Ich on my Flame

[Rcpilot]

I woke up today to find my Flame angel covered in white spots. It's ich. I'm so F*#@*ING mad I could scream. Now my whole tank has it. That means ALL my fish are going to get exposed to it. Probably already have been exposed to it.

I know it was this angel that brought it into my tank. This is the same angel that had ich at the store. I kept checking on it and finally bought it when it looked healthy. I should have waited longer.

The angel has some kind of glob or mass of goo growing on the top of his tail fin and he was covered in ich this morning.

I made some baffles out of eggcrate and sectioned my 5.5g tank off into 4 compartments. One compartment for each fish. I want to keep them isolated while they are all in QT so they don't fight. Each fish is going to have like 3.5" x 8" of swimming room. Not much. I'll toss a few pieces of PVC into each compartment so they can hide. I stuck a Whisper 20 HOB filter on one end of the tank and ran a piece of vinyl hose from the pickup all the way to the other end of the tank. That should keep the water flowing across the entire tank.

I still need to make an eggcrate top for the tank to prevent anybody from going carpet surfing. Need a heater too.

I don't have a light for this tank. Will they be okay without it? The QT Tank is going to be sitting right next to the DT, so it should get some light from there--just not really bright.

I'm thinking I can put my fish back into the DT sometime around late February or early March -- just to be safe. That'll be like 10 or 12 weeks. Should be long enough to kill all the ich in the DT.

This sucks. I should have QT'd that angel when I brought him home. Feel like a dumbass. Now I get to jack around with water changes in the QT tank every 2 or 3 days. And only for 8--12 weeks. Yippee!

On the bright side, my DT won't be getting any food, so I should see nutrient levels drop. That may help get rid of my algae.



Waiting on the silicone to dry. Should be cured in about 3 or 4 days.

[Piggy]

Do all the fish have ich? If not the only fish that needs to be QT is the one infected. Feed the ohers garlic and watch them closely.

[Rcpilot]

My whole tank has been exposed to ich now. There's no point in just taking out one of them. The ich has probably already dropped off him and gone into the reproduction stage. As soon as those hatch, the whole tank will have been exposed to it.

I would rather get it overwith now, instead of doing this multiple times and worrying about it for the next year.

I'm going to have to wait at least 3 or 4 days for the silicone to dry in the QT tank. I'll see how the rest of them look at that time.

[reeffreak]

All these Ich problems scares me.I hope I never get it,knock on wood.I hope it works out Rc.

If your putting all your fish in QT then your going to have to feed the DT's bacteria.Ghost feed every other day or the beneficial bacteria will die off.

[Rcpilot]

Whats ghost feeding?

I assume it means I should just feed the tank about 1/2 rations every couple days? Now that I think about it, the crabs and nassarius snails will need something to eat. Makes sense to keep some waste in there so my bacteria bed doesn't die.

[Piggy]

I would think that the fish are going to stress more with the little bit of swimming room your giving them. There is ick present is every tank. All I can say is good luck and keep us up to date.

[Rcpilot]

Originally Posted by Piggy

I would think that the fish are going to stress more with the little bit of swimming room your giving them. There is ick present is every tank. All I can say is good luck and keep us up to date.

I disagree with your statement that ich is present in every tank.

Are you telling me that if I put together a new reef tank with new equipment and I start with dry sand and dry rock that it will have ich?

WE, the hobbyist, introduce ich to our systems by stocking. If I had been smart, I'd have already had a QT tank set up and ready to go. Every coral and fish would have been QT'd for 2 months before adding it to my DT. THAT simple procedure would have kept my tank completely ich free--indefinitely. The QT tank doesn't even have to ever see any medication--according to most hobbyists. Ich can supposedly be safely irradicated with simple hyposalination.

Corals placed in the QT tank for 2 months will surely show any signs of trouble in that time. Any aiptasia will show up in that time and can be killed. And ich cysts that may be on the frags will surely die in QT without a host for 2 months.

So tell me, how do ALL systems just HAVE ich? I know how I got it. I was lazy and I introduced it with a sick fish. But before that--I'd have bet a years wages that you couldn't find even one single cyst in my tank.

[yote]

Actually Piggys right.All fish carry the ick parasite.We only see it when a fishs immune system is weakened or the fish is stressed.
So as soon as we introduce a fish to the tank,we introduce the parasite.

[Rcpilot]

Okay, so I will QT my fish and completely clear it from their bodies. A few weeks at lower salinity should do the trick. I'm still researching to see exactly how long I will have to leave them at lower salinity to completely kill all the ich parasite. Lower salinity won't kill the parasite while it is attached to their bodies. But it does kill the parasite once it drops from their bodies and becomes free swimming in the water column.

I will leave them in QT for 8-10 weeks. NOT so that I can continue to treat them needlessly after the parasite is dead. BUT, so that the parasite can be completely killed off in my DT.

You telling me that my fish will still be carrying ich after I put them back into the DT in 10 weeks? You telling me after all that BS that my fish could still pop up with ich anytime they might become stressed?

If thats the case, I'll just flush them all right now and save them from all the suffering and infection.

[Bifferwine]

I also agree with Piggy. Your fish are going to carry it no matter what.