Ich had ruined this hobby.

[Halal Hotdog]

I took all my fish out and went fallow 2 times in 6 months. I pulled them all up had quarantine systems in different rooms. Treated the fish with copper and still had ich after both times. It was very difficult and completely worthless. I'm not saying that it is not possible to quarantine fish but I am saying that it is easy to get wrong even if you do everything right. I currently am trying a reduced stocking rate and UV but I 100% understand your problems. I have killed more fish in copper QT than i ever did just dropping them in the tank. I do see the merit in at least some QT though. My QT is observation only while allowing them to learn to eat. Fish illness is by far the most frustrating thing that i deal with in the hobby.

You're right, QT is not easy. If done correctly Ich and a host of other parasites can be permanently removed. If you feel uncomfortable with copper then you can try TTM or hyposalinity. Keep in mind those two only work for Ich and not other parasites.

For me it is a non-issue. In the early 2000's I didn't QT anything, relied on fish selection and observation. It worked for awhile, but eventually I introduced something nasty and it basically wiped out my fish. The issue with observation is you cannot see parasites attached to gills. Also parasites don't always have a physical manifestation.

 

[Paul B]

I feel very bad that there are so many people in this fantastic hobby that still have problems with parasites. The hobby has been in the US for 48 years and just as many tanks have problems now as then.

 

[lolmatt]

You're right, QT is not easy. If done correctly Ich and a host of other parasites can be permanently removed. If you feel uncomfortable with copper then you can try TTM or hyposalinity. Keep in mind those two only work for Ich and not other parasites.

For me it is a non-issue. In the early 2000's I didn't QT anything, relied on fish selection and observation. It worked for awhile, but eventually I introduced something nasty and it basically wiped out my fish. The issue with observation is you cannot see parasites attached to gills. Also parasites don't always have a physical manifestation.

Unfortunately hypo was found to be ineffective against a couple strains of c. irritans. I agree that ttm is a better option than copper but it only treats ich and not velvet. CP is probably the miracle you're looking for but some fish don't tolerate it and it's hard to find (and expensive).

 

[lolmatt]

I feel very bad that there are so many people in this fantastic hobby that still have problems with parasites. The hobby has been in the US for 48 years and just as many tanks have problems now as then.

I really respect your tank and method. I think a problem arises for anyone that would slack or those that don't have access to live black worms. If you didn't feed live food for a few weeks, do you think you'd see an outbreak or decline in "breeding condition" of any of your fish?

 

[Paul B]

Actually I have not fed live worms in well over a month, maybe two. Since I moved here over a year ago I never started up my blackworm culture and my white worm culture just about crashed. I still have the white worms but not enough to feed to the fish yet. I have not fed them in maybe 6 or 8 weeks.
I have been using clams that I got at a bait shop. But I only feed them maybe twice a week. The rest of the time I use LRS food.

The fish are still in breeding condition with no signs of disease and I am sure they will remain like that as they have since the 70s.

Clams, as long as they are not commercially frozen should provide the proper bacteria and nutrition to keep them immune forever.

Last week I added some live SPS coral and a couple of months ago I added a Hippo tang and some other fish that I forgot already.

 

[Halal Hotdog]

I am about to get flamed, but here goes. So I agree Paul has a fantastic tank, I think the problem arises from trying to replicate it. How many of us have access to the ocean to acquire mud and water from? Do we all have access to mature live rock? Who is actually cultivating live foods? Doing the PaulB method isn't just throwing fish in your tank and hoping for the best. There has been a lot of steps taken so his tank can thrive. The problem arises trying to replicate his system without doing exactly what he did. With resources available to most of us, it is not really a possible system to setup except for a very limited few. NO ONE likes to QT their fish, but we are all trying to create a predictable way to add and keep healthy fish. QT is the biggest pain in the butt for me, but I have not found a more predictable way.

The true unsung heros in this hobby are people like Humblefish who have created the guidelines and done the testing to help us find a predictable way to add healthy fish to our systems. This is who people should be following, in my very humble opinion. If you want a fish that does not require QT, that is fine, just buy it form him. He sells fish that have already been treated.

 

[sarcophytonIndy]

I started a 180g about a year ago, upgrading from a 40 (via a 125 tank my fish spent some time in), and ich just popped up on my purple tang yesterday and is showing on a few other fish today (tusk maybe, desjardini and blue tangs probably, still not 100% confirmed ich as it's not PERFECTLY grainy like I'm used to seeing, but that's probably me being over hopeful).

