[polishfarmer]

hey guys ive had a marin tank for 7 months and ive been adding calciumand other supplements to the water for the last 1-2 months and its seems like they have jsut made things worse. On top of that i had a tang and he developed ich i didnt treat the water or anyhting i just freshwater dipped him for a while and the ich settled and went away. I then bought a cow fish and it spread to him so i got the 100 % organic ich fighting medicine that is safe to use with live rock and after like the 4th day the tangs ich looked reall really bad and he died... he just settled at the bottom of the tank and died under some rocks and now i jsut woke up and i see that my cow fish is chillin under a rock too and i dont want him to go... I also have been having a problem with my anemones... they dont see to stick to the rocks welly anymore they jsut fall off and lie on the bottom of the tank... they will move a littlebit but the yseem really weak i dunno whats wrong.

[RyanG]

How big is your tank?

[polishfarmer]

its about 45 gallons

[polishfarmer]

my cow fish also died about 2 days ago... im so mad.... never had any problems with my grouper... until i got that damn lion fish and he killed it and all the fish after him have died....

[RyanG]

What other animals do you have in your tank? Ich can be caused by overstressed, overfeeding, and lack of water changes.
What are you tank parameters?

[Kevin W]

you really have to take your time adding fish i killed over 400$$$ worth of fish in a week with ich and ich attack dosent work at all i have a reef tank also and i couldnt treat with anything that worked i lost everything best bet is having a holding tank even if only 10 gal its something to place a sick fish in a treat with copper then readd to the reef after the ich is gone..also make sure you put the fish your going to buy on hold for atleast 1 week at the store to make sure there is know problems the develop

[Tinyfish]

I had my tank set up for 6 weeks before ich showed up. I had to set up both a Quarantine Tank and a Hospital Tank. I ended up taking all the fish out of the display tank and putting them in the 15 gallon QT and one in the 5 gallon HT. I had to get the salinity down to 1.090 through water changes over a 48 hour period. I will be leaving the fish in these tanks for 3 weeks and then take a week to bring the salinity up to the levels in my Display Tank. Then I will put the fish back in the DT.

My understanding of this process is that ich cannot tolerate the low salinity even though the fish can. And letting the Display Tank alone without fish robs the parasite of its food source and it dies completely out.

I am only on day one so I hope it goes as planned.

[Kevin W]

i have been told the ich will become dormit and is always in the water.. its when the fish imune system goes down because of stress the ich will infect the fish. my guys at the fish store have been using garlic as a imune builder feeding the fish garlic cloves choped up into small pieces so the fish can eat it will help reduce the infection with ich i havent tryed this yet i used a uv light while adding fish back in to the tank about 4-6 hr a day or when ever i seen white spotts on the fish. now i have no problems and i have added all the fish im going to add to the tank and removed the uv without any probs so far knock on wood!!

[luciafam]

Hello,

I am thinking that my Hippo Tang may now have Ich. It was fine for the first few weeks we had it, but when we added the second batch of new fish....a pair of black and white cardinals and a yellow long nose butterfly, I noticed 3 tiny white dots on the darker portion of the tang. Could this be ich? The tang was really nervous around us and was just coming out more when we got the new fish. The tang is eating good and swimming around a lot now, but I am worried. I do not have a quarantine tank set up yet. If I were to do that, do I need to take water from my current tank? What size is good for a hospital tank? Is there anyway to treat the ich while the fish is still in the main tank? I don't want to loose the tang, so would appreciate help in this area. I am new to this hobby so am still trying to figure everything out. Also, is the ich contagious to the other fish? I have heard that it is from stress like others have mentioned and is always around, but it's the fish's lower immune system that can bring it on. I think maybe our tang got stressed out by the new arrivals. Is there a chance the ich will go away on it's own? One last question, if we were to treat it in a hospital tank, what medicine is the best. And the garlic.....is that something that you add as a regular part of the diet? How often?

[baycity20]

If you want to get rid of ick turn off yer lights crank the heater up to 85 and put in the treatment Im tellin ya

[rlcline76]

Hmmm, I would be concerned about any corals living in the tank at 85 degs. Really, going fallow is a good way to go and maybe consider a UV sterilizer. I haven't see ich in my main tanks for almost 2 months, it is an improvement over once a week.

[jimw369]

Only 2 ways to get rid of Ich. Copper and Hyposalinity. Maybe this read can help out a little. Good luck.

ATJ's Marine Aquarium Site - Reference - Marine "Ich"

ATJ's Marine Aquarium Site - Reference - Hyposalinity Treatment

[Fishhead Junkie]

if i was you, i would go to the LFS, pony up $50 and get a couple cleaner shrimp. if you can afford more of them, go for it. i am telling you...they really do a good job cleaning all my fish. i was sure my hippo was coming down with ich, i bought 1 cleaner shrimp and sure enough..that hippo was just hanging around him, getting the cleaning of his/her life. i would definitely try shrimp before chemicals. my 1st bought with ich cost me my last hippo( i stressed him out to the max by treating with kick ich and then moving him to hospital tank) plus some other fish. hope my words of advice help.

steve

[jimw369]

I believe I have read that the cowfish can release toxins when stressed that can kill other things in the tank. Just a thought.

[Fishhead Junkie]

you are right, cowfish do release a toxin if they die and arent removed very quickly. i bought one, very cool fish, but it just couldnt take the water current, kept getting its face sucked into the filter intake of my 29gal bio-cube....i got scared it might die while i was at work and i would lose my entire reef tank. i had to pull a dr. kevorkian on it. it just wasnt strong enough to hang with the big boys. a fish like that either needs to be in a tank with other cowfish or in probably a huge tank where the toxin will be dispersed enough that it isnt that harsh.

steve