"Best" way to treat Ich in display tank?

[fishykid9212]

I recently converted my tank back to salt 3 months ago (92g). I currently have 2 chromis, 1 ocellaris clown, 1 yellow tang and 1 coral beauty with only live rock, no inverts or anything else. I noticed a couple spots on the coral beauty which went away on its own. Now I noticed a couple spots on the yellow tang and he occasionally scratches against the sand.

I definitively should've quarantined everything.... but I'm going to be away for a week and was wondering if anyone knew of the most "effective" way to at least knock down the ich population or weaken it. I don't have to worry about corals/inverts but I do not want to mess around with the bio filtration and deal with ammonia spikes, etc. I may also add corals/inverts in the future.

I have read a ton and it seems like all mixed reviews on a lot of the treatments. I am just looking for something temporary that can give me time until I get back and quarantine to cure the ich from the tank. I just don't want anything to happen while I'm away. Any opinions? Thanks a lot

[Lsufan]

There isn’t really anything u can do short term like u are asking. The only way to treat in the display would be going with hypo. That isn’t somthing u can do if u aren’t around because u have to pay close attention to the salinity & keep it stable.

They only have 3 ways to cure ich. Hypo, cooper & ttm. Hypo is the only one that can be done in the dt but the only way I would go that route is if I had a huge tank with a ton of fish & removing them just wasn’t a option. I prefer ttm but it’s hard to do if u have more then 5 or so fish. I do ttm on all new arrivals & haven’t gotten ich since I started doing so.

The only issue with ttm is it only takes 14 days to treat the fish. So u would have to have a place to keep them for two months after u finish ttm before u can place them back into the dt. U have the same thing with cooper, so regardless u will have to home them for a couple months so the dt can go fallow for the 72 days.

If I was in your situation I would go to the lfs & get 10 to 20 lbs of liverock & setup another tank now. That way between the week u will be away & the two week treatment period, it will have 3 or 4 weeks to fully cycle. Use this tank for when u are finished treating the fish so u don’t have to do daily water changes for 2 months while u are waiting on the dt to be ready. Once u get back I would get two containers & use those to do ttm to treat the fish. Do plenty of research so u know u are doing it correctly. They have a sticky on ttm that explains it very well. The treatment will take 14 days & when it is over u will have a cycled tank to home the fish for the next 2 months while the dt is going fallow

[Subsea]

Fish immune system is an effective tool. Stress on fish accounts for 300% more fatalities than all parasites. So, to answer your question about short term solution. Reduce stress.

Long term solution: reduce stress. Read the science.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...45305X17301118

To enhance a fishes immune system, I feed live shellfish like mussels or oysters. IMO, live gut cavity bacteria are the beginning of a healthy fish immune system.

[nereefpat]

I would hypo your display tank.

You will want to keep track of salinity, as mentioned. Keep track of ammonia too, just in case.

[NYCBOB]

if u have no corals or inverts, just do hypo by lowering the salinity to 1.08 over time.

[sde1500]

Yea since there are no corals or inverts a hypo treatment in the DT is possible. Definitely keep an eye on ammonia because you won't be doing your beneficial bacteria any favors, but likely you should be ok. Keep some prime on hand just in case, and maybe add some bacteria in a bottle to the tank after the hypo treatment is done.

[ca1ore]

This is a very 'old' discussion. It is basically curing versus managing. There is no effective way to remove ich from a running reef tank, though there are things like hypo and CP that can be done if you can remove the inverts. There are ways to reduce the parasite pressure, UV and a diatom filter as examples, but neither will completely remove it. The best course of action really depends on how bad the ich infection is. I tend to go with a management approach, including minimizing stress (though impossible to eliminate it completely) and feeding the fish well ... but there are certain fish that are consequently unavailable to me. FWIW, been managing ich in my system since 2013.

[Uncle99]

CA1ORE, can you just clarify for me.
Is what you are saying is that Ick, can remain in a tank for years, but not affect the fish because they are not stressed and they are well fed so they do not fall victim to the parasite...do I understand you correctly?

[Tripod1404]

Originally Posted by Uncle99

CA1ORE, can you just clarify for me.
Is what you are saying is that Ick, can remain in a tank for years, but not affect the fish because they are not stressed and they are well fed so they do not fall victim to the parasite...do I understand you correctly?

Not for everyone. Not only your fish but overall tank ecosystem need to be very health and well balanced. Ich generally causes minimum damage to healthy fish in mature healthy systems.

[sde1500]

Originally Posted by Uncle99

CA1ORE, can you just clarify for me.
Is what you are saying is that Ick, can remain in a tank for years, but not affect the fish because they are not stressed and they are well fed so they do not fall victim to the parasite...do I understand you correctly?

Absolutely. Just as for us if we are well fed, lead generally stress free lives, we stay healthier, as do fish.

[Subsea]

Originally Posted by Uncle99

CA1ORE, can you just clarify for me.
Is what you are saying is that Ick, can remain in a tank for years, but not affect the fish because they are not stressed and they are well fed so they do not fall victim to the parasite...do I understand you correctly?

The answer is yes, but the reason is more complex than a healthy fish immune system. For me, the more important issue is the ich cyst dormant stage. When reading scientific articles 30 years ago, incubation period was “most hatched in 14 days”. Today, depending on who you read, ich cyst incubation is 56 days.

IMO, the reason the ich incubation period changes is because unexplained ich infestations occur which require longer incubation periods. When reading these peer reviewed articles on ich cyst incubation the phrase, “Most will incubate in X days”.