All my fish from the 40/125 went through ttm prior to entering the 180, and every added fish since has spent at least 4 weeks in careful observation, usually in another established tank of mine (a 20 long for a while, nuvo 10, few others that have come and gone). I've had dreadful luck with medicated qt, lost 10+ fish in sterile tanks with just pvc, and until now the observation-only (treating as needed) had worked well. Fish are healthy, corals recently started growing, all was well or so I thought.

In the past 6 weeks or so, I added a few corals from macna, a couple things I traded for, and a tiny juvenile bristletooth tang that spent a month in the 10g with no signs of disease. Ich could have come in on anything here.

As a fairly active hobbiest, I've taken some steps to avoid sick fish, but days like today make me wonder how other less dedicated people avoid ich and other common diseases and parasites. Maybe they're lucky. Maybe I have bad luck. Maybe it's not ich (lol I doubt it). I have this dream to keep an awesome reef tank, but maybe it just isn't meant to be.

So the way I see it, I've got 3 options:
- Feed extra and try ich management, with it flaring up every time I have a stress inducing problem, try my best and see what dies. Maybe it'll be OK. I doubt it. This sounds like a nightmare.
- Somehow catch the 20 or so fish I have, half of which are burying wrasses, treat them one way or another, and leave the tank fishless for 11 weeks. My rocks are half glued, tank has a good amount of coral, and I really don't have a place in my home to house 20 fish for so long. This sounds like a nightmare.
- Get out of the hobby and let someone else deal with it. Having spent thousands on setting everything up, countless hours planning and building, this too sounds like a nightmare.

And it's not like the problem goes away after doing this. I had hoped to add a few more fish at some point, maybe replace a few of the easier to catch with something new. If the simple act of adding anything without over medicating (fish) or sitting it in a tank for 11 weeks where it likely will die (coral) means getting disease, I'm probably out.

GG cryptocaryon irritans. You win no matter what I end up doing.

Been there... I went with option number one, as I have a 125 reef with tons of rock work, and there was no way I would catch all the fish. So the ich got really bad for a couple of weeks, but I ended up only losing one fish (a powder blue tang). After it peaked, the ich was still noticeable, but then it started to wane. Now, six months later, I can't see any signs of it. No fish glancing off rocks, etc. No cysts when closely examining body/fins.

 

[lolmatt]

I am about to get flamed, but here goes. So I agree Paul has a fantastic tank, I think the problem arises from trying to replicate it. How many of us have access to the ocean to acquire mud and water from? Do we all have access to mature live rock? Who is actually cultivating live foods? Doing the PaulB method isn't just throwing fish in your tank and hoping for the best. There has been a lot of steps taken so his tank can thrive. The problem arises trying to replicate his system without doing exactly what he did. With resources available to most of us, it is not really a possible system to setup except for a very limited few. NO ONE likes to QT their fish, but we are all trying to create a predictable way to add and keep healthy fish. QT is the biggest pain in the butt for me, but I have not found a more predictable way.

The true unsung heros in this hobby are people like Humblefish who have created the guidelines and done the testing to help us find a predictable way to add healthy fish to our systems. This is who people should be following, in my very humble opinion. If you want a fish that does not require QT, that is fine, just buy it form him. He sells fish that have already been treated.

I don't think you should get flamed for this, though it's definitely outside the scope of this thread. PaulBs method does indeed require careful planning and a good amount of work, and it's ongoing. QT method is more "set it and forget it" but I think Paul would argue (feel free to correct me...) that his fish are potentially healthier than QTd fish, which imo is probably true.

Immune tanks require constant upkeep, very similar to ich management imo - you have to provide some live bacteria source to keep the immune system healthy, and maintain a healthy diet always. I read somewhere Paul wrote that if a QT fish was dropped in his tank it would likely die quickly, and vice versa if you drop one of his fish in a tank full of QT fish it would kill most of the fish. That's a fine line to walk.

 

[Paul B]

Humblefish (Bobby) is a friend of mine and it is not a bad idea to follow his philosophy.
If you want to quarantine, follow what he teaches.

 

[Halal Hotdog]

I don't think you should get flamed for this, though it's definitely outside the scope of this thread. PaulBs method does indeed require careful planning and a good amount of work, and it's ongoing. QT method is more "set it and forget it" but I think Paul would argue (feel free to correct me...) that his fish are potentially healthier than QTd fish, which imo is probably true.

Immune tanks require constant upkeep, very similar to ich management imo - you have to provide some live bacteria source to keep the immune system healthy, and maintain a healthy diet always. I read somewhere Paul wrote that if a QT fish was dropped in his tank it would likely die quickly, and vice versa if you drop one of his fish in a tank full of QT fish it would kill most of the fish. That's a fine line to walk.

