Ich, Again??

[joro]

How are the fish doing I the DT?

Same situation as you.... I introduced my Harlequin Tusk back in DT after 6weeks under QT. Immediately it started to flash and ich spots appearing on the fins on the third day. The yellow scopas tang was bulling him and could have been better if I used an acclimation box. Maybe next time. Today is the forth day and he seems better /w no new ich spots and acting more normal and not flashing, actually looking for food. I hope he can show more improvement in the coming weeks. Last time I had to rescue him after he was overly exhausted from constant/nonstop flashing. He only lasted for two weeks before I decided to take him out.

All spots have disappeared on all DT inhabitants and honestly none seem to be bothered by them at all (I didn't observe any flashing, appetite suppression, etc). Hopefully that's a good sign for the long-term success but we'll have to see. Good luck with your DT as well!

 

[4FordFamily]

Keep us posted. May take up to a month to slowly progress enough to be a pressing issue. If not, ich management may work out. New additions that cannot handle it (species like most acanthurus tangs and fragile fish like regal angels, moorish idols, etc) will perplexingly not be able to cope as your other fish do.

So just know going in that your fish selection will be limited going forward.

 

[joro]

Keep us posted. May take up to a month to slowly progress enough to be a pressing issue. If not, ich management may work out. New additions that cannot handle it (species like most acanthurus tangs and fragile fish like regal angels, moorish idols, etc) will perplexingly not be able to cope as your other fish do.

So just know going in that your fish selection will be limited going forward.

Thanks and I've already got my fish lineup locked in (most of which are in QT currently). List includes -

• Copperband Butterfly
• One Spot Foxface
• Starry Blenny
• 3x Blue Star Leopard Wrasses (1 Male, 2 Female0
• 1x Exiquisite Fairy Wrasse
• 1x Diamond Watchman Goby
• 3x - 5x Anthias (still TBD and only group that hasn't been purchased)

Any concerns with those? Please note the CBB, Foxface, and Blenny just finished their 30 days copper treatment yesterday and I'm, starting prazi today. The wrasses and DWG just went through their first round of prazi this week and I'm still on the fence about treating them with Cu at this point, so depending on that decision they may go in with/around the other group.

 

[4FordFamily]

Thanks and I've already got my fish lineup locked in (most of which are in QT currently). List includes -

• Copperband Butterfly
• One Spot Foxface
• Starry Blenny
• 3x Blue Star Leopard Wrasses (1 Male, 2 Female0
• 1x Exiquisite Fairy Wrasse
• 1x Diamond Watchman Goby
• 3x - 5x Anthias (still TBD and only group that hasn't been purchased)

Any concerns with those? Please note the CBB, Foxface, and Blenny just finished their 30 days copper treatment yesterday and I'm, starting prazi today. The wrasses and DWG just went through their first round of prazi this week and I'm still on the fence about treating them with Cu at this point, so depending on that decision they may go in with/around the other group.

Copperband have enough issues in captivity adjusting, ich certainly won't help that.

Anthias are pretty fragile to ich as well, IMO-- and prone to bringing in velvet (like tangs and Angels) in my limited experience with them. Feeding them can be a challenge which may be a large contributing factor.

Everyone else you may be OK. Foxface are touch and go some are tough as nails others succomb quickly to even minor parasite infections. I had one live with velvet for a few months and I had a couple one spot foxface over the years in my ich management tanks. Once established they're pretty tough.

 

[joro]

Copperband have enough issues in captivity adjusting, ich certainly won't help that.

Anthias are pretty fragile to ich as well, IMO-- and prone to bringing in velvet (like tangs and Angels) in my limited experience with them. Feeding them can be a challenge which may be a large contributing factor.

Everyone else you may be OK. Foxface are touch and go some are tough as nails others succomb quickly to even minor parasite infections. I had one live with velvet for a few months and I had a couple one spot foxface over the years in my ich management tanks. Once established they're pretty tough.

The CBB is in with the FoxFace/Blenny right now and has been a voracious eater since we got her. As mentioned, they just finished the 30 day Cu treatment yesterday and getting ready to start the prazi here in the next day or so once the Cu has been removed. Good to know on the anthias as well, they are the only ones in my list who aren't already here in a tank. Perhaps I'll re-think that purchase - any suggestions for something similar to Anthias that might be a better option?

Thanks,

 

[kevindo123]

I thought anthias have a thick slime coat and are more resistance to Ich.

I have trios of Dispar and Lyretail anthias in my tank with ich. Ich doesn't seem to bother them.

All were females at intro but after 8 months each group has atleast a male in them. Dispar has two males and some times lock their jaws. The Dispar males are very colorful, light purple heads, yellow body and red dorsal, with blue borders. The females are pale pink in color.

I also have a school of 13 chromis for over a month now. They make the tank look more livelier.

