ICH!!!!!!!

[pilot_bell777]

OK I am about to scream and take up another hobby....

Here is the storey. I got ich when I first setup the tank and it whiped out a few fish. I took the remaining fish out of the tank and treated with copper. I left them in the hospital tank for 5 weeks and let the tank go completely fallow. Just as Wet Web Media said to do but they said 4 weeks not 5. I figured an extra week wouldn't hurt. Put the two remaining fish back in the main tank and haven't seen a sign of ICH yet.

Well I found two fish that I really likes a Purple Tang and a Flame Angel. I watched both fish at the LFS for two full weeks and looked at them about every other day. I purchased the fish and got them home and put them in the QT tank. The stayed in the QT tank doing great with no signs of ICH for 3 weeks. That is 5 weeks I have watched these fish with no signs of ICH and no signs of ICH in my main tank for quite some time. I move them to the main tank and two days later both of them have signs of Ich.

What is the deal here? How can I get rid of this and keep it gone?What could I have done different to prevent this? On RC a guy was talking about his fish get it a little and then it goes aways. Another guy was talking about using Vinalla Extract???????

Can ICH come in on corals?

What should I do at this point because I am getting very frustrated and I am about to have a very expensive turtle tank!

All advise welcomed! :(

[Ross]

I know how that is...very frustating. If you watched them for 5 weeks w/no signs of ich then they should have been good. The life cycle is 4 weeks. Ich cant be on inverts,but i think certain stages of it live in the sand and lr, so maybe u got it in the lr?? Im not sure though, someone correct me if im wrong.

I got rid of the ich on my flame angel by just keeping him stress free and soaking his food in garlic. Good luck!

[pilot_bell777]

I have had the same LR in the tank sense I set it up......the same LR that was in the tank when it went fallow......

Should I put the purple back in the main tank and give a lot of garlic and vitamins and hope for the best?

[RobertG]

Pilot I had issues with Ich, is this a FO tank Or a reef tank? I know you have gotten frags of things from people here. COPPER I hope not in the reef. Sorry, I will most likely grab hell for this but I have used a UV Sterilizer for the last 5 Months. I have noticed no Ill effects, my Regal no longer goes in & out of Ich signs.

I highly recommend them! I think anyone could benefit from one. I forgot everything bad everyone said of them. I know they work for me!

The fish are most likely just stressed, dont panic yet! My powder blue started to show some signs the other day, I looked at him the next day. Nothing at all..

Hope it works out.

[Ross]

If you already have the purple in the qtine tank, then just leave it there. As long as hes eating and acting normal he should be ok. Research hyposalinity...thats the best way to cure it.

[pilot_bell777]

It is a full reef tank with all sorts of small to large corals, inverts, anemonies, etc.......I might check out the UV Sterilizer.....

[pilot_bell777]

I have the qt tank going through hyposalinity right now to help the purple and added some copper (QT no reef in there).......but my fear is getting rid of it and putting him back in the main tank and there it is again.....I can't keep taking all my rocks and corals out to get the fish out to treat them.....I am at my wits ends here.......

what are the ill effects of a UV Steralizer?

[StephenA]

Every tang I bring home gets ich. The purple got over it in about a week. None of my other fish have ever gotten it.

[RobertG]

Pilot check out this thread.

http://www.maast.org/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&p=42347&hig hlight=#42347

[NaCl_H2O]

Someone please correct me if I am wrong or inacurate: I believe ICH is ALWAYS present, the outbreak is caused by stress, which includes water parameters. Also, higher salinity levels promote more disease in fish.

What are your parameters: Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrate, and your SG?

Do you have dominate fish picking on the new ones, causing "Tank Stress"?

The UV is a good piece of equipment, it does help keep ICH at bay when a breakout starts, but won't eliminate it. It also helps keep the water clear. It will also kill any pods, etc. that get pumped through the UV, but hopefully these stay where you want them & not in your sump/UV.

I run a 25w UV (Lifeguard) in my ~200g system and have only had minor ICH problems that cleared up by themselves in a few days - usualy after introduction of a new fish, and causing a change in the pecking order.

[StephenA]

Someone please correct me if I am wrong or inacurate: I believe ICH is ALWAYS present


That's the way I understand it.

[pilot_bell777]

OH......that changes things!

My water is near perfect...Amo 0 Nitri 0 Ntrata .5 Salinity 1.022 - 1.023, temp 80, Cal 400.......

Maybe that is what it is.......just a little stress with the new order or the tank....

I will get a UV Steralizer.....should these be ran 24/7 or just when you notice an outbreak? I really don't want to loose any pods!

[RobertG]

Pilot I run mine for about 10 Hrs a day. I run it on with my fuge lights. The tank is not so pod populated as my CBB eats them all. However my fuge is just infested with all kinds of different pods & lots of worms. I have a 25w UV, it works great.

[Reef69]

sorry to hear about your ich outbreak pilot, the way i see it , temperature plays a big role in getting ich, This past week my central air unit broke in my apartment and my regal got ich really bad from 1 side, next morning they fixed it and the ich was gone, my temperature was steady all the time until the ac broke, also, about a UV steralizer, they are good, doesnt hurt to have 1, 1 have a 9 watt coral life turbo twist in a 90 gallon and it works great, helps with alge and never had a sign of ich until my ac broke, hope this helps..good luck

[pilot_bell777]

It is not really an outbreak this time....last time ALL the fish were infected and I followed the advise of my LFS and purchased a 22 bottle of water...well not water but it might as well been as good as it worked and becuase of trying to use that all the fish got worse and I lost all but two. This time (Still being scared from what happened last time) my purple and my flame have a couple of spots. I looked at the Flame this morning and he is all cleared up. I moved the purple to a QT tank and was treating him with copper. (I took everything out to get the purple out and treat not knowing that the flame had it too, then put everything back in to find spots on the Flame too). I just moved the purple back to the main tank because he is looking a lot better and figure I will give him a week or two to see if it was just the stress. THey are all eating good adn I am feeding vitamin soaked food with a lot of garlic on it (must have Italian Fish). The flame is cleared up adn i am hoping that the purple will to. I'm goning to get a UV Steralizer and see if that helps.......