It only takes one parasite to multiply. I

[shaginwagon13]

Originally Posted by fishykid9212

I recently converted my tank back to salt 3 months ago (92g). I currently have 2 chromis, 1 ocellaris clown, 1 yellow tang and 1 coral beauty with only live rock, no inverts or anything else. I noticed a couple spots on the coral beauty which went away on its own. Now I noticed a couple spots on the yellow tang and he occasionally scratches against the sand.

I definitively should've quarantined everything.... but I'm going to be away for a week and was wondering if anyone knew of the most "effective" way to at least knock down the ich population or weaken it. I don't have to worry about corals/inverts but I do not want to mess around with the bio filtration and deal with ammonia spikes, etc. I may also add corals/inverts in the future.

I have read a ton and it seems like all mixed reviews on a lot of the treatments. I am just looking for something temporary that can give me time until I get back and quarantine to cure the ich from the tank. I just don't want anything to happen while I'm away. Any opinions? Thanks a lot

I JUST finished 80 days of hypo and I did it in my main display tank like yours. I had fish, no inverts.

Honestly it wasn’t as hard as people made it out to be. I got the salinity down to 1.008 and topped off eXh day without rodi water to make sure it stayed there.

Honestly I would do it again if I had to, it really was not that bad.

[Joe0813]

nothing.. if you cant get a QT to treat with copper or TTM then just feed well and keep the water quality up

[swiftvision]

I was told by a LFS (I know) "all tanks have Ich"....and suggested UV filter, higher water quality, even garlic.

I did all of the above and it disappeared for good (8 months so far). Sometimes my purple tang has a spot or two but goes away within a week.

[sde1500]

Originally Posted by Joe0813

nothing.. if you cant get a QT to treat with copper or TTM then just feed well and keep the water quality up

Why don’t you think hypo would work?

[shaginwagon13]

Originally Posted by sde1500

Why don’t you think hypo would work?

It will work. I just did it.

[thegrun]

Originally Posted by swiftvision

I was told by a LFS (I know) "all tanks have Ich"....and suggested UV filter, higher water quality, even garlic.

I did all of the above and it disappeared for good (8 months so far). Sometimes my purple tang has a spot or two but goes away within a week.

Typical LFS comment but certainly not true. Many of us keep completely Ich free systems, but it is fair to say that there are a number of tanks out there where the owners are willing to take the risk. The problem (as I see it) with living with Ich is that you are living with a ticking time bomb. Ich while lying mostly dormant is still there, waiting for some stress factor to reduce the fish's immune system where it can flair up to the point of killing fish.

[nereefpat]

Originally Posted by swiftvision

I was told by a LFS (I know) "all tanks have Ich"....and suggested UV filter, higher water quality, even garlic.

My tank doesn't have it. I did TTM on all current fish.

Originally Posted by sde1500

Why don’t you think hypo would work?

Was going to ask the same thing... maybe a blanket statement that there is nothing you can do in a reef.... but this is a fish only.

[ca1ore]

Certainly not all tanks have ich, though I have long been of the view that there are two types of tanks: those that have ich and those that the keeper believes do not. I'd suggest that of the latter, some are ich free and some are not. Often one discovers upon introduction of a suceptible fish that you have ich.

[ca1ore]

Originally Posted by Uncle99

CA1ORE, can you just clarify for me.
Is what you are saying is that Ick, can remain in a tank for years, but not affect the fish because they are not stressed and they are well fed so they do not fall victim to the parasite...do I understand you correctly?

Stressed is an imprecise term. What I am suggesting is that under broadly healthy conditions, most fish can acquire long-term immunity to ich. Healthy conditions would include proper diet, healthy corals and plenty of space. There are lots of variables though, including the virulence of the particular ich strain. Some fish are so susceptible that they should be avoided.

I've had ich in my display for the last five years. Obviously it persists by going through the natural lifecycle; so my fish do act as carriers, though actual symptoms are rare and none ever seem to be distressed. I notice it mostly when introducing a new fish, that will sometimes show spots for a week or two.

At this point, I have a sizable Fish population, most of which were added after the tank got ich. Not entirely sure how it got in since I QT all fish. Maybe slipped through, came in on a coral, etc.

[LED Jack]

Let me simplify what many have said. Happy healthy fish do not get ick. Treat the cause not the symptom.

I have never and I say NEVER quarantined any fish but I do always put them in an aquarium in which they can thrive. Sure a new fish might show ick when they are introduced initially but they get over it rather quickly and none of their tankmates show signs.

[LED Jack]

ca1ore what would you put the percentage of ick problems due to user error (poor tank conditions)? I would have to say it is well above 90%.

[ca1ore]

Originally Posted by LED Jack

ca1ore what would you put the percentage of ick problems due to user error (poor tank conditions)? I would have to say it is well above 90%.

Not sure I would know to assign a percentage. I do follow a strict QT protocol, mainly because there are things far worse than ich - even if ich is the most common problem. Trouble is that there are any number of variables that would dictate the severity of an infection, including things that the hobbyist cannot influence like the aforementioned ich strain potency. With a particularly virulent form, it may be that no husbandry approach will be effective.

I think foolish choices are a big factor in fish death. Whether it's 90%, 50% .... or something else is ultimately unknowable.

[Uncle99]

Thanks so much for this great input!
I thinks it helps me better understand the real reasons and prevention strategies.

[reefgeezer]

Once Ick is in the system, I'm on the "managing" side. If your fish show a spot or two every once in a while you might be ok as long as you keep them well fed and in a good environment.

If stress occurs though, you could have an outbreak and lose a bunch of fish. Improperly implemented hypo processes can cause that stress. I'd play wait & see.