ICH WONT DIE!!!

[polyppal]

Hey Guys so I have had my fish in a QT for exactly 25 days today. I have been doing water changes every other day and treating with ICH X. These past 3 weeks the fish have been fine I even took them out to observe them in a separate container with a magnifying glass just to maker sure they were free of ich and they were I was giving them 1 more week of QT before adding them to my Display and behold just as I was thinking about adding them...last night i checked on them as I beleive at night is truly the best time to check and see if your fish have ich and to my surprise I notice quite a few white spots on 2 of my fish a damsel and a few on my foxface and when i mean a few i can count every spot...ive been treating with ich x... for almost the entire time theyve been in QT i just dont understand how this ich is possibly still in the QT tank and I only use equipment specifically for this tank only! Anyway I know what to do and all I just felt really annoyed about this ich and just kinda wanted to talk crap about it! lol I hope ich dies forever!
Side note...PEA PUFFERS ARE IMMUNE TO ICH!!!

Ich X is garbage. The tried and true meds that most people use are:

Copper Power
Prazipro
Metroplex
Kanaplex
General Cure

*Im sure someone will have issue with this, but again these meds are tried and true

 

[aquakj]

Ich X is garbage. The tried and true meds that most people use are:

Copper Power
Prazipro
Metroplex
Kanaplex
General Cure

*Im sure someone will have issue with this, but again these meds are tried and true

Seems right as everyone seems to agree that ich x is not good at all

 

[Pny]

If you use tank transfer method you dont have to rely on any meds...

 

[polyppal]

Seems right as everyone seems to agree that ich x is not good at all

I learned the hard way when a LFS sold me a very expensive fish that they assured me was 'quarantined with Ich X'. That tang had both velvet and Ich.

Copper Power is great. Its safer/less harsh than the more readily available Cupramine.

 

[Mywifeisgunnakillme]

try copper treatments

Specifically, Copperpower and a Hanna tester.... And it will die....

 

[hds4216]

That’s because fish always have I h, it’s only when they are stressed that their immune system become comprised and allows for ich to Warcraft the fish.

regardless of the r2r mob/myths fish will and always have ich.

This is categorically false. Ich does not materialize out of thin air. If it's not introduced to the system, the fish will never have it.

 

[polyppal]

regardless of the r2r mob/myths fish will and always have ich.

 

[Hugh Mann]

As most have said, Ich X isn't really all that good. The major thing to know about ich, is it doesn't always present with spots. Healthy fish can have low level infections that don't present with any signs or symptoms, but it's still there in the background. That is perhaps the most insidious thing about ich. Makes it very easy to miss. Fortunately, it also makes it relatively easy to manage by keeping fish healthy and many do just that.

That being said, there's a few medications and methods that actually do work. Those are copper, hyposalinity and tank transfer method. Maybe a couple other I missed. Pick whichever one suits your schedule and materials. Tank Transfer generally being the safest, but copper being the most fool proof.

 

[Bepis]

Hello folk please let’s not hijac this thread and stay focussed on helping the OP with his issue. To call in a expert @Jay Hemdal, he can further confirm but there is absolutely no proof that ich is always present and actually on the contrary this has been pretty much disproved tho Jay will hopefully further inform us with rock solid proof and information. Please this forum is for discussion but not on personal help threads where people rely on others to provide them with reliable information to help them in their efforts, please don’t jeopardize that.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Hi folks,

Lots of opinions here, difficult to wade through all of the thread. Ich-x is formalin and malachite green. I've never had any success curing marine ich with those drugs, but it works in freshwater very well.

Ich is NOT present in every tank and it can be eradicated. For me, the best method is in a QT with copper and a good test kit.

When ich first gets started, the trophonts on the fish's skin are all in sync with one another, and it is common to have them all drop off the fish at the same time to form tomonts. Then, the tomonts all release theronts at the same time which go back and attack the fish again. These grow in size to become new trophonts and these spots show up again. Eventually, the parasites become out of sync and the fish has more and more spots all of the time.

That said, diagnosing ich from photos is difficult, and I can't see any confirmed ich in the photos I looked at.

Jay

 

[Reef and Dive]

Yes because the other person was saying that ich lives in fish only which is the theory I was referring to...I know ich has been studied this is why we have all these methods and medications for it...it’s beatable and present...even my LFS said once the fish have no ich go ahead and put em back in the display tank I didn’t bother arguing back to that just ignored it

Ich goes through a cycle that demands obligatory parasitism:

The trophont stage lives in the fish for few days (max 6 days). This stage causes the disease.

The tomont stage is a free reproductive cystic stage that lives on the substrate, rocks, hard surfaces for weeks (max 72 days)

The next stage only occurs at the moment the tomont eclodes: the infective free swimming ciliate teronts (this is the form that lives in the water column), they live only for 24-48h.

So these are the areas where Cryptocaryon irritans lives.

 

[Saltyanimals]

Hi folks,

Lots of opinions here, difficult to wade through all of the thread. Ich-x is formalin and malachite green. I've never had any success curing marine ich with those drugs, but it works in freshwater very well.

