ick meds

[ltljoker]

can any of you recamend a good ick medication that is reef safe. I took all my fish out and want to treat my tank for ick. I have coral still in there so copper is a no no

 

[Ted]

If you have no fish in there you dont need to medicate just run it fishless for 6 to 8 weeks. I tried a "reef safe" med Ich Attack by Kordon didnt kill my live rock but didnt help the fish either. He died. :frustrat:

 

[bjohanson1234]

+1 Ted

What will happen is that any ick in your tank will pretty much starve to death without any sutable hosts

Brian

 

[Hornet]

+1 more Don't treat the tank, treat your fish in the QT and let your tank go fallow for 8 weeks and the ich will die of with no fish to host it.

 

[dustin_P74]

if ANY medication on the market for our hobby says reef safe then that means it will NOT work. if it is not reef safe then it has copper in it and that will work but it will also cause your tank to never be safe for corals or inverts again. that being said since there are no fish in your tank anymore then you dont need any medication because the ich parasites will die as the have no host to breed and feed on

 

[dcantucson]

I agree with all the above. Don't treat the water! Even though they say they are "reef safe" I think they can mess with the water quality and can throw the water parameters off. You could shock your entire system and damage or kill your corals.

 

[Bifferwine]

Any meds that are gentle enough for your corals and sensitive inverts aren't going to do any damage to ich. Others are right -- ich needs a host to survive. No fish host, no ich. As long as you only have corals and inverts in the tank for 6 to 8 weeks, the ich will be gone by the time you re-introduce fish.

 

[jhnrb]

You might want to consider keeping the main tank free of fish for at least 3 months. The cycle should break in 2 months, however, as with everything else some cysts may be able to survive longer, so, 3 months is my recommendation. when you put the fish back in the main tank, add a cleaner gobie, or, cleaner wrasse, or cleaner shrimp depending on your fish type. good luck.

 

[ltljoker]

Thanks for all the help and answers but I was reading online that if u raise the water temp that it will further help kill of the ich in the tank. So the question is eill this help and will raising the water temp to 85 harm my corals. this is without any fish in the tank and they are in qt and waiting out the 45 days for the ich to cycle out of the water

 

[dustin_P74]

it probably wont be good for the very sensitive inverts. i dont really see a point in it since you still have to wait a while to treat the fish

 

[Hornet]

+1 to what Dustin said.

Your going to need to treat the fish and that will take at least 4 weeks, so why rush. Rushing the treatment of ich might mean you'll have to fight it off again.

How are your fish that you took out doing doing? Are you treating them in another tank? Any die?

 

[ltljoker]

Hornet all fish are fine no symptoms on them no lose of fish either i was just curious about raising the water temp to kill ich

 

[ltljoker]

i agree and am doing the treatment dustin i was just curious if this was a way for future reference in any of my tanks since i am getting my 210 gallon in a few weeks

 

[1geo]

The Ich parasite has eggs in its life cycle. The eggs can lay dormant in the substrata of your tank for 8 weeks before they hatch. Once they hatch they become "swimmers" looking for a host. If they don't find one in a matter of hours they die. That's why you have to keep your tank fallow for 8 weeks and it better be a FULL 8 weeks or you will reinfect your fish when you put them back in the tank. Treating the tank water with a product like "Revive" will kill the swimmers but will not kill the eggs. Still, after 8 weeks, I would treat the tank with Revive and after the 9th week I would put the fish back in the tank.

 

[daugherty]

i would just use a qt tank and treat all fish with copper before you put them in a display tank

 

[dcantucson]

I would also get a UV light for your tank (an oversized one) for future assurance. Works for a lot of people.