Suggestions please! Ich!!!!!

rebel souljah · Oct 25, 2012

Okay so yesterday i noticed my newly aquired (a week) sailfin tang had ich. Im guessing that he was stressed out from my hands being in the tank for the pass week since I was transferring all my corals from my old into my new tank. He was still eating fine and swimming around. I managed to get him out today and noticed that none of my other fish has ich. Well my question is I have a pair of lyretail anthias (had over 1 year, still in old tank) that I am wanting to transfer into my new tank as well. Would it be safe? or should I wait and for how long? I am pretty much done transferring all my corals into the new tank so my hand will be out of the new tank for a while. I am just worry that the transfer will stress them out and they might catch ich. But I don't know if there will actually be a safe waiting period since there are fish still in the new tank. Im lost and not to sure what to do...PLEASE HELP!

rebel souljah · Oct 25, 2012

Heres some extra info: New tank has been up for about 1 month now and all parameters are good (cured live rock). Livestock in the new tank consists of 1 yellow coris, 1 solar wrasse, 1 mandarin goby (eats frozen), 4 green chromis. I purchased the sailfin (impulse) and did not QT him :tsk:. He looked healthy and ate everything. Through out the week I have been transferring all my corals from my old tank during the middle of the night after work so I would turn the lights on after they have been off for about 5 hrs. Thats what i think stressed him out. and even with the ich he swam all around and ate just fine. but I decided to remove him anyway and placed him into my QT. Now I am wanting to transfer my 2 lyretail pair (favorite fish) but I am very nervous LOL...I've had them for well over a year and became my daugthers aka barbie fish...hahahaha...:sad:

SeymourDuncan · Oct 25, 2012

You didn't quarantine did ya!?!
99% chance that the ich has hopped off the fish in your display. Not for sure saying your fish will get ich BUT if you see the spots, those are the exit wounds if you will. That means the ich that was inside have jumped fish, and not all of them most likely.

There are a billion "cures" but only 2 I have ever had good results along with scientific fact, so I will spare you the hype of "natural" and "reef safe" remedies.

You should quarantine all your fish period at this point and choose from one of the following treatments.

Hyposalinity-dropping the salt level for a couple weeks while maintaining proper ph levels
Or
Copper treatments-liquid traces of copper

Google either methods...there's loads of tutorials...(mr saltwater tank is an outstanding guy to watch on youtube, he posted a 3 part video on this exact thing recently)

Both of these methods will no doubtedly kill anything that is not a fish..

At the same time your display tank must run fallow for 8 weeks minimum to starve the ich.
It will only live with the presence of fish.

I like hypo, its a little cheaper and gives the same results.

Hope all goes well!

rebel souljah · Oct 25, 2012

won't be able to do hypo...tons of coral in the tank...i think i remember reading some where that the same strain of ich if nothing new is added can live only for so long?

Connie · Oct 25, 2012

I know a lot of people will disagree with me, but it worked for me...Install a UV Sterilizer.

returnofsid · Oct 25, 2012

You may have to find another way to QT, such as a large rubbermaid tote or stock tank. There are absolutely no "in tank" treatments that are both reef safe and will kill Ich. Read through this for more information...

https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/fish-discussion/56989-ich-discussion-treatment-options.html

MBSL55 · Oct 25, 2012

I personally prefer hypo as I feel it is less stressful for the fish although it does take longer and required you to really watch your salinity or have an ATO to do it for you. I've got a few tangs going through hypo right now in my QT system and have been documenting the progress in my build log.

If you have an existing tank that you were transferring stuff from, why not transfer over all your corals and inverts to the new tank and keep all the fish in the old tank for treatment?

SeymourDuncan · Oct 25, 2012

Yeah buddy....once you got ich, all fish are sick. 8 weeks is their rough life span w/ no food. With as much stuff as you have in your tank, I would not mess around. Get it done, hypo is not as painfully hard as it sounds...as long as u can keep a stable ph similar (or exact is better) to your tank.

Ich is not something you can be stubborn about at all if you care about the quality of life your fish have. Picture being in a room full of nudists with the clap and they keep brushing up against you...what would you do then??? The fish are experiencing the same thing...even if they are not visibly infected yet it is only a matter of time.

We all know what to do and have suggested hypo as the winning cure, if you ignore our suggestions its all on you. We don't want to hear a thread about ich killing your fish in the future

that makes us all cry and we can't read other posts with tears in our eyes

Saltgator · Oct 25, 2012

Hypo is the only thing I'd do. I've tried meds before, but nothing seems to be less stressful than hypo. I've done it twice and will always if needed prior to meds.

Country Boy using tapatalk on his EVO

rebel souljah · Oct 25, 2012

Warlock_trivection_Falken said:
Yeah buddy....once you got ich, all fish are sick. 8 weeks is their rough life span w/ no food. With as much stuff as you have in your tank, I would not mess around. Get it done, hypo is not as painfully hard as it sounds...as long as u can keep a stable ph similar (or exact is better) to your tank.

Ich is not something you can be stubborn about at all if you care about the quality of life your fish have. Picture being in a room full of nudists with the clap and they keep brushing up against you...what would you do then??? The fish are experiencing the same thing...even if they are not visibly infected yet it is only a matter of time.

We all know what to do and have suggested hypo as the winning cure, if you ignore our suggestions its all on you. We don't want to hear a thread about ich killing your fish in the future that makes us all cry and we can't read other posts with tears in our eyes

What im trying to say...is MY DT is full of corals so doing HYPO in my DT is a no go. It would be pretty difficult trying to catch all my fish out of my DT wrasse...they will burrow in the sand or hide in a hole faster then you can count to 1. Im not ignoring your suggestions but i do hypo in my reef that would kill my corals. Hypo in my QT is no problem.

SeymourDuncan · Oct 25, 2012

Well thats just the price to pay for lack of prevention my friend. your either going to have to figure out a way to trap the hard to catch ones (google diy fish trap) or remove the corals and rock and catch them in an empty tank. you can also just drain the water into a large container and make a trench in the sand, the fish will head for deeper water and can be caught more easily.

You really are stuck with removing either the fish or ALL THE ROCK CORALS SAND AND INVERTS, which is even more of a pain.
I have been there, trust me...you will seek an answer that you will not find, i tried haha. UV will only kill free floating ones ability to reproduce..so the ones in the sand, rock, fish, are not going to be effected. The low flow a UV requires is no match to the rate of which needs to be filtered in order to actually solve the issues.

We are dreaming for the day an actual reef safe remedy rises out of the shadows of science...but for now its quarantine, treat, and wait.

now ich can come on anything...period. Say you got a snail that was with a fish...the water has to be invert safe for the snail to live, meaning no ich treatments in the water. If the fish has ich and you take the snail home expecting perfect results, you will easily be suprised. I quarantined everything I got after the first incident like yours...never have a single "ich"ssue now! A 40 long would be a decent quarantine tank to have for new purchases, but not as a population hospital, the more fish you have the more it costs to fix them.

rebel souljah · Oct 27, 2012

Warlock...

i very much appreciate the help...but i think i will go with option C....

If no new MI is introduce into an infected aquarium, the MI already there continues to cycle through multiple generations until about 10 to 11 months when the MI has ‘worn itself out’ and becomes less infective. A tank can be free of an MI infestation if it is never exposed to new MI parasites for over 11 months.