My Tang is Dying!! Help ASAP Please!!!!!

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

Woke up this morning to find my tang was covered in ich. I knew I should move him immediately to a hospital tank but all I had was a 5 gal hospital running. So I want to the store I work at and grabbed a 20 gallon tank. We were out of premade salt so instead I filled the 20 with 50-60% water from my display tank and the rest I mixed at a lower salinity since I had heard hypo-salinity helps with ich.
since my tank was at a high salinity (1.027) I didn't want to immediately jump TOO far down, So i lowered it to 1.020.
In the hospital tank I have a marineland penguin 150, a 50w heater preset to 78 degrees, and a hiding spot for my tang. The tank is barebottom.

HERE IS WHY I THINK MY TANG IS DYING!

I did a quick, ten second freshwater dip and my tang began to thrash around like crazy after 5 short seconds. After putting him back in the hospital tank he started breathing insanely rapidly, lost color, and kept swimming on it's side and laying flat for 10-20 seconds at a time. He started swimming a little better, found his way to his hiding place, and is now inside the hiding spot somewhat tilted instead of swimming upright and breathing at an insane speed and losing more and more color. He has been in the hospital tank for about 50 minutes now and his breathing has not gotten any better.

PLEASE leave tips on how to help this! I don't want to lose him, I really, really like him.

Cherim7 · Feb 25, 2016

Did you adjust your ph of freshwater? Sounds like ph shock

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

I did not, I'll test the PH of the freshwater right now. All I had done was condition the freshwater. What should I aim for the PH to be?

Humblefish · Feb 25, 2016

When I hear that a fish is "covered in ich" the possibility of velvet exists in my mind, since both diseases can appear similar. I mention this because hyposalinity only treats ich, not velvet. A few things that would be helpful to know right now:

A pic of the fish showing the white dots.
A history of the fish. How long ago was he added to the DT? Was he QT'd?
A history of your tank. When was the last livestock added to this tank?

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

Humblefish said:
When I hear that a fish is "covered in ich" the possibility of velvet exists in my mind, since both diseases can appear similar. I mention this because hyposalinity only treats ich, not velvet. A few things that would be helpful to know right now:

A pic of the fish showing the white dots.

A history of the fish. How long ago was he added to the DT? Was he QT'd?

A history of your tank. When was the last livestock added to this tank?

Here's my tank background:

70 gallon FOWLR setup. Has about 60lbs of live rock in it right now, adding more after each paycheck I get from work, lol.
Tank cycled for 3 months before any livestock was added.
First livestock: 10 hermits (I now regret, they are evil and kill my snails. Didn't know this when purchased), 10 snails. Put small amounts of food in every day or two to finish up the cycling.
Two weeks later I added 2 chromis'. They did perfectly fine.
About a week and a half later I added one baby black ocellaris clown. This is where I think the problem started.

At the store I purchased him from, he was under deep blue lighting and it was hard to see him extremely clearly...But he DID look to have small white spots on him. I asked the owner of the fish store and he swore to me up and down the fish was healthy. Pulled out food and started feeding it to prove his vigorous appetite meant good health. I trusted the guy, who had owned the store for 20+ years. Figured he wouldn't sell me something bad as I often get from this store and they normally are honest with me when they think I shouldn't get a fish if it had exhibited odd behaviors. when I got home and put him in my tank under my lighting, it was clear. he was sick.
here are his pics from the morning after i brought him home.

http://postimg.org/image/ladqu7ctn/

http://postimg.org/image/y7tbvrqjr/

I worried, shortly. And then by the night all his spots went away. I've dealt with ich before in freshwater, and his spots looked a little different...So i didn't jump right to it. Once they went away and my tank was fine for 3 weeks, I assumed no further problems existed and it was a weird fluke.

Then, 3 weeks later, I added 1 baby blue hippo tang. About 2 inches long in size. I am aware he will need a much larger tank in the future, when I move within a year I will be purchasing a 150+g tank. Just don't have the room in my current living quarters.

