Ich management or quaratine?

[Chayster]

My first round of fish (2 years old) were wipe last March due to velvet. I ended up leaving the tank fallow for almost 3 months. I recently purchase new set of fish (lg blue tang, sm naso, sm brown tang, 2 snowflake clown, bicolor benny, sm fox face, med butterfly and sm kole tang). The tank size is a 180 gallon with a 40 sump.

All of the fish were at in copper for 2 weeks and showed no sign of ich. Since I introduce the fish into the DT, Brown tang had large dots after 2 weeks of being in the DT. I haven't introduce any new coral or new fish during that time. A few days later all the other had ich. Blue tang had the most. They are all eating well besides the naso which passed 3 days ago.

I am currently running aa green killing ma chine 25w and feeding reef frenzy/brine mix with garlic, vitamix and light ginger.

The smaller fish seems to be doing alot better with light-no visible sign of ich. Blue hippo seem to have the same amount but hes eating alot.

I just set up 20 gallon quaratine tank last but I'm worried about catching them and stressing them out alot more. I did this to my previous set of fish and everything died since they wouldn't eat after the transfer. I made sure the water temp, salinity etc was the same as my main.

Main tank water quality
Ph 8.2
Ammonia 0.25
Nitrites 0
Nitrate 0

I am at lost and I dont know what to do at this point. It have been about 1.5 weeks since they have gotten ICH. I am torn between ich management or to qt them. I had bad experience qting. Any advice or tips would be highly appreciated!!!

 

[Viking_Reefing]

Here we go, this has the potential to get messy [emoji1]

Well, I personally don’t believe in QT for ich (especially not with copper and other poisonous substances) since, in my view, you will never lose a fish to ich provided that you provide them with proper husbandry in a stable, stress-free environment with lots of nutritious food.

I would personally reduce stress as much as possible and make sure that they are feed much and often with a varied diet, in conjunction with good water parameters.

Best of luck, you will get a lot of opinions on the matter.

 

[Chayster]

Here we go, this has the potential to get messy [emoji1]

Well, I personally don’t believe in QT for ich (especially not with copper and other poisonous substances) since, in my view, you will never lose a fish to ich provided that you provide them with proper husbandry in a stable, stress-free environment with lots of nutritious food.

I would personally reduce stress as much as possible and make sure that they are feed much and often with a varied diet, in conjunction with good water parameters.

Best of luck, you will get a lot of opinions on the matter.

What would you do if the fish no longer wants to eat? My naso was eating just fine until he was covered in ich spots

 

[EmdeReef]

Check this out for good info on management:

Ich eradication vs. Ich management

Ich eradication vs. Ich management The purpose of this article is to discuss the pros & cons of ich eradication and ich management, and present the best methods for implementing each. Ich eradication - Simply put, this method means doing everything possible to keep ich out of your tank. That...

www.reef2reef.com

The main challenge of ich management IME is that not all fish seem to develop sufficient immunity no matter the period. Over time those fish don’t do well. Tangs are usually in the category of more challenged fish to keep in an ich management tank due to their thin mucous. If a fish stops eating, assuming it’s due to ich, it would mean the infection is too overwhelming.

A 25W UV will do nothing for ich.

You could try DE filters and hydrogen peroxide ( if you don’t have any shrimp in the tank). The goal of management is to lower the viral load to a point that infections become mild and potentially asymptomatic. This is accomplished by filtration, chemicals, or over time assuming fish develop at least partial immunity.

One very important thing to keep in mind is that management can quickly go sideways as soon as you add a new fish to the mix.

 

[Chayster]

Check this out for good info on management:

Ich eradication vs. Ich management

Ich eradication vs. Ich management The purpose of this article is to discuss the pros & cons of ich eradication and ich management, and present the best methods for implementing each. Ich eradication - Simply put, this method means doing everything possible to keep ich out of your tank. That...

www.reef2reef.com

The main challenge of ich management IME is that not all fish seem to develop sufficient immunity no matter the period. Over time those fish don’t do well. Tangs are usually in the category of more challenged fish to keep in an ich management tank due to their thin mucous. If a fish stops eating, assuming it’s due to ich, it would mean the infection is too overwhelming.

A 25W UV will do nothing for ich.

You could try DE filters and hydrogen peroxide ( if you don’t have any shrimp in the tank). The goal of management is to lower the viral load to a point that infections become mild and potentially asymptomatic. This is accomplished by filtration, chemicals, or over time assuming fish develop at least partial immunity.

One very important thing to keep in mind is that management can quickly go sideways as soon as you add a new fish to the mix.

I guess I'll go with quaratine. Would be a 29gallon tank be okay for the treatment?. The blue hipp is almost 6 inch in length. I do have another 10 gallon that I can put the clowns and smaller fish in. Any suggestion on how togeoup them for treatment?

 

[Viking_Reefing]

What would you do if the fish no longer wants to eat? My naso was eating just fine until he was covered in ich spots

In that case I would try putting it in hypo.
Do you have the correct flow rate through your UV filter to kill free floating parasites?

 

[Chayster]

In that case I would try putting it in hypo.
Do you have the correct flow rate through your UV filter to kill free floating parasites?

I set the flow to the lowest setting but I was told it wouldn't do anything

 

[Jet915]

Your UV is undersized so it wont do anything for parasites. Id also feed nori if u havent started that.

 

[Chayster]

Your UV is undersized so it wont do anything for parasites. Id also feed nori if u havent started that.

I'm going to qt the fish. The brown powder is covered under blue light. Would running the uv in the 29 gallon mix with copper work?

 

[JenniferMcK]

I'm going to qt the fish. The brown powder is covered under blue light. Would running the uv in the 29 gallon mix with copper work?

No you can't run uv sterilizer and copper at the same time. From what I've read, the uv sterilizer can dilute the copper concentration and make it less effective. Also I have read that hype isn't effective on certain strains of ich. I personally just use copper when I quarantine new fish. I don't knock anyone for their methods or how they keep their fish fish. This is just personally what I do bc I've lost so many fish and money, until I started using @HotRocks protocall. Here's a good thread to read through:

Thread Links to All Things Quarantine - Fish/Inverts

The original comprehensive guide to quarantine by @Humblefish How to Quarantine Also by @Humblefish, this pretty much speaks for itself. The Do's and Dont's of Quarantine The dangers of Aerosol Transmission by @Humblefish Aerosol transmission Information on Bio-film and its impact on...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[rkpetersen]

From what I've read, the uv sterilizer can dilute the copper concentration and make it less effective.

Reference please?
Because this particular idea makes little scientific sense.
Ionic copper is just Cu++; passing through UV radiation will do nothing to it.
Chelated copper could possibly be dissociated from the chelating agent by UV (I suppose).
But even then, it would convert to ionic copper, making it more potent, not less so.

 

[JenniferMcK]

Reference please?
Because this particular idea makes little scientific sense.
Ionic copper is just Cu++; passing through UV radiation will do nothing to it.
Chelated copper could possibly be dissociated from the chelating agent by UV (I suppose).
But even then, it would convert to ionic copper, making it more potent, not less so.

Yes I'm sorry. You're right. It makes it more toxic. I do apologize for incorrect info. Although i did have the correct notion that they shouldn't be used together, unless someone's willing to take that chance. Thank you for correcting me.