but other than that things seem fine. I only have the two new tangs, a few wrasse, a Blenny, and a goby and a clown. Both tangs are eating and getting along fine with the other fish.

What are my chances of surviving with all fish being fine?

My purple tang has white dots - i would say about 20 visible dots.

You know I went to Austin recently for work and I visited a few stores. I met one individual who came to mind as soon as i read your post. This guy talked people into getting rid of their "high end modern lighting" and switching to VHOs. Told them that the reason their corals are doing horrible is because their radions, AIs, t5 etc, are no good new technology. The other stores were upset because customers were coming back complaining that they spent a lot of money on lights at their store when the real deal were VHOs. The real issues had nothing to do with lighting.

I get to travel a bit and any chance i get i like to visit stores and see how different places do things.

 

[twilliard]

The link on this post pretty much nails it.



You know I went to Austin recently for work and I visited a few stores. I met one individual who came to mind as soon as i read your post. This guy talked people into getting rid of their "high end modern lighting" and switching to VHOs. Told them that the reason their corals are doing horrible is because their radions, AIs, t5 etc, are no good new technology. The other stores were upset because customers were coming back complaining that they spent a lot of money on lights at their store when the real deal were VHOs. The real issues had nothing to do with lighting.

Classic!
I remember my days of VHO.

 

[dabeling]

The link on this post pretty much nails it.



You know I went to Austin recently for work and I visited a few stores. I met one individual who came to mind as soon as i read your post. This guy talked people into getting rid of their "high end modern lighting" and switching to VHOs. Told them that the reason their corals are doing horrible is because their radions, AIs, t5 etc, are no good new technology. The other stores were upset because customers were coming back complaining that they spent a lot of money on lights at their store when the real deal were VHOs. The real issues had nothing to do with lighting.

I get to travel a bit and any chance i get i like to visit stores and see how different places do things.

Yep. This is my store. He really hates LEDs (which I use) and swears by metal halide.

He's definitely not pushing VHO but does have a few t5s.

I will say he knows the most about reef keeping in the Austin LFS, has the cleanest water and healthiest corals. But he comes off as a know it all. Looking at his reviews on Yelp you see the exact same thing.

 

[dabeling]

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/two-methodoligies-to-keep-a-reef-tank.226995/unread
Is a good read
Now back to the ich!
I too have had a fish in the past with ich in the dt. When in good health went away never to appear on any other fish.
You can pull and qt but up to you.
Chances of survival.. feed well with a good diverse food and may pull right out of it

Thanks Twilliard - I'm a fan of your tank btw. I soak with garlic and selcon and feed LRS and Rods frozen.

Hoping for the best and hoping the aggression between the two doesn't make it worse.

 

[Brian Kim]

It's a good idea to keep your lights off for a day if aggression exist on new acquired tangs. I just got an achilles and purple tang 2 days ago and keeping my lights off for a day stopped the aggression.

 

[Humblefish]

Classic!
I remember my days of VHO.

I still use 'em! You can't beat them for actinic lighting with MH. And no, I'm not secretly a LFS owner from Austin. I have some LEDs... in a box somewhere.

 

[Breakthecycle2]

Stress does trigger but ICH, but only if the tank or fish already has it. Ir doesn't just magically appear. My opinion is, you did yourself and tank a disservice by knowingly adding a fish that is diseased into your tank. On to QT...yes, you will have ammonia/nitrite spikes but only if you do not have a QT tank constantly running, which is the easiest IMO to do. Yeah, you can get away with ICH in your tank and if they are healthy, they won't show any signs, however, just because there are no signs of the disease doesn't mean it magically went away. There are people that painstakingly avoid doing anything to introduce any type of disease into their tanks.

 

[ou12004]

Haha sadly I know just what store you went to. I stopped going there, not sure how he stays in business with that attitude. Good luck with the tang it is a beautiful fish.

 

[dabeling]

Haha sadly I know just what store you went to. I stopped going there, not sure how he stays in business with that attitude. Good luck with the tang it is a beautiful fish.

I agree but I haven't found stores with better quality stuff in Austin. And I'm not a big fan of shopping online for fish or corals.

 

[dabeling]

Stress does trigger but ICH, but only if the tank or fish already has it. Ir doesn't just magically appear. My opinion is, you did yourself and tank a disservice by knowingly adding a fish that is diseased into your tank. On to QT...yes, you will have ammonia/nitrite spikes but only if you do not have a QT tank constantly running, which is the easiest IMO to do. Yeah, you can get away with ICH in your tank and if they are healthy, they won't show any signs, however, just because there are no signs of the disease doesn't mean it magically went away. There are people that painstakingly avoid doing anything to introduce any type of disease into their tanks.

I know QT is the way to go but the option of Ich management is so much more appealing anyway, I have Ich in the tank for sure now and this is my only option moving forward. Keep everyone happy, feed quality stuff and pray for the best.

PS - on day 3 now and purple tang is looking better and eats like a pig. Love that fish.

 

[Lynchmob3000]

Cleaner wrasse cleaner shrimp and selcon soak spirilina mysis and I'll take algae sheets to a small cheese grater let soak with spirilina

 

[Breakthecycle2]

Cleaner wrasse cleaner shrimp and selcon soak spirilina mysis and I'll take algae sheets to a small cheese grater let soak with spirilina

Cleaner shrimp and cleaner wrasses don't eat ICH, they are primarily eating dead skin.

 

[Lynchmob3000]

Cleaner shrimp and cleaner wrasses don't eat ICH, they are primarily eating dead skin.

You quote me like I said they do! They have been known to dislodge ich from the fish tho, beneficial right?

 

[robert]

Cleaner shrimp and cleaner wrasses don't eat ICH, they are primarily eating dead skin.

As part of a project to develop a vaccine for ich they actually gave several groups of yellow tangs ich - and housed some with cleaner wrasses some without - the ich dose was so severe that even the cleaner wrasses came down with the parasite and in some cases died along with many of the tangs.

It was an interesting note in the study however - in the tanks where the cleaner wrasse survived - there were no tang deaths. Now this might just mean that those particular tanks they induced a milder outbreak - but none the less everybody likes the cleaner wrasse...

 

[jujuman16]

I agree but I haven't found stores with better quality stuff in Austin. And I'm not a big fan of shopping online for fish or corals.

I think the best store out of the 3 I went to was River City Aquatics (I think that was the name). The store owner was a pretty cool dude, and the livestock looked good.

Now for the ich, if you are not going to quarantine all the fish, get yourself a big ol' UV sterilizer from ebay, and mix in garlic and vitamins on your fish food. Research it. Not saying it will fix the issue, but 2 people I know went that route and suffered no losses and haven't seen ich on a fish in years. Now it doesn't guarantee anything, but i have seen folks who don't do anything and lose all their fish.

 

[saltyhog]

In your case Ich management is obviously the easiest path and might turn out ok. Good nutrition, pristine water conditon and avoiding over crowding gives you your best chance to "live with it".

I will have to strongly disagree with his assertion that every fish in nature has Ich and it's visible. I don't remember the percentage on the studies I read (and the fish involved weren't the usual fish we keep in aquariums) but it was only a small percentage of wild fish with Ich. I don't know where he dives but in ~75 dives in the Caribbean and Hawaii I've never seen a fish with visible Ich. I've seen a few Atlantic Blue Tangs rubbing on rock but that wasn't necessarily Ich and it wasn't visible on them.