ich treatment advice

[nick063]

Ok so on my blue eyed kole tang i noticed some tiny white spots on him last night, it was late so i decided to wait until morning to capture him and put him in my qt tank. Today he is in the qt tank but he has no white spots on him, if i treat him with the ich meds and he doesn't have it will it kill him?? also should i treat the dt also? Yesterday was the first day i noticed the spots, thanks for all your help!!

[nick063]

Also which is the better of the two treatments i bought, i have kordon rid ich and ruby reef kick ich, thanks again

[linz13]

i had a case of ich and i used rid ich. it worked awesome. i only did it in my quarantine tank because if you have any live rock or sand or tube worms or anything like invertebrate wise the medicine will kill it. as for your tang, treat him because the ich may be in a different stage of life where it is floating in the water which is when the medicine works. make sure you use the medicine the way it is supposed to be. read the directions and follow them exactly. dont skimp out or anything. also dont use too much because then it may harm your fish. just follow the directions exactly.

leave him in the qt tank for at least 6 weeks.

do you have any other fish in the dt?

[nick063]

in the dt tank i have a naso tang and 2 b/w clowns i havent noticed any spots or anything on them

[toolfan]

Save your $$. There is no evidence that any of the Ich "snake oils" work. The parasites generally drop off the host within a few days. (this is why some people believe these remedies work). the only proven methods to rid Ich are copper/hypo salinity/removing the fish from the infected tank. Or you could opt to do nothing. depending on the species, the fish can fight it off naturally. continue to feed good foods, maintain excellent water perameters/perform water changes.

The medicines do not work, most of them will not cause any ill effects (I have used some that have killed entire tanks) but trust me...there is no magic cure for Ich.

Mark

[linz13]

yeah i think you should qt the rest of the fish, leave the dt fishless... even though you havent seen any spots on them doesnt mean that they dont have it. im using hyposalinity right now after a few weeks of rid ich treatment (which seemed to get rid of everything because none of them have been reinfected).

if you dont leave the dt fishless, ich will remain in the tank and keep infecting new tank inhabitants, meaning any new fish you add could possibly get ich. so my suggestion would be to qt all of the fish and leave your dt fishless, treat with either rid ich or hyposalinity...

as for hypo here's how to do it...

acclimate your fish to regular saltwater in the qt... ph 8.2, salt level 1.025 or around there...

then leave it for around a day or two so that the fish get used to the water.

after a day or two replace about 1/5 of the water in the qt with freshwater (with all of the harmful chemicals taken out... my suggestion would be to use ro/di water)

then around 12 hours later do the same, replace 1/5 of the water in the qt

12 more hours replace 1/5 more of the water....

keep replacing 1/5 of the water 12 hours later until the salinity is 1.009... the last replacement of water may be smaller than that... just be sure to keep checking the water with a refractometer

make sure it is no more or the treatment may not work... no less or the fish could be harmed...

[nick063]

ok, hmm well here's the thing, i dont plan on adding any more fish to the dt, would the fish already in the tank be safe from it or no?

[linz13]

uhm well it kind of depends... some fish are naturally immune to it and some arent.... at any point if you choose to leave your fish in the dt they could get it... whether they are stressed or they get sick or anything could trigger ich... stress is a common trigger...

my suggestion would just be to qt the fish... it will be better for them in the long run and get rid of ich totally from your dt and your fish.

here's a link to show you how to do hypo if you choose to qt the fish...
http://reefshow.com/html/modules.php...rticle&sid=159

scroll down to where it says how to treat with hyposalinity...

[otrlynn]

Originally posted by nick063
ok, hmm well here's the thing, i dont plan on adding any more fish to the dt, would the fish already in the tank be safe from it or no?

The fish in the tank are not safe and have already been exposed. The best thing would be to get all of the fish into a hospital tank, and treat them all, IMO. The display tank has been exposed to the ich parasite. At one stage, the cysts drop into the sand, where they can later hatch and infect more fish. I suggest you go to the "sticky" at the top of this forum, marked with a * "New to..." Look under the section on common problems and you will find all that you need to know about treating ich.

