Possibly ich?

Brett newell · Dec 10, 2017

Good morning.
I have had this tank running for about 7 months now. All has been good. I left town for training, and when I left there were 2 occy clowns, a firefish, mandarin draginet, bi color Angel, coral beauty Angel, purple tang, skunk cleaner shrimp, starry blenny, hammer coral, red mushroom coral, and a toadstool leather. When I came back from training at the end of the week the wife had gotten a powder brown because it was pretty and all alone and put it in the tank. Everything seemed ok for a few days, then the 2 tangs started having white spots, only 3 or 4 each and they were about the size of a 1 millimeter food pellet. They would go away over night, be gone all day then be there that night at feeding time, then gone again next morning. Also the coral beauty started having it's dorsal fin turn white and lose shape like fun rot. So I ordered some nls ich shield food and while that was being shipped I fed them nls hex shield. They have been eating the ich shield now for about 2 weeks, all still are eating. Last night I saw a few spots on both tangs but not a ton and the coral beauties fins look good again. After lights out I waited an hour then looked in the tank with a flash light and the purple tang had small spots of peeling skin on its head, and he was dead this morning. The powder tang has no spots today but his skin is peeling in a way that looks like peeling after sun burn. I am not optimistic that he will make it. My question is, if this is ich and then an infection possibly after that's killing the tangs. If no other fish show symptoms will the ich die off in the tank? Having another tank really isn't an option right now and I don't think stressing him out more to catch him will do much good. But if the fish aren't showing symptoms, isn't it possible everything else could have built an immunity to that strain and then it'll die off because no fish in there can host. If this is the case I would think it would take alot longer also, say 3 to 4 months maybe?
Tank is a 75 with 30 gallon sump and 5 gallon fuge
Salinity is 1.025
Ammonia nitrite nitrate all 0

Sonam · Dec 10, 2017

Brett newell said:
Good morning.
I have had this tank running for about 7 months now. All has been good. I left town for training, and when I left there were 2 occy clowns, a firefish, mandarin draginet, bi color Angel, coral beauty Angel, purple tang, skunk cleaner shrimp, starry blenny, hammer coral, red mushroom coral, and a toadstool leather. When I came back from training at the end of the week the wife had gotten a powder brown because it was pretty and all alone and put it in the tank. Everything seemed ok for a few days, then the 2 tangs started having white spots, only 3 or 4 each and they were about the size of a 1 millimeter food pellet. They would go away over night, be gone all day then be there that night at feeding time, then gone again next morning. Also the coral beauty started having it's dorsal fin turn white and lose shape like fun rot. So I ordered some nls ich shield food and while that was being shipped I fed them nls hex shield. They have been eating the ich shield now for about 2 weeks, all still are eating. Last night I saw a few spots on both tangs but not a ton and the coral beauties fins look good again. After lights out I waited an hour then looked in the tank with a flash light and the purple tang had small spots of peeling skin on its head, and he was dead this morning. The powder tang has no spots today but his skin is peeling in a way that looks like peeling after sun burn. I am not optimistic that he will make it. My question is, if this is ich and then an infection possibly after that's killing the tangs. If no other fish show symptoms will the ich die off in the tank? Having another tank really isn't an option right now and I don't think stressing him out more to catch him will do much good. But if the fish aren't showing symptoms, isn't it possible everything else could have built an immunity to that strain and then it'll die off because no fish in there can host. If this is the case I would think it would take alot longer also, say 3 to 4 months maybe?
Tank is a 75 with 30 gallon sump and 5 gallon fuge
Salinity is 1.025
Ammonia nitrite nitrate all 0

I would be super cautious. We had a really bad experience with what we later discovered to be marine velvet from which we are still recovering but lost many fish.
We had a similar presentation in that initially symptoms were sporadic and didn't immediately kill anyone. We started metroplex and garlic, added another cleaner shrimp and it seemed to work. For about a week or two. Then the domino's started to fall.
We also thought we couldn't have a hospital tank but we learned the hard way. We have one now and had we heeded the early warning signs 9 fish might still be alive.
Ich is less deadly so maybe you are ok.
We're also planning to install a UV sterilizer to help reduce risk.
Good luck. Hope your fish recover!

Brett newell · Dec 10, 2017

I'm hoping for ich over velvet for sure. I don't think its velvet because the spots seem bigger than that. And the biggest thing leading me sway from velvet is the amount of spots isn't at a high level like velvet usually is. I just looked at the tank for a while examining each fish and no fish has any spots at all. Even the powder brown that has some peeling doesn't have any spots. For now I guess I'll wait and watch.

Brett newell · Dec 11, 2017

Another tang has died on me. I pulled out all the remaining fish and put them in a qt. They show no signs of anything at the moment. I will be starting paragaurd in the morning. I attached a picture of my poor powder brown, hopefully it posts. Does that look like velvet or an infection after ich?

Sonam · Dec 11, 2017

So sorry to hear this. But definitely feel your pain. It's heartbreaking.
For what it's worth we rescued 3 fish from our main display a month ago. One, a yellow tang, wasn't looking good. He had dark areas on his body and wasn't eating. Hovering in caves. After a few days of cupramine he was back to normal. They've all survived so far but it is a lot of work. Really frequent water changes. Our tang is stressed - the QT is 32 gallons but he's a good size tang. The wrasses are happy enough.
We're counting the days.
Once you get some medication going hopefully your fish will recover. As horrible as it was to watch our fish die it feels good to know we can help them if they get sick again.
Good luck.