 

[4FordFamily]

I thought anthias have a thick slime coat and are more resistance to Ich.

I have trios of Dispar and Lyretail anthias in my tank with ich. Ich doesn't seem to bother them.

All were females at intro but after 8 months each group has atleast a male in them. Dispar has two males and some times lock their jaws. The Dispar males are very colorful, light purple heads, yellow body and red dorsal, with blue borders. The females are pale pink in color.

I also have a school of 13 chromis for over a month now. They make the tank look more livelier.

I don't claim to be an anthias expert, it's been almost 8 years since I tried any. They all died in my ich management tanks and they seemed to come down with ich and velvet a lot in the LFS I worked at years ago.

 

[joro]

So just a quick update, the spots have come back and are much more plentiful than the first round, especially on the Kole Tang. She's also started very aggressive flashing though she continues to eat very well basically everything we put in the tank. I'm going to install a UV Sterilizer today to hopefully help with some of the free swimmers but wanted to see if anyone has had success treating with Metroplex in a reef? I'd lean towards mixing it into the food vs a general treatment but open to recommendations. :confused:

 

[shoelaceike]

Just feed well and keep them happy. I have ich in my tank and none of my fish have it....including a tomini, clown tang, Hippo tang, Naso, h tusk, yellow tang, sailfin....

 

[Germ42]

Appreciate everyone's insight and feedback, I think what we're going to do now is wait it out and see how it progresses given the other QTs are currently stocked out. The batch of fish that are in the DT right now are (or should be) very strong given the treatment protocol and hopefully they are able to fight it off naturally. The next batch of fish are still 2-3 weeks out and we'll have some time to adjust strategy if needed, fortunately they are currently understocked in terms of the QT so they can stay put a little longer if necessary. Still open to further thoughts and experience, this has been a great learning process even before the spots appeared o_O

Straight up, I've been battling this BS ich/ velvet for the past 3 months. First, I screwed up and i was impatient and put a petco Niger trigger in my 75 gallon tank, without QT. Big mistake lol everything died including my trio pair of clowns, my eel and pair of sleeper gobies are all that lived. well I started dosing the remaining fish with parasheild (def. Reef safe) and it worked, the final three stayed alive. Well about two months later I got a bluejaw trigger from liveaquria and I didn't realize it was only the divers den that was quarantined, and got another attack except this time I had parasheild and it saved my fish. Out of 10 fish this time I only had to pull out one fish, the rest made a great recovery so far! And the one is in QT and is doing great! Swimming eating and happy seeming, skins clearing right up!
I also got a good sized cleaner wrasse and he sees to suck the parasites right off!

I also bought this Reef safe "sort of" caviar that had medicine in it, it was some kind of anti bacterial stuff but it really helped them heal up. The LFS just said to watch when feeding the food and make sure no coral really eat a lot of the medicated caviar.

 

[Humblefish]

but wanted to see if anyone has had success treating with Metroplex in a reef? I'd lean towards mixing it into the food vs a general treatment but open to recommendations. :confused:

The problem with metro (I've experimented with it) is it doesn't stay active long enough in the water for complete eradication. And if you treat with it (or food soak) indefinitely, the parasites themselves will eventually develop immunity to the medication. :eek:

 

[4FordFamily]

Sounds like a struggle... Best of luck to you :/

 

[joro]

The problem with metro (I've experimented with it) is it doesn't stay active long enough in the water for complete eradication. And if you treat with it (or food soak) indefinitely, the parasites themselves will eventually develop immunity to the medication. :eek:

Good to know and likely enough to dissuade me from using metro, I definitely don't want resistant parasites if I need to call in the "big guns" :eek:

Sounds like a struggle... Best of luck to you :/

Thanks and it's definitely been a struggle recently. Trying to do right but can seem to win :(

 

[4FordFamily]

Good to know and likely enough to dissuade me from using metro, I definitely don't want resistant parasites if I need to call in the "big guns" :eek:



Thanks and it's definitely been a struggle recently. Trying to do right but can seem to win :(

My fish have been in and out of my tang tank for one year now due to bad meds, wrong tests, and twice re contamination with my ich management tank. Believe me I'm with you. All was good for 2 months of that and then I made foolish mistake...

The other thing that makes life hard in my case is that I am busy with two very young kiddos and watch them by myself on weekends and 3/5 weekday nights after work until 10-- and my qt is in the basement so I don't observe very much. All of my RO water is in the basement and it makes it much easier to maintain the qt down there or I would move it.

It leads me to over medicating and being too sure now going forward lol. I guess on a rare note I thought my eye infected Achilles was not going to make it when it came down months ago again. I replaced him and to my astonishment he survived and although he is a cyclops, after a day in the dark with his smaller girlfriend they actually are best buddies. Unlike my powder blue attempt that led to a horrible break up when in the DT (which I suppose is possible) these two don't just tolerate each other but swim in their corner o the 55 gallon together very differently than my PBT "pair" did. It's pretty neat I hope it works long term. Don't try this at home kids.

