Dang... Ich...

[mattsreefadise]

So... In all my excitement of getting my tanks stocked back up from the move, I might have completely disregarded a qt tank... (Well mainly, I didn't have room)
And I have a tank full of tangs, and I saw a real nice clown tang at a local LFS.. And like a dummy, I bought him and didn't do any qting/ parasite treatment at all...
So I wake up a few days ago and my blue hibbo tang is covered in ich...
So. The Battle Begins!!!
Temp has been raised to 80 degrees. Salinity is slowly getting lowered, and garlic is getting introduced back into the diet.
And of course, my lion is a boss and is ich free.
So, my question.
What has been your experience with ich?
What treatment helped the most?
How do you treat in a tank full of corals?

 

[reefrookie88]

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[bamareef]

Are u doing hypo with corals?

 

[Mike J.]

Well, raising the temp, feeding garlic, and lowering the specific gravity are all rumors that will not cure fish infected with ich. There is no way to treat for ich in a tank with corals. You can hope that you can manage the parasite, but the fish will still suffer.

 

[bamareef]

No ideal treatment for corals. I suggest setting up another tank.
Lowering Salinity with corals = $$$ down the drain.

 

[bamareef]

You can go fishless for 4 to 6 weeks. It will die in the DT without a host fish. You can do a RO/DI Water dip. That will help knock it out. Most do about 5 to 10 minutes in dip.

 

[mattsreefadise]

Well, raising the temp, feeding garlic, and lowering the specific gravity are all rumors that will not cure fish infected with ich. There is no way to treat for ich in a tank with corals. You can hope that you can manage the parasite, but the fish will still suffer.

The garlic is, yes. Put the raising temp WILL absolutely speed up the life cycle. Lower salinity WILL kill ich. If the corals die from hypo, so will the parasites. Garlic doesn't kill ich, instead it helps keep the fish appetite up. And keeping stress down on fish is the most important part of this whole thing..
I've decides to pull out the hippo and dose him with hypo. I'm hoping everything else in the tank is strong enough to fight it off.
So far everybody is eating well, staying active, and none of the fish are hyper ventilating.
I've defeated ich before in my first tank by removing all the rock and substrate and raising temp, and lowering salinity. (The tank was FOWLR)
So, let's see what we can do.

 

[mattsreefadise]

You can go fishless for 4 to 6 weeks. It will die in the DT without a host fish. You can do a RO/DI Water dip. That will help knock it out. Most do about 5 to 10 minutes in dip.

Yes, this has helped in the past. But mother nature has a funny way of keeping her creatures alive.

 

[aslmx]

I used powdered ginger and haven't seen any ich since. Do a YouTube search. Worked for me. Fish are fat and healthy and eat like pigs. Blue hippos seem to be the best fish to get ich. I don't even try to keep one anymore.

 

[mattsreefadise]

Powdered Ginger, huh? That's a new one for me.

 

[Mike J.]

Since you believe in fairy tales - 1/4 tspn per gallon of mint extract will cure tangs of ich.

 

[NanaReefer]

Since you believe in fairy tales - 1/4 tspn per gallon of mint extract will cure tangs of ich.

Kinda rude don't you think

 

[mattsreefadise]

Since you believe in fairy tales - 1/4 tspn per gallon of mint extract will cure tangs of ich.

Actually I don't believe it fairy tales. There has been many, many scientific studies on ich. And the only proven 3 ways to cure ich are:
Copper based medications (obviously bad for corals)
Hyposalinity (once again, bad for inverts-which includes coral and Ichthyophthirius multifiliis, or ich in case your too stupid to read that whole thing.
And lastly,
Tank transfer.
Those are the proven methods of actually killing the ich. Were not sure which stage it actually kills the ich, but at some point, it does.
Know what else will kill ich?
Starvation.
If you keep the fish's immune system up, then the parasites has nothing to eat. And will die.
Weird. Lawyered.

 

[gcrawford]

My powder brown developed ich after bringing him home a couple of years ago. I put him in a 10 gallon QT with a large pvc plumbing union large enough for him to swim in/through. I used copper safe and followed the directions on the box which worked perfectly. I think it's important that they feel safe while under medication. Also QT wade bare bottom. He's now the big king of the tank. Beautiful fish. Hope that helps and good luck!

 

[mattsreefadise]

That's what I'm doing for my hippo. Just gotta catch this sucker... Lol.
...dorie..... Dddooorriiee.... DOOOORRIIEE!

 

[aslmx]

Since you believe in fairy tales - 1/4 tspn per gallon of mint extract will cure tangs of ich.

you are correct about fairy tales. I read somewhere that LEDs grow corals. That one bit me in the rear bad. Calcium reactors are the way to go.... Lol. You've got to have ro/di water.... One of my favorites. You can take tangs out of the ocean and put them in an aquarium as long as it's 6' long. I've heard them all.

 

[NeuroticAquatics]

Do you have corals? I did not see that anywhere, but might have missed it in between all the other nonsense on this thread. Copper, Hypo and Tank transfer are indeed the ONLY proven cures, but copper and hypo will not work if you have corals.

I prefer hypo as it does not subject the fish to anything that can do damage, like copper. Tank transfer works, but takes a lot of work.

 

[mattsreefadise]

Ah, yes. I do have plenty of corals, thus my dilemma. Im going to do a hypo treatment on the hippo. I found some real estate and set up a 10 gallon qt tank.
Now I just have to catch here

 

[mattsreefadise]

you are correct about fairy tales. I read somewhere that LEDs grow corals. That one bit me in the rear bad. Calcium reactors are the way to go.... Lol. You've got to have ro/di water.... One of my favorites. You can take tangs out of the ocean and put them in an aquarium as long as it's 6' long. I've heard them all.

Not sure what you are implying here?

 

[rayn]

Just pulling one fish and leaving the others ownt get rid of the ich. One you put the hippo back, without a clean DT, ich will reemerge on the hippo.

QT all your fish and let the DT go fallow. If you are going through all the trouble to QT one fish you might as well do them all in my opinion.