Ich Problem, Please Help

[Roy 9121]

My wife wants to kill me most days. She's a pharmacist so she could do it and get away with it. If I ever disappear....

Be afraid....very afraid.

 

[domination2580]

My wife wants to kill me most days. She's a pharmacist so she could do it and get away with it. If I ever disappear....

If you ever disappear we will organize a search party for you...will look for the fish tanks...because they might be with you...lol

 

[Humblefish]

I agree with wait & see approach. If its ich or velvet, it should come back.

 

[melypr1985]

Ok guys. here's the thing. @Brew12 is correct. Ich can't be diagnosed based on one white spot. If a raised white spot is seen in the same place for 3-5 days and then it disappears for a while only to come back again for the same 3-5 days.... that's ick. Likely you will see more than one spot, but not so many that you can't count them. They are about the size of salt grains.

Chromis often have issues with their scales looking funny. They are prone to uronema for one thing and tend to damage them by fighting with each other or by scraping against rock work. The wait and see approach is the right one. Look for the spots like I described.

 

[Striperviper]

Figure out if it's ich. Read the info on this site. Then if it's ich just ditch the fish. Give it to a store or just dispose of it. It's a chromis. Like a $5 fish. Then let tank lay fallow for the 72 days. Buying Meds, a qt, test kit for the meds. Plus ticking off ur parents is a high price to pay to save a $5 fish. And make sure whatever fish u get down the line look perfect. I'm dealing w ich in my tank and have to set up a hospital tank to treat my fish and let the tank lay fallow bc if u don't get rid of ich it will haunt u forever.

 

[Humblefish]

Figure out if it's ich. Read the info on this site. Then if it's ich just ditch the fish. Give it to a store or just dispose of it. It's a chromis. Like a $5 fish. Then let tank lay fallow for the 72 days. Buying Meds, a qt, test kit for the meds. Plus ******* off ur parents is a high price to pay to save a $5 fish. And make sure whatever fish u get down the line look perfect. I'm dealing w ich in my tank and have to set up a hospital tank to treat my fish and let the tank lay fallow bc if u don't get rid of ich it will haunt u forever.

I agree with this EXCEPT DO NOT EVER JUST DISPOSE OF A FISH. It is a life with a fixable problem (ich). Take responsibility and do what it takes to fix the problem: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/ich-cryptocaryon-irritans.191226/

Saving that $5 fish will make you a better reefer because you'll learn how to QT, it will build character and teach you life lessons you'll always remember.

This is assuming, of course, it does turn out that the fish has ich.

 

[Velcro]

Why couldn't he just use his tank as the hospital tank and just go hypo in it? I know it can kill of some of the bacteria, but I've been able to transfer my fish to a hospital tank (not cycled) with some of the liverock from the display and have it still maintain enough biofilter to prevent ammonia... I am of course assuming there are no inverts or coral in this tank.

 

[domination2580]

Why couldn't he just use his tank as the hospital tank and just go hypo in it? I know it can kill of some of the bacteria, but I've been able to transfer my fish to a hospital tank (not cycled) with some of the livestock from the display and have it still maintain enough biofilter to prevent ammonia... I am of course assuming there are no inverts or coral in this tank.

The thing I think about that hypo is that there's no proven source that it effectively kills ich...so there's no promise that it will work.

 

[Velcro]

The thing I think about that hypo is that there's no proven source that it effectively kills ich...so there's no promise that it will work.

Uhhh. What?

 

[melypr1985]

The thing I think about that hypo is that there's no proven source that it effectively kills ich...so there's no promise that it will work.

It's more that it doesn't kill all strains of ich. There are several hypo resistant strains out there that it won't work on. Not to mention the PH problems involved.

 

[Velcro]

It's more that it doesn't kill all strains of ich. There are several hypo resistant strains out there that it won't work on. Not to mention the PH problems involved.

Resistant strains? Or people that aren't using an appropriate device for monitoring salinity as well as not using an ATO to prevent swings.

 

[melypr1985]

Resistant strains? Or people that aren't using an appropriate device for monitoring salinity as well as not using an ATO to prevent swings.

Both are actually problems. There are hypo resistant strains of ick. There are also lots of people who perform hypo incorrectly making it even less effective. That's why hypo is rarely suggested by me and humblefish. Though, in this case, I thought it would be a good idea. Thank you for pointing that out

 

[Humblefish]

More recently, studies have demonstrated different salinity tolerances among strains of Cryptocaryon. Yambot (2003) described one Taiwanese outbreak occurring in sea bream Sparus sarba at a salinity of 5 g/L, and another outbreak in sea perch Lates calcarifer occurring at a salinity of 10 g/L. These two strains were successfully propagated in the laboratory at 7 and 10 g/L, respectively, and are well below previously documented preferred salinities.

Source: http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/fa164

 

[melypr1985]

Source: http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/fa164

Thank you for the source humble! You're awesome sir!

 

[Reeftown]

Remember, Ich is present in the gut of all fish and requires a stress to cause the cyst wall to rupture and the ich to reproduce.

