Ick Treatment

Mtrueblood

Reefing newb
My blue hippo tang has come down with a case of Ick. What medication should I use in the tank that will get rid of the problem but wont hurt the corals or the fish. I was told at the LFS that Kick Ick would be good but could not garantee me that it would hurt the stuff in my tank. Pretty much they werent much help to me. If anyone could help and tell me the best medication that would help me I would apreciate it a whole lot.
 
you need to get a qt tank and use copper in it. do not use any medication in the dt tank usually they will kill everything even if they say reef safe. you can get a ten gallon or a twenty galon tank cheap and use that for a qt. but it will take at least 6 weeks to get rid of the ich.
 
There isn't anything you can use in the display tank that won't hurt your inverts or contaminate your live rock and sand. If you want to treat ich, you must do it in a quarantine tank. The only effective treatments for ich are copper and hyposalinity, both of which will kill your inverts.

That being said, hippo tangs are extremely prone to ich (they are disease magnets and most are very fragile fish; not hardy at all), and a 75 gallon tank is too small for one. If it gets over this bout of ich, it will almost definitely just keep getting it over and over again from the stress of being in a small tank.

Many people choose not to treat ich and give the fish a chance to fight it off by itself. You can do this by minimizing stress, keeping water quality high, soaking food in vitamins (like Selcon) and garlic extract (to boost the immune system), etc. But, since hippos are so sensitive to ich, this approach may not work for this particular fish.
 
I had luck using a product called No-Ich.

http://www.fishvet.com/no-ich.htm

I used it on some clowns which are less prone to ich then yours, but it still worked great for me.

Also, garlic soaked food for immune system boost.

Edit:
I do have inverts in my tank including snails, starfish, some polyps and a skunk shrimp.
 
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Hyposalinity or copper, both of which are best carried out in a quarantine tank. Your tank is small for a tang. It might prove impossible to prevent strain induced ich in a 30 gallon tank, and difficuly in a 75 gallon. How long ago did you introduce the hippo to the tank it is in, and how long has the tank been established? It is usually not recommened to treat only the effected fish if the ich has been present for any time at all.
 
i soaked algae strips in a jar of minced garlic and fed it to my fish since i added a new fish and almost all my fish come down with ick it was crazy never had that happen. Since tangs need algae and green food for healthy immune system and garlic is like really good for fish to it worked great, including the fact i have two cleaner shrimp and cleaner wrasse which all also clean parasites off fish.
 
Ok check it out it has been a couple of days since I posted this problem, What I did was went out and researched what I was suppose to do. The thing that I have found and has helped significantly is an ich med. called Ich Attack. I also purchased a cleaner shrimp that has I believed been helping out with the parasites. The stuff that I have been putting in the tank has not hurt any of the corals or inverts that I have in there. Everything seems to be doing fine. I do have a quick question why is it that most keep saying that the tank is to small for a Blue hippo tang when all the websites and stores all say the min tank size is 70 gallon?
 
Hyposalinity or copper, both of which are best carried out in a quarantine tank. Your tank is small for a tang. It might prove impossible to prevent strain induced ich in a 30 gallon tank, and difficuly in a 75 gallon. How long ago did you introduce the hippo to the tank it is in, and how long has the tank been established? It is usually not recommened to treat only the effected fish if the ich has been present for any time at all.



The Tang is in the 75 gallon, and it has been for about a week. The tank has been astablished about two months now I believe maybe a week short of two months.
 
Another thing that I was told to do but I didnt do for the fear of the fish was give it a fresh water bath, if the fish stresses out easily then that wouldnt be a good idea would it? That in turn would cause it to get more ick right?
 
Get a cleaner wrasse. It will eat the ick off of the fish. It is actually pretty amazing and it starts immediatly upon arrival of the fish. Your tangs will swim right up to it and stick out a fin to let them eat it off. They should only cost about 10 bucks at your LFS.

My LFS has a 13 inch lion fish with 2 2 inch cleaner wrasse in the tank with him. Even the lion fish wont eat the cleaner because he knows who the doctor is.
 
Cleaner wrasse has dismal survival rates.No clener fish or shrimp is the ''cure all'' for ich....help perhaps.If you want a cleaner fish then get the cleaner goby and not the cleaner wrasse.
 
Freak is right on, cleaner wrasses rarely live longer than a few months in captivity. My LFS won't even sell them to customers because of their dismal survival rates.
 
I do appreciate all the help that everyone has put in on the forum. I knew if I posted it on here that I would get some good responses. My fish seems to be fine and has been clear of all white spots for about 5 days now. I used some different methods that I read about and got from here. The one that seems to have done the best is Paraguard by seachem. I of course had to take all the inverts and corals out because I didnt know what the stuff would do to them. I also will be going to buy a cleaner goby like Freak suggested because like Freak and Biff both said I have found that the cleaner wrasse is very hard to take care of. Once again thanks for all the help.
 