[nick063]

ok well if i put all the fish in my qt wont it stress them even more because its a smaller tank?

[tmz]

Uh Oh another ich thread.

I think treatment of the fish and the tank is the best option for an ich (cryptocaryon irritans) infestation. The treatment protocols are difficult and many do not choose to do them or are in a circumstance where they can't do them(such as catching a fish in a fully deveoped reef tank). You have to make a choice wether to treat or not treat. The following should give you some information to help with this decision.

Treatment:

There are only 3 proven treatments for ich. Copper,hyposalinity or the tank transfer method. All of them require removing the fish from the display tank and treating in (a) separate tank(s).

I personaly prefer copper treatment or tank transfer since Hyposalinity for a prolonged period is ,in my opinion, quite stressfull and has been ,in my experiece, ineffective.

When ich is in the tank it is very likely all of the fish are affected wether or not they show obvious symptoms since many parasites host in the nostrils, mouth and gills. Fish with lesser infestations that are not visible probably have a degree of immunity perhaps from prior exposure(82% of surviving fish that have had significant exposure develop some immunity). So it is necessary to remove them all and treat them.
It is also necessary to leave the tank fishless for a minimum of 6 weeks( some cysts have survived for 72 days) to be pretty sure that all of the parasites have hatched and perished for lack of a host fish. Otherwise new fish including th one you may treat will likely be attacked.

There is a lot of information available on this protozoan parasite and a google search or a search of the fish and disease forum on RC will help you understand a lot about cryptocaryon irritans and it's treatment.

No Treatment:

Hope and cope strategies are often employed. Some fish can and do survie an infestation, Some don't. In either case the ich will be in the tank for about 11 months unless it is particularly virulent or does not hold true to form with studies on its life cycle. It is believed that a single strain of ich can reproduce a maximum of 34 times (over a period of about 11 months). After which it expires even when a host is available. This is attributed to cell aging in the strain.

During this period new fish are likely to be attacked and the fish in the tank already will have some level of infestation seen or unseen usually every week or two.

Manging water quality with an emphasis on steady temperature and salinity and good nutrition are important to keep the fish healthy and to give them the strength to cope.

There are a number of "reef safe treatments" on the market. In my experience none are effective teatments and some are not effective or reef safe.

Other things aquarists do in an effort to help the situation when treatment is not chosen include: uv sterilization, cleaner shrimp, neon gobies, garlic soaked food,diatom filtration. None of these will cure ich in my opinion but they won't do any harm either and may have some benefit when a decison is made not to treat.

[linz13]

if you give them a few places to hide... like small pieces of pvc pipe and stuff they wont be stressed out as much... just be sure theyre eating and swimming around or doing what they normally do and you're all set! ich will be gone in about 6-8 weeks... im on week 4 of my treatment and so far everything looks good... i did hypo and rid ich and no more spots! =] i hope it goes well!

[inachu]

the only proven methods to rid Ich are copper/hypo salinity/removing the fish from the infected tank. Or you could opt to do nothing. depending on the species, the fish can fight it off naturally. continue to feed good foods, maintain excellent water perameters/perform water changes.
Mark

I should tatoo the above on my arm somewhere to save money.

[inachu]

Originally posted by linz13
if you give them a few places to hide... like small pieces of pvc pipe and stuff they wont be stressed out as much... just be sure theyre eating and swimming around or doing what they normally do and you're all set! ich will be gone in about 6-8 weeks... im on week 4 of my treatment and so far everything looks good... i did hypo and rid ich and no more spots! =] i hope it goes well!

When you see them clean of white spots do you see white spots on the bottom of the QT tank?

My only concern now with a QT tank setup is how much copper to put in.
My QT tank that I have is a 10 gallon.

[atrox]

NEW TO RC LOOK HERE!!!!!!
At the top of this forum click the link, scroll down look for these articles


Marine Ich 1 and 2
Quarantine Tank

These are very usefull articles that were authored by considerate reefers. Take advantage of them, read them and you will understand exactly what ich is, and how to properly deal with it.

[nick063]

Thanks for all your help tmz, linz13!!