Don't want to get too deep into the etiology of Crytocaryon, I wasn't saying the ich lives in the gut, but what I meant be this. Is in a perfectly healthy tank. The tomont stage can lie dormant for many months and quite possibly in my opinion even much, much longer. The tomont can be eaten by fish as a grazing endeavor and lay dormant there. Then when stress is induced it will cause the outer layer of the encapsulated hardened cyst to break down "reactivating" the tomont. Give another explalnation of how, hypothetically, you take a healthy fish from a mature tank with no ich. You can dip the fish, place in a copper solution, then move the fish to a sterile tank with freshly made saltwater. Nothing living on the fish....Stress the fish and voila, Cryptocaryon will rear its ugly head. The tomonts must dormant inside the fish. A brine shrimp can lay dormant inside its encapsulated, even dried out egg for years, then hatch when the egg becomes wet with salt water again.

 

[Brew12]

Don't want to get too deep into the etiology of Crytocaryon, I wasn't saying the ich lives in the gut, but what I meant be this. Is in a perfectly healthy tank. The tomont stage can lie dormant for many months and quite possibly in my opinion even much, much longer. The tomont can be eaten by fish as a grazing endeavor and lay dormant there. Then when stress is induced it will cause the outer layer of the encapsulated hardened cyst to break down "reactivating" the tomont. Give another explalnation of how, hypothetically, you take a healthy fish from a mature tank with no ich. You can dip the fish, place in a copper solution, then move the fish to a sterile tank with freshly made saltwater. Nothing living on the fish....Stress the fish and voila, Cryptocaryon will rear its ugly head. The tomonts must dormant inside the fish. A brine shrimp can lay dormant inside its encapsulated, even dried out egg for years, then hatch when the egg becomes wet with salt water again.

The lifecycle of Cryptocaryon and its relationship to fish immunity is pretty well documented. When a fish develops a natural immunity to Ich the biological response from the fish makes it so that the Ich can not feed effectively. This means the fish is damaged significantly less, the Ich rarely grows to a visible size, and it reproduces into much lower numbers. When a fish is stressed this acquired immunity can break down in a matter of hours. Any Ich feeding on the fish will be able to grow to a visible size in under a day and an outbreak occurs.
If you treat a fish with copper at therapeutic levels for 30 days in an isolated space and then remove the copper from the system the fish will never develop Crypto. If you see this happening there are a few possible causes. Not adding the copper to the replacement water when doing water changes can open a small window for the Ich to survive. There is also evidence that Crypto can spread via aerial transmission to tanks up to 10 feet away. Cross contamination by using the same buckets, nets or testing equipment can also be an issue.

If you are really interested in this I can link the scientific studies that explain all of this in depth.

 

[4FordFamily]

Figure out if it's ich. Read the info on this site. Then if it's ich just ditch the fish. Give it to a store or just dispose of it. It's a chromis. Like a $5 fish. Then let tank lay fallow for the 72 days. Buying Meds, a qt, test kit for the meds. Plus ******* off ur parents is a high price to pay to save a $5 fish. And make sure whatever fish u get down the line look perfect. I'm dealing w ich in my tank and have to set up a hospital tank to treat my fish and let the tank lay fallow bc if u don't get rid of ich it will haunt u forever.

Yeah please don't kill a fish because it's inconvenient. I hate to sound like a hippie but while we are talking about convenience- I don't imagine it was too convenient when our fish were ripped out of the ocean and passed through the distribution system through several facilities and tanks before arriving in our own tanks. It's not the fish's fault that many of us don't practice proper husbandry as we should. I'm not on a moral high horse, I did things unethically (no quarantine) for years, myself. That said, velvet is everywhere now and I abandoned my old ways. It's our responsibility to care for these creatures. If you cannot do so properly, you shouldn't buy the fish to begin with.

#rantover.

 

[GHsaltie]

@TheReefer27 Are you still in school? If it turns out that you do need to QT, maybe approach your parents with the prospect that this is a hobby you are serious about and learning to properly treat ill fish would be a major learning lesson for you. Make it sound like there are more advantages than just treating a sick fish . It will also improve your wooing skills .

 

[Humblefish]

Don't want to get too deep into the etiology of Crytocaryon, I wasn't saying the ich lives in the gut, but what I meant be this. Is in a perfectly healthy tank. The tomont stage can lie dormant for many months and quite possibly in my opinion even much, much longer. The tomont can be eaten by fish as a grazing endeavor and lay dormant there. Then when stress is induced it will cause the outer layer of the encapsulated hardened cyst to break down "reactivating" the tomont. Give another explalnation of how, hypothetically, you take a healthy fish from a mature tank with no ich. You can dip the fish, place in a copper solution, then move the fish to a sterile tank with freshly made saltwater. Nothing living on the fish....Stress the fish and voila, Cryptocaryon will rear its ugly head. The tomonts must dormant inside the fish. A brine shrimp can lay dormant inside its encapsulated, even dried out egg for years, then hatch when the egg becomes wet with salt water again.

Can you provide citations to back any of this up?

A synopsis of Crypto's known lifecycle can be found here: http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/fa164

 

[Reeftown]

If you treat a fish with copper at therapeutic levels for 30 days in an isolated space and then remove the copper from the system the fish will never develop Crypto.

I don't want to get into a joust. I will concede and refrain from making observed hypothesis of ubiquitous parasites until proven in the scientific community. Sorry to interject.