This is abit of a side note to help you avoid future break outs, its a small write up I did about a year ago in regards to the ich and QT tanks. Hope you find some useful info in it.

Cheers.

First a small introduction, anyone that has had experience with an aquarium will tell you about the bane of all marine hobbyists, disease or more specifically the Ich. Ich will appear as small white spots on your animal that if not treated properly can be fatal to your beautiful and expensive pets. There are many treatment methods available to aquarist wishing to treat the ich and each have positive and negative results. The following will be my methods for treatment and will address its pros and cons, I will also address some of the other methods and why I do not suggest them. Though ich is present in both fresh and salt environments, my expense lies with salt and thus the path of this guide will be Salt


What is Ich?
Ich is a naturally occurring disease that most all fish have been infected with at one stage in their lives. The ich is generally always present on a fish however a strong immune system will fight off the parasite. When a fish is stressed out or ill for other reasons, an ich out break can occur. When buying a new animal for your tank, always assume that it is infected and follow precautionary measure to insure your pet lasts more than a few weeks. Ich is small parasite that will attach it self to your fish and burrow under the fishes scales and feed off the animal. The ich parasite that can loosely be considered invertebrate (this will have significance later in this thread) and as such is very treatable. Ich is an extremely resilient disease that undergoes different stages in its life cycle. The entire cycle lasts roughly 10-14 days. However the cycle length can very based on temperature, colder temps will lengthen the cycles and warmer temperatures will shorten the cycle.
http://sleekfreak.ath.cx:81/3wdev/VITAHTML.../GIF/12P167.GIF

Ich is only susceptible to medication when it is in its free floating stage, the link above is a simplified explanation of the life cycle of the ich. As you can see the free floating stage is only 1 part of a 4 part life cycle. That being said with a cycle of 10 -14 days you can see your window for treatment is very small. If ich goes untreated It can and will kill your fish.

Treatment Methods:
There are only a limited number of options available to an aquarist in regards to treatment of ich. These treatments are as follows Medication, Fresh Water Dips, the might Quarantine Tank or a combination of all 3. The first treatment method is the most obvious, Medication. Ich medications are generally copper based meds that when introduced to a tank will kill off your ich infestation and not harm your fish. Now why is this important? Copper based meds kill ich and not fish… that’s good right? Wrong. As I mentioned before the ich can loosely be considered an invertebrate. Invertebrates as a whole are extremely susceptible to copper based medications. Copper of any kind added to a fish tank will kill not only your ich infestation but also any other invertebrate inhabiting your tank. (shrimp, crabs, corals, stars) you name it… its dead. Also copper has the nasty tendency to soak into the silicon sealant used in your tank and can almost never be removed 100%. So by adding a copper based med you have killed the ich and made your tank uninhabitable for any invertebrate for ever. Simple don’t use it. Some medications you will find are not copper based and are reef safe, however they (in my experience) are difficult to find and do a piss poor job.

Fresh Water Dips are exactly as they sound, when your fish is infected with ich, dunk it in a bucket of fresh water. A tropical fish can survive in freshwater for a limited amount of time however the ich in your animals gills will be flushed out and killed almost instantly. The down sides to this treatment is that it will cause a great deal of stress to the animal that is already stressed out to begin with, second it won’t kill ich that has burrowed under the fish scales and you’ll have to do continuous dips in order to save the fish. Blah blah blah its effective but generally a worst case option and will probably end up killing your fish.

Quarantine Tank.
This is the most effect way to treat Ich in my personal opinion. It is the most expensive option to set up, however it is as I said by far the most effective.

What you’ll need.
• 10+ gallon tank
• Salt
• Filters
• Heater
• Chunk of coral skeleton
• UV Sterlizer
• Copper Based ich medication
• News paper
• Water

The General Idea
the idea behind this tank is to get the ich when it’s most susceptible and most likely to occur. When you buy a new fish it will be stressed out and will likely have an out break. If this animal is placed in your community tank you have just placed a time bomb with one expensive investment. So you want to avoid doing this, what are your options? Well how about a second tank that takes the brunt of it? The general concept behind a quarantine tank is to isolate an infected animal and treat it and it alone. Keeping it separate in a small tank as apposed to the community tank will provide a number of things. It will prevent healthy fish form getting the ich, it will allow you to use copper based medications and not effect invertebrates, it in theory will starve out any ich in your community tank and will thus make it an ich free zone.

