Need help

[HockeyRooster]

Possibly. I’m building a sump to go under the tank now. So for right now I’m using canister ( on this tank ) I can clean it I just don’t want to kill what’s left of the good bacteria..

Just get the big detritus out. rinse all media in the canister water. Then rebuild your canister minus the very dirty water. Don’t “wash” any of the filter parts though as you need to keep the bacteri on it. You’ll get through this with water changes. And your sump will help a lot too.

 

[laverda]

You have to many things going on at once. Too many changes to figure out what is doing what. Not enough proper filtration.
1. Adding bacteria and 2.running a UV are counter productive. The UV will kill a lot of the bacteria your adding. 3. Treating for copper while trying to solve other issues. 4. Temp is a bit high and may be contributing to a bacterial bloom. More importantly, Is the temp stable?
Personally I would stop the copper treatment. Drop the salinity to 1.019. Use carbon and get decent filtration ASAP.

 

[laverda]

Just get the big detritus out. rinse all media in the canister water. Then rebuild your canister minus the very dirty water. Don’t “wash” any of the filter parts though as you need to keep the bacteri on it. You’ll get through this with water changes. And your sump will help a lot too.

Rinsing with tank water will not kill the bacteria. I would clean the canister filter daily until this clears up.

 

[laverda]

Do you have plenty of circulation?

 

[soggywaffles]

I would definitely clean your canister filter by rinsing it with some old tank water. You need to be cleaning it at least weekly until you get better filtration. As mentioned API test kits are know to be inaccurate when it comes to ammonia. That said the badges are not. I suspect you increased your bio load to quickly and or your tank was not fully cycled. I would try to get more fully cycled live rock to add to your tank.
Do you fish show signs of tattered or rotted fins? This would be a sign of ammonia damage. Ammonia is toxic to fish and may be adding to their stress contributing to the ICH out break.

All the fish look healthy.. finsAnd tails are all good, eating great swimming around good nobody is hanging out at the top or bottom. Yeah I’ll clean the canister for sure.

 

[soggywaffles]

Canisters are known Nitrate factories. They have to be serviced frequently for a saltwater tank as they only offer mechanical (little chemical) filtration. API test kits are less than accurate in many cases, and your temperature is about 3-4 degrees too warm supporting any bacterial blooms.
Bring salt down SLOWLY to 1.025 and assure there is adequate oxygen in tank.
AGE OF TANK ??

I would recommend with use of API kits to grab a good water sample and take to a trusted LFS and have them test for you to see what readings they come up with and to compare to yours.

I thought higher tank temps would be better for ich? I can definitely lower salinity and temp I just wasn’t sure if it would feed the Ich with lower temps?

 

[soggywaffles]

You have to many things going on at once. Too many changes to figure out what is doing what. Not enough proper filtration.
1. Adding bacteria and 2.running a UV are counter productive. The UV will kill a lot of the bacteria your adding. 3. Treating for copper while trying to solve other issues. 4. Temp is a bit high and may be contributing to a bacterial bloom. More importantly, Is the temp stable?
Personally I would stop the copper treatment. Drop the salinity to 1.019. Use carbon and get decent filtration ASAP.

I Turned off uv . Temp is stable at 81.6 ( thought it would be better for the Ich) only fish I see with it now is the trigger.. so I should drop the temp back to around 78 and get copper out? What do I do for the Ich then? In process of building a sump. But it’s not there yet. Water started turning cloudy after the treatment began.. so i wasn’t sure if it was that.. but it’s sounding more and more like I added to much fish at once

 

[xxkenny90xx]

As @laverda mentioned I think adding some good established LIVE rock would really help here, did you use all/mostly dry rock?

 

[laverda]

I Turned off uv . Temp is stable at 81.6 ( thought it would be better for the Ich) only fish I see with it now is the trigger.. so I should drop the temp back to around 78 and get copper out? What do I do for the Ich then? In process of building a sump. But it’s not there yet. Water started turning cloudy after the treatment began.. so i wasn’t sure if it was that.. but it’s sounding more and more like I added to much fish at once

Higher temp and ICH will go through its cycle faster. I am not a fan of copper as I creates stress for a lot of fish. The UV should help control ICH if the flow is slow through it. I would turn if off for a few hours when adding the bacteria. The lower salinity will also help with ICH. It makes it easier for your fish to fight it off as they do not need to expend as much energy removing salt from their system. Do not drop the temp too quickly.

 

[soggywaffles]

Rinsing with tank water will not kill the bacteria. I would clean the canister filter daily until this clears up.

As @laverda mentioned I think adding some good established LIVE rock would really help here, did you use all/mostly dry rock?

everything in the tank was live.. minus 2 pieces of dry rock. Could the copper kill the live stuff off the rock?

 

[soggywaffles]

Higher temp and ICH will go through its cycle faster. I am not a fan of copper as I creates stress for a lot of fish. The UV should help control ICH if the flow is slow through it. I would turn if off for a few hours when adding the bacteria. The lower salinity will also help with ICH. It makes it easier for your fish to fight it off as they do not need to expend as much energy removing salt from their system. Do not drop the temp too quickly.

Ok so I need to drop temp back down slowly.
I was using coppersafe by Fritz so I need to stop that?
Lower salinity to what ? 1.16? Over the course of about a week?

 

[HockeyRooster]

Rinsing with tank water will not kill the bacteria. I would clean the canister filter daily until this clears up.

I agree and that’s why I suggested that he use the canister water to rinse.

 

[vetteguy53081]

I thought higher tank temps would be better for ich? I can definitely lower salinity and temp I just wasn’t sure if it would feed the Ich with lower temps?

Higher temps reduce oxygen. Lower salinity (hyposalinity helps with ich)

 

[soggywaffles]

Higher temps reduce oxygen. Lower salinity (hyposalinity helps with ich)

What should I lower the salinity to?

 

[laverda]

Ok so I need to drop temp back down slowly.
I was using coppersafe by Fritz so I need to stop that?
Lower salinity to what ? 1.16? Over the course of about a week?

I am not a fan of copper and have never used it in 26 years of reef tanks.
Salinity can be lowered fairly quickly. You need to raise it slowly when you do bring back to normal. Fish can handle decreases better than increases. I would use 1.019 but I know some use lower salinity.

 

[soggywaffles]

I am not a fan of copper and have never used it in 26 years of reef tanks.
Salinity can be lowered fairly quickly. You need to raise it slowly when you do bring back to normal. Fish can handle decreases better than increases. I would use 1.019 but I know some use lower salinity.

Ok and I can run carbon and get the copper out? I’ll do it first thing tomorrow