Advice on what to do about ich in my new tank?

[BoxInSox]

I don’t know what to do about Ich in my newish tank, yes I messed up early.

I have a 2-3 month old tank that is cycling very well, but due to poor discipline I introduced ich.

It’s a 40 gal system/50 gal total

0 ammonia / 0 nitrites

0.16 phosphates / 15 nitrates

Tank is cycling, I have 6 small fish, and NO coral as of yet.

I recently turned the light on full time and in less than one week diatoms bloomed but are quickly dying down, which I am excited about.

Now here’s the fish / ich part

I have:

2 juvenile engineer goby’s 1 tiny watchman goby 1 juvenile Midas Blenny 1 mandarin goby that is eating pods and frozen baby brine 1 possum wrasse

I didn’t QT, I know I should have. I put all of the above in about the same time, and noticed some minor flashing early on.

After having them for 2 weeks, I also introduced a small flame angel. I should have QTd, I knew it, but my excitement got the better of me and I decided I’d start qt ing after that one.

Then I got nervous, knowing that flame angels often have flukes and seeing the flashing, I dosed the display tank with API general cure. I know now that this lowers fish immune system, and during the general cure process, ich started appearing on the flame angel.

I read a lot about curing ich vs managing ich, and opted to manage at this point after considering also going hyposalinity and qt fallow for 73 days.

Well, the angel died in a few days, before ich even looked too bad. Not happy about this.

The good news is that none of the other fish have any spots or signs of ich, but, the Midas Blenny is flashing a lot.

I’m still going with the management approach, but wondering if I should go another way. Farrow with fish in copper qt at this point, (which would suck!) but would get rid of it, and just continue with tank cycling and bringing in coral when ready. Not sure if lack of fish would alter parameters and I’d need to dose ammonia or something though?

Or, since I have no coral, I could do hyposalinity, which would kill ich faster, but would likely throw off my promising bacterial cycle?

Or, should I just continue to manage as is?

I’m kind of unsure about which way to go given that my tank isn’t established yet.

 

[Saltyreef]

Might be velvet if the fish died quickly.

I Would remove all fish to QT and let the display remain fallow while you continue to feed the BB and run the fish through theraputic copper.

 

[mtraylor]

I agree. Removing the fish and qt with therapeutic copper is the best method. Just had a really bad infection when i reset my aquarium just a while back. I tried everything and non of it worked except the following.

Catching all the fish I could get and qt with therapeutic copper. Taking display down to hyposalinity for the fish i couldn't catch. So if you dont want to remove fish. I would go with hyposalinity and get yourself a really good uv sterilizer.