The setup is fairly simple, fill your 10 gallon tank with fresh water, I use bottled water due to its low mineral contents. Add salt and wrap the outside of the tank in newspaper so light does not get in also a light bar is not required. You will not use a substrate in this tank it will be a bare glass bottom. Both the news paper and bare glass will assist in cleaning the tank. In the center of the tank place your coral skeleton fragment, add filter, then let it cycle for a few days so all the salt is absorbed. The next 3 components are the most important to a successful quarantine tank. Place the heater in the tank and set it slightly above the optimal tank temperature of 75-77. I usually place my heater at 80. This increase in temperate will decrease the cycle time of the ich and give you more “free floating” stages, thus giving you more time for treatment. The UV sterilizer is a self-contained UV light and pump that will kill any free floating parasite in your water, the benefits of this are self explanatory and I don’t really need to go into any detail. Finally Copper based medications, I know I just went through a rant about how bad they are, and I still agree they are terrible…. In a community tank… By using the medication in a quarantine environment you limit the coppers exposure to your community tank to 0 and you are still able to treat ill fish with this effective medication. Keep in mind the only down side to copper is that it will kill all invertebrates in that tank. If the tank only has one dead piece of rock and a fish it will work wonders.

Now that you have it set up, here is how you use it. When you purchase a new fish instead of a 30 minute acclimation into your community tank, acclimate it to your Quarantine tank, after the 30min acclimation dump the fish in the tank and add some copper medication, and turn on the UV Sterilizer. That’s all there is to it, keep the animal in the tank for 3-4 weeks feed regularly and keep an eye on it. Nearing the end of the quarantine time start to reduce the temperature to the same as your community tank, once that is done you can remove the fish and place him into the community for all to see. NOTE: Only transfer the animal, do not transfer any of the copper medicated water!!! Fish only. Once the fish is introduced, tare down the quarantine tank, clean it out with a mild vinegar/water solution rinse it well and start over again for your next addition. This isn’t only useful for new fish, but also established fish that become ill. If you notice a fish rubbing on rock, or with white spots, scoop him out and put him in the quarantine tank, then follow the same process.

Naturally this is only used for fish type animals, placing a shrimp into a quarantine tank is a bad idea because you’ll kill it. This process is a long one, and can be a pain in the butt, however in the end it is worth it. You will have a stable community tank with zero ich infestation. This process is most effective when you are just starting your community, an empty tank has no ich and if you quarantine all your additions it will stay that way.


I rushed through this and its got some holes I’m sure. I’ll read over and edit over the next few days. Other than that, read, enjoy, ask questions, comment you name it. I’m here to help you.

Regards
Kozmo
 
I believe a light less environment is a stressful and unhealthy environment for fish when used over a long term (over 8 to 12 hours). Iwould use a moderate amount of overhead lighting or at least see that a lamp is near by the tank. I agree with the news paper but I would use it to avoid sressing the fish due to peoples movemoment around the tank. I would use a sponge filter for the tank and I would not botter with the cost of a UV filter for a quaratine tank. The flow rate through an average UV light of low wattage would have to be very, very, low to kill ick or nearly any form of parasite and the UV lighting tube or its cover tube would need to be kept sparkling clean to be for the light to be of any signifiacant assistance. Also UV lights are not cheap and as stated previously the UV lights usually supplied to the aquarium trade have small low wattage bulbs that are overrated in their performance capabilities. I would suggest all fish be quarantined in a hyposaline quarantine tank for parasite control for a period of 3 to 4 weeks and if ick appears externally visible on the fish I would then use copper and start a recounted for the time to be spent in quarantine. I would also recommend plastic flower pots and or acrylic or large PVC tubing for hiding places for the fish(es) in quarantine. A heater and mild aeration is also important. A small increase in temprtature to 78 - 82 degrees is also a good idea. I have not heard of silicone absorbing copper, but any carbonate based rocks or substrates (aragonite or crushed coral) will readily absorb copper and if a "live rock" or carbonate sand is added to a quarantine tank the copper level will need to be repeatedly tested and copper will need to be repeatedly added to make up for the copper absorption by the rocks/sand.
 
i dont mean to bring up a dead thread but i didnt wanna start a new one for no reason... i too just got a clown and it looks like it kinda has ick... its not quite white spots, but more like faded spots on the red part of the body but i think its the start of ick... it was like that when i bought it today but i couldnt really tell in the store, untill i got it back to my house. Now, i dont have a qt tank, and i dont have enough stuff to run one, so my question is, can fish just get over ick on their own? or will it die for sure?
 
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I miss fatman!

If your clown has ick then it's probably directly related to your water quality. Check your parameters and do some water changes. Soak his food in garlic and hope he gets better.

If you want him to have a better chance against ich and you dont have inverts or corals you could treat your tank with hypo-salinity.
 
well i JUST put the clown in my tank, so its not my tank, it must have been the water from the LFS, i do have some inverts, i have 1 emerald crab, 2 hermits and 2 astria snails.
 
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