yellow tang... black dots

[jaded]

No pics to show but its exactly what the title describes. Tiny black dots on a yellow tang. The big purple tang has been on a tear, chasing everbody since the large hippo started chasing the yellow corris wrasse... its total mayhem in the tank the last 2 days!!!

I'm thinking this might just be the remains of a small ich breakout but I thought I would ask.

P.S. I did a small water change tonight

[::pete::]

You didnt do it with RO/Di did you?

[jaded]

of course i did... dont do that... I'm already insecure about my RO/DI ignorance.

now you got me wondering... PPPEEEETTTTTTTEEEEEEEEEE

[abe77901]

Awesome avatar Jade.... :)

[Reef69]

Black ick...its called "tang turbellarian disease", caused by a worm (called a turbellarian). They mature at about a week, then they drop to the bottom and breed, then the young hatch by the 100s looking for fish to attach to. Symptoms are numerous dark spots distributed over the fins, gills and body. Other signs include fasting, listlessness, paling or whitish skin and scratching against objects. Secondary bacterial infections are known to occur aswell..Id get him out and QT him, using formalin or trochlorfon and hypo..HTH's...

[jaded]

Hmmm I have no QT tank. I will try to get pics tonight for further verification. Thanks for the info

[Reef69]

Im sure thats it, its usually known as a tang only disease, but it does affect other fish..post some pics of you can..

[jaded]

I've found a few sources of info on this. One site says this will run its course and as long as the tank is in good shape there may not be much of a problem. Another site says I should pull the fish immediately, chemically treat him and QT for 2-4 weeks.

I think a freshwater dip is definately in order, but I dont have a QT tank running. Donny mentioned that he always has a flow filter with biowheel running on his sump just so he can instantly set up a QT. I wish I had that now!!! I do have a 20 gallon tank I can set up but I dont know the details of running a QT tank. Does anyone have a good link for me to read?

[Reef69]

"Black ick" usually appears after regular ick runs its course, it has happen to me before, sadly it was a Powder brown and i couldnt do much about it.

What i would do is take 10 gallons out of your tank and put them in your 20 gal. depending wether you want to do hyposalinity or not, you can add RO water to that, to lower your salinity, If not, add 10 gal. of water from your tank and 10 of new SW, then treat with whatever it is you want to treat with. Keep the tank as sterile as possible, no sand, no rocks, nothing..just the bare tank and maybe a piece of PVC so the fish can hide..keep a heater and a filter with the filter media only, no carbon...Thats what I would do..

[jaded]

sounds easy enough. I suppose I need to do a water change once a day or so?

[Reef69]

No, i wouldnt do a water change once a day..thats too much. Healthy fish will fight it off, keep feeding them..the parasite will die if it has nobody to attach to. Plus it seems its the early stages, just get the fish out and the rest should be fine..

[CD]

Jaded - also remember if you are going to do the lowered salinity, that you will need to acclimate the fish VERY slowly to that new environment. As far as doing water changes, a lot of that is going to depend on the bio-load that the fish in question creates. We have a 20G I keep two percs and some hermits in, and I change water for them once a week (about 15% volume). You'll want to keep a close eye on the water params too...even something as simple as one of the HOB filters is still going to cycle if it's newly set up. Good luck with curing your fish, and keep us posted. ;)

W. :)

[jaded]

Diego... I meant water changes on the QT tank. I'll get the yellow out tonight and keep a close eye on the rest. Apparently this is more common in yellows than any others, but not exclusive.

Wendy... thanks for the info, I'll probably do a little more reading before I decide how to treat him. For now I think I'll try to get some kind of filter for the 20 so I can get him out of the general population.

I'm assuming I need some sort of filter on the QT tank so I think I'll stop by walmart on the way home for a cheapy HOB.Thanks for the help and if you think of anything else we haven't talked about do be shy to post it!!! I need all the help I can get :)

[Reef69]

Yea Jade, do a waterchange ever 2 days, because most medications are every other day....remember not to run carbon, just the filter media on the HOB..anything else just LMK..hope everything goes well, those yellow tangs are usually bullet proof...good luck

[jaded]

Im really not to worried about him... I just want to make sure this doesn't spred. The other tangs could fall faster and I dont need an outbreak of anything in this tank!!!!

thanks for the tips

[jaded]

I got home to see he has fewer black dots. Of course that could mean the worms have simply fallen into the sand bed and Im in worse trouble than I thought. One way or the other I'm going to try to get a picture while I wait for RODI water

[jaded]

This is the best pic I could get... I tried to zoom a bit so you could see the spots but they are tiny