ANYWAYS, the DAY i brought my tang home. He had weird raised up lumps on his under belly. Very odd, I thought. I did some research and those who helped me insisted it was nothing contagious, most likely an abrasion from rubbing against live rock since he had been hiding under there. Here is a pic of the lumps

http://postimg.org/image/3qroyqutr/

My tang is currently hiding and full of stress so I'm worried about removing him from his hide to take pics. But I will try to go get some right now. What he is covered with is nothing like these raised bumps on his belly, but something I would say resembles ich perfectly. But maybe it is velvet! I will try to get a pic to help you get an understanding. Thank you for helping! sorry this is such a long response.

Oh, and My tang was NOT QT before adding to the tank. I learned my lesson from this. I only had a 5gal QT set up and felt like this was too small and would only add stress to a tang, so I skipped it. I now have a bigger QT running and going forward will always QT my fish

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

He hasn't gotten any better yet either...breathing is still super rapid. I will try to take pics now

alxjrz · Feb 25, 2016

Before you do anything else think about it. You do not want to stress this little guy out more than it has to going threw. Preparation is very important for his survival. If you are not prepared to properly treat for ich, take time to organise your thoughts. water conditions is just as important and you do not want to do anything drastic. initially before moving him your quarantine tank water should have been pretty much exactly like your display tank. If your making emergency water you still have to wait sometime before you can introduce life into it. Your best bet is hit up the local fish store for some fresh RODI and RODI premixed Saltwater. Once he was quarantined feeding him food with garlic and making sure he still has an apatite would have been your next step. So many people fear ich and 9/10 times they kill whatever it is they are trying to treat in a short amount of time. within then next few days you could have used methods you detailed and returned him to his known environment. His immune system is the best for fighting ich, focus on that. Best of luck I hope these tips help your little friend.

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

acrorgv said:
Before you do anything else think about it. You do not want to stress this little guy out more than it has to going threw. Preparation is very important for his survival. If you are not prepared to properly treat for ich, take time to organise your thoughts. water conditions is just as important and you do not want to do anything drastic. initially before moving him your quarantine tank water should have been pretty much exactly like your display tank. If your making emergency water you still have to wait sometime before you can introduce life into it. Your best bet is hit up the local fish store for some fresh RODI and RODI premixed Saltwater. Once he was quarantined feeding him food with garlic and making sure he still has an apatite would have been your next step. So many people fear ich and 9/10 times they kill whatever it is they are trying to treat in a short amount of time. within then next few days you could have used methods you detailed and returned him to his known environment. His immune system is the best for fighting ich, focus on that. Best of luck I hope these tips help your little friend.

Since I already panicked and moved him to the QT, should he be returned to the display tank until I get some of the premixed water?? We were out at the store I work at which is why I panicked and did the 60% water from my DT. I feel like moving him again would only stress him more. But then again, if the water isn't ready it isn't ready.

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

Humblefish said:
When I hear that a fish is "covered in ich" the possibility of velvet exists in my mind, since both diseases can appear similar. I mention this because hyposalinity only treats ich, not velvet. A few things that would be helpful to know right now:

A pic of the fish showing the white dots.

A history of the fish. How long ago was he added to the DT? Was he QT'd?

A history of your tank. When was the last livestock added to this tank?

Got a pic, not perfectly clear because I didn't want to disturb his hiding.

Cherim7 · Feb 25, 2016

Def looks like ich. Does your lfs stock anything for water cycling, like bacteria in a bottle? Stability or Special Blend. Can be added to quarantine to keep stable. Not many people like copper treatment, but it does work.

Kershaw · Feb 25, 2016

Looks like bad Ich. But he still appears to have good color. My purple tang turns super white when he gets stressed. I unnecessarily moved him to my sump because I thought he was attacting a fish. And just catching him he went ghost white. Once he calmed down turned back to his dark purple.