Would you say someone with a latent TB infection is healthier than one who doesn't? One of my big points is who is able to actually go to the ocean and acquire water and mud? There is only a limited number of people who have access to a ocean to do this.

 

[Paul B]

Actually I only added a spoonful of mud this year, mostly because I forget to get it when I am out. I did stat the tank using garden soil but I didn't invent that.
I also don't think the mud has anything to do with immunity, I think it helps more with fish such as mandarins because of the tiny creatures that are the beginning of the food chain.

It also may help with water conditions due to the bacterial diversity. But again, I am guessing.

 

[Brock0019]

I just want to say @Halal Hotdog I feel your pain.
im on my second round this year of this crap and it has wiped out everything.
QT must not have been good enough.
so like you, I have a few choices. I think I'm going to empty it and just bleach run the whole tank for a few days, and start 100% fresh and try and not make the same stupid mistakes. Going fallow for another 90 days just sounds horrible vs. the 2-4 weeks it'll take to get everything started over.

you're not alone with your feelings of helplessness

 

[Paul B]

I wonder how ppl not on the forums even keep anything alive. Without having a commercial qt protocol as good as a public aquarium, how can a reef tank be kept successfully long term? Without fail, you will get ich or velvet eventually if you don't qt everything with a fail proof qt protocol. I'd wager under 10% of the ppl on this forum qt inverts and coral, and the forum represents under 10% of reef tank keepers. Are 99% of people keeping tanks successfully? If others weren't, if fish got sick on the regular fish stores would never stay in business.

I think about this all the time and really can't figure out why this happens in many tanks and in other tanks like mine, I never have any problems and disease is a non issue. I remember in the beginning my fish always had ich and other things because I have my Log book from then and I had to use copper continuously. I can't see me doing anything much different from those tanks except maybe I don't feed any dry foods, I use clams, I never quarantine and I don't keep my tank sterile.

I almost never do anything on my tank, I rarely test or add anything. I don't change that much water. If I see a fish I want, I throw it in no matter how many parasites it has.
I did add some mud occasionally from my yard, now I may add some mud from the sea.
I just don't get it but I wish I did because I really love this hobby and hate to see us taking fish out of the sea just to watch them die.

 

[Soggydrysuit]

I'm new here and this thread is everything I hoped I'd find here, so thank you all!

 

[lolmatt]

I'd like to update this to say by using UV I was able to remove all ich symptoms including flashing and spots within a week. Since adding the UV I've seen literally no ich symptoms. That doesn't mean it's not in my tank, but I no longer care about it. I've added fish (a presumed stressor) and seen no outbreaks.

I am still treating all incoming fish with either CP or ttm for velvet, plus prazipro, metro medicated food, and sometimes prophylactic antibiotics. I added a blue spot jawfish last month after a 6 week qt and he's doing great.

I am now really only worried about velvet, gill flukes, and internal parasites, all of which are treated fairly easily with prophylaxis (particularly with humblefish's fairly new method of ttm for velvet). Well, and getting my corals to grow which is not as easy as it sounds in a tank with dry rock

 

[AquaholicAquariums]

Thats great, Velvet is the new monster taking a toll on this hobby. About 90% of fish I get have velvet. Really is sad

 

[sarcophytonIndy]

I had ich in my mixed reef 125 about a year ago. No way I could catch out all of the fish, so I rode it out. Only lost one fish, a powder blue tang. Other five tangs, clowns, angel, wrasse, etc. survived. Now I don't see any signs of ich anymore, but it is always going to be present at some low level. I haven't added any new fish since then, but I am pretty happy with the ones I have.

 

[Paul B]

I think what happens in such tanks is that parasites are always in there at a low level (as they are in the sea) and they keep trying to infect the fish causing the fishes immune system to stop it and keep up the fishes immunity.

In those tanks, fish will never become sick no matter what we add which in my case, Is totally what I want.
I want diseases to be a non issue and never want to think about them which is what I have achieved.

 

[Teemingtank]

I don’t know if it’s been mentioned yet, but crypto is kinda unavoidable. I did some research on it a while back and if I recall, if a fish gets crypto at any point in their life cycle it remains dormant in their gut bacteria... little bit of stress or compromised immune system and BOOM, they get crypto.

 

[Paul B]

I am not sure about that as my fish have never had Crypto and some of them are almost 30 years old.
My fish have also had plenty of stress in the last four decades of disease free living with the power going out many times sometimes for days. I just don't understand it.