nutsz71
New Member
Back during the summer a friend of mine posted that he was selling his aquarium. I contacted him about buying it from him and found out that at one time it was set up as a saltwater aquarium(even though for the past 5 years it was a freshwater). I contacted a buddy of mine to ask him some inside knowledge on the setting up of a new saltwater aquarium and was overwhelmed by all that was involved but still decided that this was something I wanted to do. The original aquarium i purchased was a 30 gallon(knowing I wanted bigger but wanted to get my feet wet first). Once purchasing another filter (magnum 750) and an upgraded t5 light I began the process of cycling my tank with around 25-30 lb of live rock and a bag of live sand. My first fish purchases were from the LFS and they told me to buy damsels(wish I never did) so I brought home 3. One died the first night and the other two survived. After about two weeks I went back to the LFS and purchased an ocellaris. Then after another two weeks I added a yellow tang and a xanthia and mushroom. My xanthia was very pretty for about a week and one night I went to bed the next morning when I woke up it was completely gone? At this point I am about two months into the new aquarium. I wanted a bigger tank and I really like the set up of the Red Sea Max, so I found one on craigslist. After purchasing my Red Sea Max 250 I used approx. 10 gallons of the water from the guy I purchased the tank from, the 30 gallons from my aquarium, and added the rest as newly mixed water. I kept this same set up going for about a month and decided I was ready to add some new fish to the mix. Problem I had to catch the damsels. I made a trap and caught one and moved him to another tank, I wasn't so lucky with the other one so I gave up for a bit. During the catching of one and chasing the other my yellow tang developed ICH. Wasn't there at bed time woke up the next morning and he was covered. Before I could get to the LFS and buy a garlic treatment he was dead in just a manner of hours. I think that the cause of his stress was either that 1)wasn't using RO water(using prime and tap) 2)stressed him out chasing the other fish or 3)didn't know any better and cleaned the inside of the glass with a dish towel fresh out of the washing machine(beginners mistake). I caught the clown out and now all that was left in the tank was the damsel. I left my lights off for a week and left my system alone for 6 weeks without adding fish or coral, only doing water changes and treating to keep levels steady. After 6 weeks I removed all of my live rock to catch the damsel and purchased a flame angel, a mckoskers wrasse, and a green clown goby along with various clean up crew(snails, cleaner shrimp, pepermint, coral banded, and crabs). I added a hammer coral, a candy cane, a small feather duster and green star polys. The new addition fish (green goby) hid out never saw him except at feeding time (flame angel) out all the time took to system quickly (mckoskers) never saw him again. After about 4 days the flame angel got ICH I treated with garlic on his food and he ate, I came home that night and he was gone. I had to move all of my live rock to find him dead
. I never saw the mckoskers again. The clown goby still alive and doing well. I left the tank fishless except for goby for 6 more weeks and turned my lights back to 10 hrs a day because after the fish death I had a bad hair and cyno algae breakout. After 6 weeks I purchased another set of cleaning crew(my others werent getting rid of all the hair algae) I also purchased an RO filter from BRS and I was educated on how to properly get my skimmer adjusted. So now six weeks later I added a pair of ORA platinum clowns. The clowns had been thriving and doing well for about 6 more weeks when I added another yellow tang, a flame angel, another feather duster and a couple more coral and a bubble tip anemone. All this has been in the tank now for about two weeks and I get up last week to one of the ORA clowns with ICH and he had lost all of his color around his face and on his fins(now he was solid white). I treated food and the tank with garlic and he got better, a lot of the spots disappeared. The next day when I got up he was in bad shape again so another treatment and more garlic soaked food. When I came home from work that night one of my snails had him at the bottom of the tank eating him. The bigger clown still looked healthy. Now a week later the bigger clown has ICH! She is still eating and is eager for me to feed them, she is behaving normally other than the spots and she still has all the color around her face and fins.
I have a Red Sea Max 250, I run a bag of carbon, phosguard, and purigen, I leave my lights on 12hrs a day, water temp varies between 78-80, salinity 1.025, all of the bad stuff is at 0. I don't have a qt tank and I'm tired of killing my fish(I love these little guys)
All the hair algae is gone and the cyno
The Flame and the Tang look healthy as can be and don't show signs yet, I don't want to lose them.
Do you think maybe since these are designer clowns their anemone immunity (for lack of a better word) could be compromised, and they may have been stung trying to pair with the anemone?(I only ask because the one that died went into it and came up shaking and looking like he didn't like it)
Or have I just not give my tank time enough to push out the ICH?
I am at my wits end and will do anything if it will work( freshwater dip but most people say it does more harm than good, commercial treatment for ICH that everyone says doesn't work)
Sorry for being long winded PLEASE HELP!!!
. I never saw the mckoskers again. The clown goby still alive and doing well. I left the tank fishless except for goby for 6 more weeks and turned my lights back to 10 hrs a day because after the fish death I had a bad hair and cyno algae breakout. After 6 weeks I purchased another set of cleaning crew(my others werent getting rid of all the hair algae) I also purchased an RO filter from BRS and I was educated on how to properly get my skimmer adjusted. So now six weeks later I added a pair of ORA platinum clowns. The clowns had been thriving and doing well for about 6 more weeks when I added another yellow tang, a flame angel, another feather duster and a couple more coral and a bubble tip anemone. All this has been in the tank now for about two weeks and I get up last week to one of the ORA clowns with ICH and he had lost all of his color around his face and on his fins(now he was solid white). I treated food and the tank with garlic and he got better, a lot of the spots disappeared. The next day when I got up he was in bad shape again so another treatment and more garlic soaked food. When I came home from work that night one of my snails had him at the bottom of the tank eating him. The bigger clown still looked healthy. Now a week later the bigger clown has ICH! She is still eating and is eager for me to feed them, she is behaving normally other than the spots and she still has all the color around her face and fins. I have a Red Sea Max 250, I run a bag of carbon, phosguard, and purigen, I leave my lights on 12hrs a day, water temp varies between 78-80, salinity 1.025, all of the bad stuff is at 0. I don't have a qt tank and I'm tired of killing my fish(I love these little guys)
All the hair algae is gone and the cyno
The Flame and the Tang look healthy as can be and don't show signs yet, I don't want to lose them.
Do you think maybe since these are designer clowns their anemone immunity (for lack of a better word) could be compromised, and they may have been stung trying to pair with the anemone?(I only ask because the one that died went into it and came up shaking and looking like he didn't like it)
Or have I just not give my tank time enough to push out the ICH?
I am at my wits end and will do anything if it will work( freshwater dip but most people say it does more harm than good, commercial treatment for ICH that everyone says doesn't work)
Sorry for being long winded PLEASE HELP!!!
