Wife brought home fish with ich...HELP!!!

[rldavisou]

My wife decided to surprise me yesterday, and brought home a yellow watchman goby, who I am now convinced has ich. None of my other fish show signs of it...yet. He's been in the tank for about 24 hours, and I now have him back floating in a bag because I don't have QT tank (I know, I know...).

My other fish are:

Sohal Tang
Purple Tang
Sixline wrasse
Yellow coris wrasse
Royal Gramma (also bought with the YWG, but showing no signs of ich)
Ocellaris Clown
Bicolor Blenny

My questions are:

Are any of my other fish those species prone to ich?
I have a reef, so copper is out of the question. Are there any other treatments?
What other steps can I take to prevent a full outbreak?

I've been in this hobby over 4 years, and have been very careful to prevent this from happening, but now I'm faced with a nightmare. I have no experience at this, so any input would be appreciated.

[sassafrass]

Take it back to the fish store , it is not worth taking the chance of infecting ALL your other fish . Your wife will just have to understand.

[rldavisou]

Well, that's another problem; she got it at Petco, which doesn't accept returns on SW fish.

Also, I know the YWG may not be worth saving, but are the other fish in danger? That's the big question here.

[AuroraDrvr]

Yes. They are all "in danger" especially the tangs.

[sbeane]

Well no offense i have not had luck with petco. They do not maintain their tanks. The one where i live we bought a couple damsels and well they gave my tank ICH........to start with we should not have bought the damsel in the first place they are mean little buggers....but i took the fish in a container back to petco they said we can not accept it. So i told them i did not care, i put it on the counter in the saltwater area and walked out. I would not or could not bring myself to flush it but now the diseased fish was in his hands. As i walked out he said well find him a home. I said like great give somelse ich! I will never shop there ever again.

I am sure not all petco's are like that just the one in my area just be careful of places that don't specialize fish!

Invest in a hospital tank. There are other options for ich. copper is the best. You can try turning up the heater slowly ich cant take the high temp it will kill the ich.

[Playa-1]

It sounds like your fixing to learn a hard lesson, I doubt it had anything to do with your wife bringing home a fish so don't blame her.

[rldavisou]

Originally posted by sbeane
You can try turning up the heater slowly ich cant take the high temp it will kill the ich.

How high are we talking? My tank usually runs about 80. I know I can get it up to 84 without killing any corals, but they get really stressed.

I have some spare tanks in the garage, so I can set up a hospital tank fairly easily, the problem is getting the fish out of the reef. It took the lady in the lfs 20 mins to catch the sohal in a tank smaller than mine with no rock.

So we've got one vote for high temps, what about hypo/hyper salinity? I remember reading a post about that a few months ago, but I don't remember the details. I have also heard garlic supplements work well as a preventative; anyone tried them as a treatment?

[Playa-1]

Here's some good info for you.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-08/sp/index.php

[rldavisou]

Originally posted by Playa-1
It sounds like your fixing to learn a hard lesson, I doubt it had anything to do with your wife bringing home a fish so don't blame her.

No, I don't blame her. If she knew the fish had ich, she wouldn't have bought it. YWG are spotted anyway, so it would be hard for an untrained eye to find the ich. Yes, I am sure the fish had ich to begin with, the spots are large enough that they are little bumps; that doesn't happen overnight.

[rldavisou]

Originally posted by Playa-1
Here's some good info for you.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-08/sp/index.php

Thanks, Playa. I haven't read it yet, but I will right now, looks like it's got some great info.

BTW, nice avatar!

[rldavisou]

Sadly, it still looks like I will have to remove all fish long-term to completely solve the problem. I do not have a tank big enough to house my collection. Anyone from the OKC area have tank I can borrow and nuke with copper?

[cham]

You may get lucky.

It is understood that the ich parasite drops off the fish just after lights out and not during the day. If you've kept the lights on all this time there is a chance that it has not dropped into your system.

Start with getting the goby in a seperate tank. Use your tank water to seed the tank and some small pieces of live rock that your willing to throw away. Be prepared to do daily water changes for the first week until it cycles.

Mine cycles is about 3 or 4 days. I also threw some cheato in my QT.

[NCSUsalt]

have you treid calling the store and talking to the manager? most will actually take it back. also, can you post a photo? most YWGs have a fine white speckling pattern that you may be confusing with ich.

[bsagecko]

hyposalination with transfer method in a QT works well if you want to save him; otherwise either give him to someone who has a QT or leave him at another store/petco............(you might want to call a lfs around your area and ask them if they will just take him............

[rldavisou]

Originally posted by cham

It is understood that the ich parasite drops off the fish just after lights out and not during the day. If you've kept the lights on all this time there is a chance that it has not dropped into your system.