How to you hook one of those up?

[Reef69]

well, the UV I have is the coral life turbo twist, most UVs are hanf back..I have my UV in my 20 gal. sump, its very easy to set up, just make sure you get a small power head that pumps something like 40 gph..the people at alamo sold me a rio 600 and the thing was shooting out water like crazy, that show how much they know..lol..the more time the water stays inside the uv light the better, it gets to kill more, so make sure the powerhead you buy for it is of 40 gph or less..thats my opinion tho..dont know what yall think..good luck with everything!

[Reef69]

oh, its the 9 watt turbo twist that I have..the powerhead alamo sold me was way to big for it..a little chart comes in the UV box, telling you the rate of gph you need to make it work, you also have to buy hose depending on how you want to set it up..hope this helps

[pilot_bell777]

Do you take water out of the sump/fuge, send it through the UV Ster,and then return it to the sump/fuge or do you put it inline of your return from the sump/fuge to the main tank?

[NaCl_H2O]

Water into the UV needs to be a clean/filtered as possible so you don't clog up the UV. Some folks even use a small mechanical/cartridge filter in front of the UV. What you are trying to kill with the UV will pass right through any filter you use.

Don't put the UV in the tank drain line - way too much goop! But in line with the sump return would be OK if you have enough pump capacity.

Also, I have heard it is best to use a flow rate (GPH) of about 1/2 the max recommended flow rate for the UV so that the UV has enough contact time to do its job.

[pilot_bell777]

If I put it inline with teh return, won't that be too fast of flow?

[NaCl_H2O]

If I put it inline with teh return, won't that be too fast of flow?

Depends on the UV. They all have a min/max GPH rating that has to do with the flow pattern through the UV and the wattage. Lots of opinions on what size UV, I use a 25w for my system which is approx. 200g total. I think 8-10w/100g is the general rule of thumb? Maybe someone else can comment/confirm that number?

[pilot_bell777]

Guess i will figure all that out when it all gets here!

[pilot_bell777]

Thanks for all the infor everyone!

[pilot_bell777]

Well the good news is that the Flame Angel is spot free now...and I added the purple back to the main tank and he already looks a lot better, way less spots....guess a copper treatment and a fresh water dip really didn't hurt him all that much (maybe his pride a little). Less frustrated now and shooting for the best.

[RobertG]

Pilot if you tee off your return line you will need to put some sort of valve to control the flow. I ended up doing this, I run my UV & my Ca Reactor this way. I have no idea how what the GPH is. Just slow. My unit is a external Lifegaurd 25W. I have it sitting in my sump. Works great!

HTH, Happy Reefing :zzz:

[Instar]

...temperature plays a big role in getting ich...

Silverchair said a whole book full of information in just this one statement. Hyposalinity has nothing to do with ick, however, salinity change does. That done too fast during acclimation or incomplete acclimation and add stress, and we have created conditions necessary during the acclimation procedure. Since the LFS fish water does not come close to reef salinity, we can't just pour in a few cups of water till the bag is full and let the fish go. It takes a lot more than this and a lot longer. Short acclimation can be credited for more fish deaths than is credited. So, where is the temperature change in all this? From store tank, to hot car, blast the car a/c, run into the house, more a/c, drop into the tank and the temp goes to whatever that is, and likely different than the store's, then the lights make it warm during the day, only to fall off after lights out and the sun sets to add thermal cooling to the tank water. Any chance the poor newly imported fish had some changes in all this short time of less than a 24 hour period? All things considered, after a net caught fish from the store, scratched from the net, gets ick... It takes a lot of TLC and patience to get thru all this and not get some ick. Don't get discouraged, practice and experience will help. Then, one day, you'll just get fish and have no ick troubles at all. Really, it will happen.

[rocketeer]

I had a persistant ich problem affecting mostly my regal tang. I added garlic to the fish food for 6 weeks with questionable success. I kept the fish alive but still had ich that came back when garlic stopped. I bought a second skunk shrimp and the ich problem diminished immediately. I won't say that my tank is ich free but it seems to be under control. That's two skunk shrimps in a 120 gal with a regal tang, yellow tang, mandarin, two clowns, two bannerfish, and a bi-color blenny.

Jack

[pilot_bell777]

I always acclimate VERY SLOWLY for these reasons Instar. I also put all fish in my QT tank for 3 to 4 weeks and my water in my QT tank matches the water from my main tank. He was fine in QT for the weeks he was in there. It wasn't a buy and release in main tank move. He was QT'd for weeks and watched and going great.

I have two cleaner shrimp in the main tank as well and I always feed garlic/vitiman soaked food to them. He is looking a lot better today sense adding him back to the main tank. Maybe it was just a little stress going from QT to the main and being put in with other fish, not teritory of his own, new lights, new rocks, etc, etc.......

I am getting a UV Sterilizer and hopefully this will help in the future along with the cleaner shrimp, garlic, and carefull watching!

Thank for all the suggestions and help everyone!

[ratboy]

I have a monster UV sterilizer I got from the tank I just bought. The chamber is about 2' long. If you want Ill take some pics and get brand info if you are interested in buying/trading for it. I do know it needs a new bulb however <15$ I was told.
-Erik

[pilot_bell777]

I'm good but thank you......

[pilot_bell777]

Good new, good news.....I checks and didn't see any ICH spots on any fish! YEAAAAAA.......