First hospital tank set up

[PghReef]

Set up a 26 gallon bowfront to treat active ich. Used media from 2 other established tanks in a hob filter along with a seachem ammonia alert badge and a powerhead. The water is about 20 gallons from an established tank and 5 gallons new. Currently testing the old heater to make sure it holds the temp where I want it before adding fish. I didnt get any PVC pipes but had some fake plastic log decor from back when I did freshwater, was thinking of adding some plastic plants too. I dosed the tank wirth copper power to .49 last night. Have 3 little hermits from tank I took down but didnt want to add them to my dt.
I'm assuming anything plastic for a tank should be ok and not absorb the copper or cause issues with maintaining levels correct?
Should I keep my temp at my dt temp of 76 or raise it up to help speed up the life cycle of ich?
Should I add the fish with the levels as is or raise them to 1, let acclimate, then ramp to 1.75? The 2 clowns appear fine but the baby tang has many spots. All still eating in the dt.
Should I do a fw dip on the tang prior to transfer to help, shes had ich the past week or so?

Plan on transferring them over this weekend. Hopefully the 2 clowns dont get to territorial in a 2 foot tank.

 

[ngoodermuth]

Any inverts will not survive copper treatment. If you are running your DT fallow for ich, it's fine to go ahead and put all of your inverts in there now... since they can't host the parasite. They will go "fallow" with your DT, no problem!

Fake decor is fine for QT, just don't want live rock or a ton of sand. 76 is fine for QT, thats the temp @HotRocks recommends. I would add all the fish now, and work on slowly bringing copper up with them in there so that they can adjust. I'd bring it to 1 pretty quickly though, if the tang is that heavily infested... and try to be to 1.5 within 48 hours if you can. You can also give him a freshwater dip prior to transfer, to provide some temporary relief and buy you time to bring up the copper the rest of the way.

 

[PghReef]

Any inverts will not survive copper treatment. If you are running your DT fallow for ich, it's fine to go ahead and put all of your inverts in there now... since they can't host the parasite. They will go "fallow" with your DT, no problem!

Fake decor is fine for QT, just don't want live rock or a ton of sand. 76 is fine for QT, thats the temp @HotRocks recommends. I would add all the fish now, and work on slowly bringing copper up with them in there so that they can adjust. I'd bring it to 1 pretty quickly though, if the tang is that heavily infested... and try to be to 1.5 within 48 hours if you can. You can also give him a freshwater dip prior to transfer, to provide some temporary relief and buy you time to bring up the copper the rest of the way.

AWS
Thanks, the reason for the hermits isn't because of ich. They came from a tank with thousands of aptasia and I dont want them bringing anything in on their shells. I figure if they live and dont grow anything over 80 days itd be safe to add them, and in the meantime they can help clean up food. I read snails never make it but many people have had unexplained success where some hermits survived copper. Figured it's better than just tossing the guys.

 

[ngoodermuth]

The only concern I would have, would be them dying and not noticing right away... and the possibility of an ammonia spike. Ammonia can be difficult to manage in QT as it is. Could you put them in a different container? Maybe just like a rubbermaid with a little heater and airstone and a sacrificial small piece of live rock for bio-filer. It wouldn't take much, and then you can monitor them there without having to worry about the copper killing them or upsetting your QT?

 

[PghReef]

Well the most important step is complete. Caught the fish and transferred them over. The tang is the biggest pain in the rear and took me hours to catch, wedged itself in a rock and doesnt come out even when lifted out of water. Had to destroy my tank to get her. First time for everything I guess, will be qtinf everything from this point forward.

Current copper level is .70. Going to let it sit there for a day or 2 to allow them to acclimate and make sure they continue to eat and then slowly raise to 1.75.