Ich???
- Thread starter Rfamous12
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Reefer5640
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Looks like ich to me. I’ve had best luck with removing all the fish from the tank and put them through tank transfer method. Dose the transfer tank water with kick ich or ich attack for the first tank or two to help sooth the outbreak (not necessary but helps). If you can keep them eating through the initial outbreak your chances of success are higher. If they won’t eat anymore then the chances are greatly reduced (I’ve found this to be true with most ailments). There are some dips out there that can help in between transfers, formalin is a good one, not readily available but a good one. To get rid of the ich though you’ll have to run your DT fallow (fishless) for 76 days or more with high flow. I know this seems pretty intense but there are two ways you can go about this; The first is to dose kick ich or similar product to your DT and hope your fish will pull through this outbreak on their own. Keep in mind by doing this you will forever have ich. It may not be physically present all the time but your fish will always be infected. This is called “ich management”. The other option is “ich free”. Which I have already mentioned. Search ich free or ich management by @Humblefish or @4FordFamily. There is tons of info about this on this forum. There are some other guys on here who are very knowledgeable about QT as well. Anyway hope this helped. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
Last edited:
Reefer5640
Well-Known Member
Here’s this. Sorry it’s ich eradication not ich free
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/ich-eradication-vs-ich-management.188775/
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/ich-eradication-vs-ich-management.188775/
Reefer5640
Well-Known Member
Here’s this one too
https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/ich-and-acanthurus-tangs-years-of-experience-and-ich-management.106/
These two posts are what got me to switch to keeping an ich free system.
https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/ich-and-acanthurus-tangs-years-of-experience-and-ich-management.106/
These two posts are what got me to switch to keeping an ich free system.
4FordFamily
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Yes that’s ich. Treat everyone in copper I agree. Good luck 
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Any treatments must be ran in a separate tank as most effective ich treatments contain copper which corals cannot handle. You need to set up a quarantine tank.
Reefer5640
Well-Known Member
There are products that you can use in a reef tank like ich attack and kick ich. It will stress your reef out and possibly kill something here or there. But all those products are doing is helping the fish get through this one breakout.
Ich has a life cycle;
1st- It starts out as a cyst
2nd- It hatches and is now in the free swimming stage where it’s looking for a host
3rd- It infects your fish. This part is where people see signs and start to treat the fish. This stage can last approximately anywhere from a few days to a week.
4th- It falls off the fish, reproduces, and then dies.
5th- The new cysts take 1-2 weeks before they hatch back into the free swimming stage.
So to treat your fish in the display with one of the “reef safe” products, really only help the fish get through this one breakout. After the week long stage of “hosting”, the ich fall off and reproduce and grow and hatch and multiply and so on. In the meantime your fish looks better and you assume your good.
This is where ich management comes in (assuming it lives through the first breakout). If you keep your fish fed a healthy diet and give them ideal living conditions then a lot of fish can usually keep the parasites at a “manageable” level. You may not see them much, maybe a white spot here and there or a little flashing against the rocks from time to time. But it will shorten the life of any fish and if they get stressed from a new tank mate, or a change in water parameters, or whatever it may be... the fishes immune system will not be able to keep it at bay like it had and you’ll be dealing with another breakout.
Your other option is to go all out and eradicate the parasite by removing all the fish for 11~12 weeks and treat them in QT. There are a few ways to do it;
1- Hypo salinity- My least favorite of the three methods. Take salinity down to 1.008-1.009 and hold for 4 weeks then observe for another 4 weeks. It takes days to lower and raise salinity, you can’t dose very many other medications with it so if you have an emergency you’re pretty much screwed.
2- Copper- this is a good one. Pretty reliable. Least amount of work. Treat for 2 weeks and then observe for another 2-4 weeks. Some meds can be used with copper if you get in a bind but not all fish can handle copper.
3- Tank Transfer- Also a good one, my go to for sure. Take two tanks, keep the fish in one for 3 days, then match all parameters in the second tank and transfer the fish. Repeat 3 more times and observe for 2 weeks. You can dose any med with this method, it’s the shortest of the three. By far the most work and the most stressful on the fish though.
Once QT is done and the displaybtank has run a full fallow period you’ll still have to QT any new addition to your tank. Obviously any fish but also anything wet (frag, invert, live rock, etc...) needs to go through it’s own 11-12 week fallow period to ensure there is no ich cyst on it which could re-infect your entire system and you’d have to go through it all over again.
Just so you know though, there are a lot of people that keep beautiful reef tanks with hard to keep fish in ich management systems so it is very much doable if that’s the route you choose to go. Either way, I would pull your fish out to treat them just to be certain the rest of the tank inhabitants won’t suffer.
Ich has a life cycle;
1st- It starts out as a cyst
2nd- It hatches and is now in the free swimming stage where it’s looking for a host
3rd- It infects your fish. This part is where people see signs and start to treat the fish. This stage can last approximately anywhere from a few days to a week.
4th- It falls off the fish, reproduces, and then dies.
5th- The new cysts take 1-2 weeks before they hatch back into the free swimming stage.
So to treat your fish in the display with one of the “reef safe” products, really only help the fish get through this one breakout. After the week long stage of “hosting”, the ich fall off and reproduce and grow and hatch and multiply and so on. In the meantime your fish looks better and you assume your good.
This is where ich management comes in (assuming it lives through the first breakout). If you keep your fish fed a healthy diet and give them ideal living conditions then a lot of fish can usually keep the parasites at a “manageable” level. You may not see them much, maybe a white spot here and there or a little flashing against the rocks from time to time. But it will shorten the life of any fish and if they get stressed from a new tank mate, or a change in water parameters, or whatever it may be... the fishes immune system will not be able to keep it at bay like it had and you’ll be dealing with another breakout.
Your other option is to go all out and eradicate the parasite by removing all the fish for 11~12 weeks and treat them in QT. There are a few ways to do it;
1- Hypo salinity- My least favorite of the three methods. Take salinity down to 1.008-1.009 and hold for 4 weeks then observe for another 4 weeks. It takes days to lower and raise salinity, you can’t dose very many other medications with it so if you have an emergency you’re pretty much screwed.
2- Copper- this is a good one. Pretty reliable. Least amount of work. Treat for 2 weeks and then observe for another 2-4 weeks. Some meds can be used with copper if you get in a bind but not all fish can handle copper.
3- Tank Transfer- Also a good one, my go to for sure. Take two tanks, keep the fish in one for 3 days, then match all parameters in the second tank and transfer the fish. Repeat 3 more times and observe for 2 weeks. You can dose any med with this method, it’s the shortest of the three. By far the most work and the most stressful on the fish though.
Once QT is done and the displaybtank has run a full fallow period you’ll still have to QT any new addition to your tank. Obviously any fish but also anything wet (frag, invert, live rock, etc...) needs to go through it’s own 11-12 week fallow period to ensure there is no ich cyst on it which could re-infect your entire system and you’d have to go through it all over again.
Just so you know though, there are a lot of people that keep beautiful reef tanks with hard to keep fish in ich management systems so it is very much doable if that’s the route you choose to go. Either way, I would pull your fish out to treat them just to be certain the rest of the tank inhabitants won’t suffer.
