White Spot!!! help me guys

[ahmed.kamal]

Hello all, this is my first question on this thread.. I bought couple of fishes few weeks back such as butterfly, banner, foxface, fire clown and dottyback.. How from the few days I have noticed that butterfly and banner has white spot on their bodies which is I know is not a healthy indication at all. One of my friend suggested me to drop Water salinity until 1.017. So I have to remove all corals and other cleaning staff from aquarium. However they are feeding nicely as usual but their white still presist.

 

[ebushrow]

well, I cannot really see it from the photo, but it sounds like Ick (the white spots are the parasites moving to the stage where they broadcast spread eggs in the tank).

The best method is copper (opinion), however, you need to be very careful with it, as too much is toxic, follow the directions closely and buy a copper test kit to monitor daily (both copper and test kits are cheap for this). Some suggest garlic laden foods and hypo-salinity (I think its like 1.010 ish - 1.007 ish specific gravity), however, there is no verified method except for copper from veterinarians (I've spoke to and read from). There are some new foods from Dr. G's for parasites and worms, but I haven't tried them so I won't recommend them, but worth mentioning.

This disease persists in fish in the wild, but is brought on by the fish having stress during collection, shipping, and then moving to your tank. The fishes natural immune system usually will keep this in check however, with the conditions listed above, creates an immune system drop in effectiveness (from what I understand).

This is why quarantine is necessary with all livestock we put in our tanks prior to introduction into our display tanks (Corals and fish). The only sure-fire way to remove ALL your fish and put them in a holding tank and treat them accordingly. Then let your tank run devoid of fish for 8 -12 weeks to kill off the free living parasites in your display. Then re-introduce them into the tank and you should be good.

However, do not add copper to your tank with inverts and corals or they all will die, Copper will often be attached to gravel, silicone, and live rock so do not do it! Unless you have a f.o.w.l.e.r, then its up to you.

 

[ahmed.kamal]

Thanks for your response, yes I agree with you I did a stupid mistake this I didn't put my fishes in quarantine this time because my supplier gave me some sort of medicine and ask me to put fishes directly into the display aquarium for the first 15 days everything was fine and fishes were feeding very nicely. however I just found their white spots on two fishes.. So please guide me should I transfer my two fishes into quarantine tank or should I make my whole display aquarium into a quarantine tank so all the parasite in the tank and sand die.. Please tell me the best solution to get rid of it. I have a pic of that medicine let me show you..

 

[sawdonkey]

You need a separate tank. You don't want to get copper in your display.

I could write a ton about ich, but there are hundreds of threads that discuss this. Just do a little research and you'll know everything you need to know. I'll say this though, crossing your fingers and hoping for the best is not a good strategy.

 

[Higher Thinking]

Yes there are multiple ways to handle the situation. I would say the best method is to move all fish into qt. Then run your tank without any fish for 8 weeks. It's a pain, but it is the safest and surest method to eradicate your tank from having anything. This would of course require you to set up a new qt tank which is a chore all by itself if you haven't handled one before. You need to do frequent water changes to prevent ammonia spikes and keep the salinity and treatment levels prefect. It takes effort, but it works. Search out some threads about this as I'm sure it has been discussed.