Yeah, well, get this: I didn't know he had ich for the first 24 hours because he jumped into the overflow about 5 minutes after I walked in from work in Friday, so I didn't get a good look at him. But of course, that means he's been sitting down there in freaking dark for a whole day. This just gets better and better, doesn't it?

Here's my plan of action, you guys can weigh in on this:

I'm going to remove the YWG. Actually, that's already done. Then I'm going to get a cleaner shrimp and some garlic supplement and hope those two together are enough to keep me from losing too much. I'm hoping that catching it early and preventing it will be effective enough.

I may try some hypo dips, but I don't have space to keep the fish in hypo long term.

I really don't have the money to set up a QT big enough for all my fish. I wish I did, but unless I can borrow a tank, I that really isn't feasible right now. I just blew all my money on a new frag tank yesterday, not knowing I'd get hit with this a few hours later. I know it's not exactly ethical, but since I'm so tight on funds, I have to look at weighing risk vs. return. Buying a $150 QT tank to maybe save $300 worth of fish is a bigger risk to me right now because I'm broke.

[Ehaze]

just get a rubbermaid bin and treat with copper leave plenty of hiding space (pvc) all sizes. This is the only thing that works. Ofcorse this is the cheap way but it works, oh yeah , dont forget to add a heater powerhead and overhang filter for amonia!

[Freed]

Don't let the myth of cleaner shrimp and garlic fool you. The only proven, documented and factual ways to cure ich are hypo OR copper OR tank transfer. There is no such thing as a "hypo dip". Hyposalinity is done in a separate tank over a 4-6 week period.

[kraze3]

The ich parasite does not drop off the fish at night. It drops off when its in the drop off stage of its cycle.

Petco should take fish back but they will not give you your $ back.

Why not get a 10 gallon tank, a clip on light and $15 filter and set up a quick QT/Hospital tank and put him in there. DO a 10 gallon water change on your main display and use that water in the new tank. Even a rubbermaid sump could be used ar a QT tank.

[rldavisou]

Originally posted by Ehaze
just get a rubbermaid bin and treat with copper leave plenty of hiding space (pvc) all sizes. This is the only thing that works. Ofcorse this is the cheap way but it works, oh yeah , dont forget to add a heater powerhead and overhang filter for amonia!

I like this idea. I thought about buying a trash can, but that wouldn't really be enough swimming room. I didn't think of a rubbmaid.

If I can buy an already-colonized Biowheel, will the copper nuke everything on the biowheel?

[Freed]

I don't think there is such a thing as an "already-colonized" biowheel. I might be missing something here.

[tkeracer619]

Ouch.

Freed is correct. Good luck.

Probably time to set up a large qt. Otherwise you very well might have a large problem on your hands. Check craigs list. It could be fine without it but if you take the chance and don't have a way to treat you could loose your livestock. If your fish have been healthy for a long time and are well fed then you might be ok. Regardless, now is the time to buy a qt or prepare for the worst.

A canister filter pad or hob filter pad in the sump of your display will collect bacteria you need to keep the other system from cycling. Unfortunatly it will not be enough with the fish you listed, you are going to need to have the tank (or rubbermaid tub) cycled. That will however speed the cycle up. You can use a bunch of your rock to help seed the tank with bacteria but be sure to remove it before adding any copper. Copper will hurt the bacteria so keep an eye out for ammonia. Do daily water changes once fish are in the qt.

[rldavisou]

Originally posted by Freed
I don't think there is such a thing as an "already-colonized" biowheel. I might be missing something here.

There's a store in my area that floats biowheels in a tank to colonize them before selling them. At least they used to, I don't know if they still do that or not.

Point being, if I buy a biowheel that's already colonized, will the medication kill the bacteria anyway?

[rldavisou]

Originally posted by kraze3
Why not get a 10 gallon tank, a clip on light and $15 filter and set up a quick QT/Hospital tank and put him in there. DO a 10 gallon water change on your main display and use that water in the new tank. Even a rubbermaid sump could be used ar a QT tank.

The problem is I have 8 fish, including a 6-7" sohal tang that will not fit in anything less than 50 gallons and remain healthy.

I'm looking for a rubbermaid bin right now. Not too many stores seem to be open yet. Does anyone know the biggest size commonly available?

[rldavisou]

IDEA:

set up my frag tank to house my corals, move all my existing filtration to it for now, and do hypo in the main tank without removing fish. The frag tank has no water in it right now. Would the corals survive this move?

[Freed]

If you use a large percentage of your main tank water to fill your frag tank, yes probably. You will want to take out live rock too as hypo will more than likely kill off large portions of bacteria and life on the rock and will cause LARGE ammonia spikes without proper bio filtration.

Issue with preseeded biowheel filters: Tank it's in at LFS could have a more deadly disease than ich, ie VELVET and you could be bringing that home with the biowheel.

Remember: hypo must be done for no less than 4-6 weeks at 1.009SG AFTER the last spot of ich is seen on any of the fish.