Ich is NOT present in every tank and it can be eradicated. For me, the best method is in a QT with copper and a good test kit.

When ich first gets started, the trophonts on the fish's skin are all in sync with one another, and it is common to have them all drop off the fish at the same time to form tomonts. Then, the tomonts all release theronts at the same time which go back and attack the fish again. These grow in size to become new trophonts and these spots show up again. Eventually, the parasites become out of sync and the fish has more and more spots all of the time.

That said, diagnosing ich from photos is difficult, and I can't see any confirmed ich in the photos I looked at.

Jay

Removing all fish and QT with copper allowing tank to run fallow is the way to eradicate ich out of the system.. however all this elbow grease may essentially reset when you introduce the next thing (fish, rock, coral, invert) without it going through QT first. This perfect world situation seems unrealistic for the average reefer as they'll spend the entire hobby life going through this cycle over and over again with every change to the tank.

Is it not better to think in terms of practical terms of ich management with things like UV to manage the population and proper diet so the fish and tank can live with ich? Accept the reality of ich unless you're the camp above and just find a way to live with it as long as your fish can as well. Ich does not kill 100% like velvet from what I've read. Sure they'll see spots and scratch at times.. I have a rash now on my leg from running through the woods.. itches like hell right now. but I'm sure I'll get over it.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Removing all fish and QT with copper allowing tank to run fallow is the way to eradicate ich out of the system.. however all this elbow grease may essentially reset when you introduce the next thing (fish, rock, coral, invert) without it going through QT first. This perfect world situation seems unrealistic for the average reefer as they'll spend the entire hobby life going through this cycle over and over again with every change to the tank.

Is it not better to think in terms of practical terms of ich management with things like UV to manage the population and proper diet so the fish and tank can live with ich? Accept the reality of ich unless you're the camp above and just find a way to live with it as long as your fish can as well. Ich does not kill 100% like velvet from what I've read. Sure they'll see spots and scratch at times.. I have a rash now on my leg from running through the woods.. itches like hell right now. but I'm sure I'll get over it.

Ich management is a very slippery slope. While it is being suppressed, everything seems fine. When stress increases in one fish or another, the number of trophonts increases. If that isn't squelched, then when Cryptocaryon reaches a certain infection level, propagule pressure takes over and 100% of the fish will die unless some treatment is initiated. It's like riding a tightrope on a unicycle...

Quarantine every fish and every coral is what public aquarists do. If you don't do that at home, expect to have higher losses. Some people accept those losses based on a cost-benefit analysis.

Jay

 

[Saltyanimals]

Ich management is a very slippery slope. While it is being suppressed, everything seems fine. When stress increases in one fish or another, the number of trophonts increases. If that isn't squelched, then when Cryptocaryon reaches a certain infection level, propagule pressure takes over and 100% of the fish will die unless some treatment is initiated. It's like riding a tightrope on a unicycle...

Quarantine every fish and every coral is what public aquarists do. If you don't do that at home, expect to have higher losses. Some people accept those losses based on a cost-benefit analysis.

Jay

Appreciate the feedback on this, Jay! Want your opinion on another perspective on ich management because the tank is too larger to tear down to get all fish into QT:

If we believe the principles behind UV; and assuming we have an appropriate UV sized for your tank. i.e. Not a $50 UV for a 100G+ tank and flow is tuned properly. Wouldn't the UV eventually sterilize all the ich and eventually eradicate because they can't reproduce anymore? This becomes a time question before you potentially have a UV eradicated tank vs medicine eradicated tank. Of course this reset for the next introduction of an un-QT'ed addition.

Thoughts on this ?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Ed Noga (the premier fish disease expert in my opinion) states “UV is only effective in controlling spread between aquaria and not in controlling an infection within an aquarium.” This is how I’ve always been taught as well. The only stage that even gets exposed to the UV are the theronts. These only need a few minutes in the early morning to swarm up from the bottom and attach to the fish, meaning some are never exposed to the UV. The only use that UV has is in ich management where the propagule pressure from the theronts is already lower than that required to create an acute infection, then the UV can hold that pressure lower and help keep the disease from breaking acutely.
Jay

 

[aquakj]

Hey guys Just wanted to give an update that...I believe I defeated ich!!! I don’t want to celebrate because you never know but it’s been 2 weeks since ive seen any ich and the new tank which is my 75 gallons was fallow for 63 days...and so far everything has been good

 

[Saltyanimals]

I had to look up "propagule pressure" lol as others will do when they read this.

I've read of UV users that plumb in special intakes to draw in the lower tank swimmers that typically wouldn't make it all the way to the top to the overflow. I see the take away here is that it may help keep it at bay. I think that's where my tank is destined at this point as I have introduced ich into it 2 weeks back and now just waiting game to see the fall out. Great discussion!

 

[Saltyanimals]

Hey guys Just wanted to give an update that...I believe I defeated ich!!! I don’t want to celebrate because you never know but it’s been 2 weeks since ive seen any ich and the new tank which is my 75 gallons was fallow for 63 days...and so far everything has been good

Great news! Now I bet you'll QT every animal, coral or rock that you introduce. =)