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

Cherim7 said:
Def looks like ich. Does your lfs stock anything for water cycling, like bacteria in a bottle? Stability or Special Blend. Can be added to quarantine to keep stable. Not many people like copper treatment, but it does work.

I have several fish stores in my town I can check, I am sure one of them carries it. Only problem is I work all day tomorrow (ALL day, 12 hour shift, 10-10.) So I wont be able to get anything until Friday. Until then should he remain in the QT tank anyways? I work at a pet supply store and my manager has had saltwater tanks for 10+ years and he told me I could add my tang tonight if I put water in there from my already cycled tank. I guess he was wrong

Cherim7 · Feb 25, 2016

Keep in mind they have very soft skins, even fishnet can scratch them. So very prone to ich. Keep him in darkness to relax. Regal tangs love wedging themselves into the smallest of spaces aswell. So can get damaged from that too.

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

Kershaw said:
Looks like bad Ich. But he still appears to have good color. My purple tang turns super white when he gets stressed. I unnecessarily moved him to my sump because I thought he was attacting a fish. And just catching him he went ghost white. Once he calmed down turned back to his dark purple.

his color has come back a lot in the last 20 minutes, he had weird pale coloration for awhile. His mouth area is still really pale. just can't see it since he's hiding.

Humblefish · Feb 25, 2016

Those pics all look like ich to me, not velvet. That's actually (somewhat) good news. I have to go to bed soon, but I'll leave you with some links to read (below) to help figure out what you want your next step to be. @acrorgv is correct that if you are not setup to properly treat, you will just do more harm than good.

How to Treat Ich: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/how-to-treat-ich.191226/

How to Quarantine: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/how-to-quarantine.189815/

The DOs and DON’Ts of Quarantine: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/the-dos-and-don’ts-of-quarantine.203898/

Ich eradication vs. Ich management: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/ich-eradication-vs-ich-management.188775/

Kershaw · Feb 25, 2016

So from what I understand. Keep in mind I have never treated for Ich before. But fresh water dip is fine and may provide temporary relief to help get him healty what I think they where saying above was to make sure temp and ph are the same as display tank. And you can use water from display tank to start hospital tank. But you you need to Insure peramiters are the same. I could be wrong and I hope to find out because I need to get a QT tank some day.

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

My very last question to all this is if I should keep him in QT since he's already in there... or move him back to my DT until my hospital tank is more prepared. I don't know which will stress him out more.

and for freshwater dips should I worry about the PH of the freshwater? Is that an ok method to treat this? someone at one of my lfs gave me a sample of a med he uses to "cure anything and everything" for his fish. Honestly forgot the name. he gave me two doses of it and i have it in a baggie. it is a green powder, apparently will turn my water green. any idea what this is? I can always call him and ask but just wanted to throw that out there while we are discussing this.

Thank you all for your help and input! It really has helped me wrap my head around the situation!!

Kershaw · Feb 25, 2016

Test your water and yes ph of the fresh water dip should match you display. Like I said I have never had a qt tank so I really don't know the right answer. If it where me and unsure. I would test water of both systems and make sure they are close. Is he swimming or being any more active? I don't know if i would move him again. I think You should just try and get your water straight. Maybe just wait and see how he is in the morning.

td3025 · Feb 25, 2016

Kershaw said:
Test your water and yes ph of the fresh water dip should match you display. Like I said I have never had a qt tank so I really don't know the right answer. If it where me and unsure. I would test water of both systems and make sure they are close. Is he swimming or being any more active? I don't know if i would move him again. I think You should just try and get your water straight. Maybe just wait and see how he is in the morning.

Ever since he got the strength to swim at all he swam straight into the hiding spot and has been hiding, with his face pointed towards the lid, breathing insanely rapidly.

I will see how he is in the morning if he makes it.

jamie callard · Feb 25, 2016

Keep in qt tank adding back to dt will expose other fish to ick as well and stress the tang more
Freshwater dip does work but ph and temp need to match your saltwater tank.
Hypo-salinity is something that should be done slow. Drop it 1 point a day.