Help......ich maybe????

[abe77901]

I am relatively new and bought a small regal tang, well a day after getting him home he started scratching on the rocks. I don't see any white scales or bumps on him yet, but was wondering if there is any preventative addative to add to my tank. It is a 55 gallon reef with lots of coral so I know most medications are out of the question. Should I pull him out, keep an eye on him or what??? I have no hospital tank or anything other for that matter. Any advise appreciated.

[DeletedAccount]

This is one of the beauties of Regals. They get outbreaks when a stressful event happens to the tang or the tank. Keep him well fed, invest in a cleaner shrimp or two if you do not have some already, maybe a neon goby... Also, make sure that the tank parameters are good. With a regal, the parameters can be perfect and he can have problems, but make sure anyway.

[Jenn]

Abe, who else is in the tank w/ the regal?

Misti, I have been thinking about investing in a neon goby, but have been reading a lot of how they don't do well in captivity and tend to jump out of the tank. Do you have one? I wanted to find out first hand before I decide to buy one. Thanks.

[DeletedAccount]

I have had many. They are great fish! I have either given them to folks who had ich outbreaks and needed one or (oops) squished them under rocks. I had four for over 2 years before I gave three of them away. I think that they are prone to jumping, but never had that problem. They were in a tank hat was semi-covered. I believe that ORA sells them. That should greatly enhance the survivability. That would mean that they are captive bred or tank raised.

[abe77901]

I have a small percula, a small black saddleback clown, a small yellow tang, and a small flame angel. I am getting rid of the black saddleback.

[GaryP]

I lost a powder blue to ich today. Ouch! I never have seen it, or any of my other fish, approach my cleaner shrimp to be cleaned. Is the problem with the fish or the shrimp? Is there such a thing as a false cleaner shrimp?

Gary

[Jenn]

Thanks Misti. I will probably try to get one in the near future.

Abe, are the clowns picking on your regal?

Gray, I am sorry to hear about your powder blue. He was beautiful! I lost mine the same way. :cry:
I had 2 cleaners and when I had my powder blue, they would not clean him either. I also had a regal and they would clean him just fine, but the regal would back up and be still for them to clean him - the powder blue never gave them the chance, at least not that I saw. Kind of weird.

[DeletedAccount]

I have 4 cleaners in one of my tanks and at least two in all of the others. All of my tangs, even the nasty Purple, back up and hold still and open the gills and everything for the cleaners. The angels will too, but the clowns (except 1 black perc) freak out if the cleaners get anywhere near them! 6 outof 7 clowns HATE the cleaners. The one that uses them got a severe heater burn (rookie mistake, exposed heater in the main tank and the clown wanted to snugge at night) that got a nasty infection. I q-tined the clown in with a cleaner in a SMALL tank and now the cown is in love with the skunk! I guess that it is mostly an individual fish thing...

[Jenn]

How interesting. Do you have cleaners w/ the neon goby? I just lost my last cleaner and need to get a few more.

[DeletedAccount]

I do have 4 cleaners in the tank with the neon goby.

[Jenn]

Great. Now I just have to find a lfs with healthy cleaner shrimp...I've run into bad luck lately w/ them. Thanks Misti.

[Ross]

Gary-i am very sorry to hear about your powder blue tang.

[Instar]

I never had neon gobies jump. They like to live inside small conch shells and they spawn in there.

Gary Sorry bout your tang. Powder blues generally hate cleaner shrimp. Generally they do not make good candidates for cleaning and may even try to kill the cleaner shrimp. Of course someone will have one that thinks he is some other kind of fish and has learned to be cleaned, but, generally that will be the exception. Also, powder blues do not acclimate well to captivity. The losses can be high. It helps to hve a very large tank and lots of macro to feed them. And yes, I believe there is a false cleaner shrimp. Fortunately we don't see them for sale. Cleaner shrimp are one of the most sensitive to changes in water chemistry during acclimation. They are easy to kill, difficult to get ones from suppliers that are not already messed up to the point that they will die no matter how good you are with the acclimation process. My experience with them lately has been about 1 in 6 will make it. I guess that is better than wild caught fish do. Should probably be getting them from Tim. Perhaps he can get healthy ones that are not all messed up from the get go. It may take a month to come to realize they are not ok.

[shellback]

How many of us use cleaner wrasse, I have one in my small tank that cleans its tank mates at least once every 30 min. He's a nice fish and doesn't bother anything eles, just really hyper. There is a pic of him with my domino in the gallery.

[GaryP]

A cleaner wrasse is very difficult to keep alive in captivity. The diet is almost entirely parasites and we can't keep enough fish in a tank to keep them fed. I have had some success in the past to feeding live brine then switching to frozen brine for cleaner wrasses. However I DO NOT recommend running out and buying a cleaner wrasses. There is a big difference between a reef with 100's of fish to be cleaned and the few fish we can put in a reef tank. Your better off with tank raised cleaner shrimp or neon gobies (see Instar's comments above).

That said, I do admit I would love to have a Hawaiian Cleaner Wrasse but can't bring myself to watch one starve. Here's a pic for those of you not familiar with this species. I guess I'll have to wait to get one for my 600 gal. tank.

http://saltaquarium.about.com/cs/msub28wrasse/l/blpickhicleaner.htm

Gary

[shellback]

My cleaner eats flake food at both feed times and enjoys the cyclo-pleze that he gets once a week. He has accepted flake from the begining and likes frozen mysis. It's dependant on the fish on what he will and wont eat.

[GaryP]

Shellback,

I think you are very lucky to have a cleaner wrasse that accepts flake. IMO its definitely the exception to the rule. That's the problem with these guys, folks hear about the exceptions and think they are going to be lucky and get one of them too.

Gary

[shellback]

I have never had a fish starve on me so far. Most fish I start with frozen work in flake slowly then ween to frozen twice to three times a week. But it is true that some fish are just picky eaters and you run your luck.