 

[kevindo123]

So just a quick update, the spots have come back and are much more plentiful than the first round, especially on the Kole Tang. She's also started very aggressive flashing though she continues to eat very well basically everything we put in the tank. I'm going to install a UV Sterilizer today to hopefully help with some of the free swimmers but wanted to see if anyone has had success treating with Metroplex in a reef? I'd lean towards mixing it into the food vs a general treatment but open to recommendations. :confused:

I experienced the same issue as you, the spots will come and go and come back again. Once the spots goes, the fish can still have ich in the gills and it may flash. But, as long your fish are eating, I believe the ich strain will weaken over time, eventually your fish will have an immunity for them. So far I have not had any fish died of ich in my tank. The Metroplex will not help with ich, but UV can help. I have UV installed and seems the overall health of my fishes have improved. Before the UV, most of the fish will take turn flashing against rocks and substrates but now they seldom do it. I think the UV may have helped with reducing the number of parasite in the water column that affects the fish gills. BTW, my Harlequin Tusk is almost in his third week. No spots but some occasional head twitching (ich may still be in the gills) and going to the cleaner wrasses. I added two cleaner wrasses in my tank since last one committed suicide. I recommend you add them as they can help clean your fish gills and bodies of any dead tissues. I am 4 of 4 for the blue streak cleaner wrasses. They eat mysis and LRS like a champ. Rumors of how hard to keep them are mostly false.

 

[joro]

An update, the battle continues :( As soon as the tank clears, it seems to come back stronger. The fish are still eating like champions every day and aren't flashing but it seems it won't subside fully which is to be expected I suppose. The tough decision now is what to do with the remaining fish in QT which are all ready to move into the DT from a timing/treatment perspective. Just to recap that roster -

• Copperband Butterfly
• One Spot Foxface
• Starry Blenny
• 3 Blue Star Leopard Wrasses (1 Male, 2 Female)
• Exquisite Fairy Wrasse
• Diamond Watchman Goby

While I've had the UV running for a few weeks now after further discussion with Coralife it seems I was running to much GPH through it so while it did kill the algae bloom in short order, it's not slow enough to kill parasites at this point. I have a new supply pump which will hit the lower gPH required to kill parasites but of course the hoses aren't the same and I need an additional barb reducer fitting which won't be here until Thursday. Suggestions on what I should do understanding I don't really have an option right now to setup yet another QT tank - I already have 2 running with the others who need to move.

 

[Humblefish]

An update, the battle continues :( As soon as the tank clears, it seems to come back stronger.

You're gonna have to give me a recap. Is it the (ich) spots that keep coming back? Also, what medication(s) are the fish currently in?

 

[joro]

You're gonna have to give me a recap. Is it the (ich) spots that keep coming back? Also, what medication(s) are the fish currently in?

The current DT inhabitants are a Yellow-Eye Kole Tang and 2x Blood Orange Clowns. They went through an extensive QT process - 30+ days of CopperSafe treatment and 2x Rounds of Prazi - before being introduced to the fallow DT and shortly thereafter started getting ich spots. The ich was confirmed by a number of people in this thread and is what, in my opinion, keeps coming back it's just that the spots seems to be getting more plentiful each go round. For example (and this is a guess), let's say the first time it was maybe 10 individual spots on the Kole Tang now, a few cycles through, it's maybe 30 spots on the Kole Tang. I don't have any reason to believe it's velvet given the lack of velvet-specific behavior (e.g. flashing, avoidance of light, swimming into the PH, etc). Also despite the increase in number of spots, the fish's behavior hasn't changed in any round.

They aren't currently being treated in the DT given we have corals, inverts, etc outside of just good feeding with LRS soaked in Selcon/VitaChem daily. All of the fish are very active throughout the day and especially so at feeding time with no appetite suppression.

 

[joro]

Also important to mention the prevailing theory in this thread and my research is that even though the DT was fallow, we did add some corals during the period which may have re-introduced ich hence the outbreak after being added.

The QT inhabitants I listed all have been run through a similar treatment in separate tanks on a separate floor of our house, so no worry there about aerosol transmission. They are now approaching 2+ months in some cases of being in smaller QT tanks hence the dilemma on what to do given the DT definitely has ich at this point.

 

[Humblefish]

To be honest with you, most of the fish below are good candidates for an "ich management" system. Except the CBB; I can almost promise you he won't make it. The most concerning thing to me is you say the spots keep getting more numerous. That tells me you are slowly losing this fight.

• Copperband Butterfly
• One Spot Foxface
• Starry Blenny
• 3 Blue Star Leopard Wrasses (1 Male, 2 Female)
• Exquisite Fairy Wrasse
• Diamond Watchman Goby