Huge ICK problem

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PowDerBlu3

Aquarium Advice Newbie
Joined
Mar 21, 2008
Messages
7
Currently I am having alot of trouble with ick in my tank. I have lost a few fish due to it. I have tried the medication, "No Sick Fish" for 7 days and I really havent seen a difference. After that was done, I ran my sump and all and turned everthing back on to clear the water up for a few days. Now I see that some of my corals are being affected by it, and that I see that some of the corals are decaying. Does anyone have advice as to what should to be done, so that I can get my tank back to being healthy
:)

Thanks
 
You probably want to read these two articles first to really understand what you're fighting. There's no easy way to deal with it, unfortunately.

Marine Ich/Cryptocaryon irritans - A Discussion of this Parasite and the Treatment Options Available, Part I by Steven Pro - Reefkeeping.com
Marine Ich/Cryptocaryon irritans - A Discussion of this Parasite and the Treatment Options Available, Part II by Steven Pro - Reefkeeping.com

Then you probably want to read this...

ATJ's Marine Aquarium Site - Reference - Hyposalinity Treatment

You need to remove your fish from your main tank, and treat the fish with either hyposalinity or copper. Any of the "reef safe" formulas out there, in my opinion, are not what they're claiming to be or are using weasel words like "controls" ich or the like. They really don't get rid of it.

While you're treating your fish in a quarantine tank, you need to leave your main tank fishless for at least 6 weeks, preferable more, to break the life cycle of the ich parasite and rid your tank of them. Yeah... it's a pain, but it's a pretty darn sneaky parasite.

I'm a little confused by your comment, "After that was done, I ran my sump and all and turned everthing back on to clear the water up for a few days". Do you mean you didn't have any circulation in the tank for 7 days while you did the treatment? What exactly was "everything" that was turned off? My guess is that if you didn't have circulation for 7 days, that's what is making your corals unhappy/unhealthy. That's assuming that whatever was in that stuff you put in your tank didn't hurt them. "No Sick Fish" stuff doesn't have the greatest reputation in the hobby. If you do some Googling, you'll see what I'm talking about.

I'd do some 20% water changes every day or so and run carbon to help out the corals. But if they're decaying, that doesn't sound good.
 
What I mean by having off, was that i had m skimmer off during the medication, and that i had the charcoal out and stuff. I had the UV light off too which is also needed during the medication

I had plenty of water flow, so that is not the cause of why my corals are not doing so good. My hammer head coral that I have is like completely closed in, and there is stringy stuff coming out of it. Another coral is a brain coral that i have and that has stringy stuff on it too. Like tissue from the coral it looks like.

Right now i do have chocoal and all running, skimmer and all so that the medcation in the water goes away. But I dont understand right now why my corals dont look that great. Also have to figure out when my tank will be healthy enough to be able to add more fish.

Thanks
 
...Also have to figure out when my tank will be healthy enough to be able to add more fish.

When you've properly treated the existing fish and let your main tank go fallow. Then you can start stocking again. If you add fish before that, then you're just making more fish that you will have to treat for ich.

Depending on how loaded your tank is, having the skimmer off for a week could've increased your nitrates to a level your corals don't like. Have you tested for nitrates? What are your levels? Also curious how big a tank we're talking here, and what type/number of fish you have in it.

Stringy stuff (maybe brown?) coming from the corals could just be something as simple as it expelling waste. How long have you had these corals? What type of lighting?

Sorry for all the questions... just trying to get an idea of what your tank situation is.
 
First off I have a 50g tank with a 50g sump. Yes my levels are fine. Ammonia = 0, Nitrites = 0 and nitrates = 10. My lighting is a 150 watt metal hallide with 63 watt Atinic. Current I only have 1 fish and that is a clown wrasse. I have lost all the others due to this problems.

Thanks for helping.
 
Start by doing the daily 20% pwc's that Kurt suggested to help the corals. Set up a QT tank and put the last remaining fish in there and start the hypo treatment. Keep the main tank fishless for 8 weeks. QT any new fish you get for 30 days to make sure they don't have Ich or other disease. After a proper QT you can add them to the display tank. That will keep the odds of another Ich outbreak down to a minimum.

In future posts please try to refrain from using the term "and stuff"
What I mean by having off, was that i had m skimmer off during the medication, and that i had the charcoal out and stuff.
It makes us wonder what the "and stuff" refrers to.
 
Sorry for your troubles...ich can be a real pain. All great advice so far. The best thing you can do your tank now is to set up a QT tank for your one fish and tx appropriately. Let your main tank go fallow for 6-8 weeks to kill off the parasite completely. Inverts and corals will be fine in the main during this time. In the future, I would avoid adding any type of ich "medication" directly to the main tank, even if it claims to be reef-safe.
 
Start by doing the daily 20% pwc's that Kurt suggested to help the corals. Set up a QT tank and put the last remaining fish in there and start the hypo treatment. Keep the main tank fishless for 8 weeks. QT any new fish you get for 30 days to make sure they don't have Ich or other disease. After a proper QT you can add them to the display tank. That will keep the odds of another Ich outbreak down to a minimum.

Yeah... what he said! (y)

Sorry for all the losses, but hopefully with an incoming quarantine setup you can avoid all this in the future.
 
When quarantining fish, how likely is it that you'll QT one with ich that hasn't shown on the fish yet, and therefore contaminate your QT tank as well?
 
The idea of a putting fish in QT for 30 days is to give you time to examine the fish for any parsites or disease that the fish already has. Ich will show up during a 30 day QT. If if does, the fish are already in QT and you can start a hypo treatment. The same goes for any disease. The fish are already in QT and you can start treatment,

New fish should be added slowly, 1 or 2 at a time wth about a month interval between additions. This gives the biofilter time to catch up with the new bioload.
 
As cmor mentioned, that's the whole point of a QT. Ideally, you just put one fish in there for the 30 day quarantine period. If any disease shows up, you already have it isolated and can treat accordingly. Once the fish is showing no signs of illness, the 30 day clock starts again. 30 days problem free, then the fish goes in the main tank. If you introduce any new fish in the QT before that 30 day period, the clock starts over again.

If you put 2 fish in the QT, then both have to stay in during any treatment, even if the other one doesn't appear to have any issues. That's why it's usually better just to run one fish through at a time. It also insures you don't add fish to fast to your main.

Also, after treating a diseased fish, once the fish is either in your main tank or in fishie heaven, then you can totally empty the QT and clean it out and disinfect it. QTs are as much a part of good fishkeeping as water changes, in my opinion.
 
Well, I was thinking more along the lines of what to do if Ich breaks out in a main tank. Say 3-4 fish show signs of infection and the rest don't. I guess you'd just heat treat the whole tank. Will Ich never occur provided you always QT new purchases for a month?
 
The ich parasite need fish in order to survive. If only some of the fish in a tank show signs of ich, ich is present in the tank. If you only treat some of the fish in a QT, the ich is still present in the main tank and will stay alive by feeding off the other fish that don't appear to have a problem. That is why the only real way to break the whole life cycle of the bugger is to remove all fish from the tank, treat all the fish, and let the tank go fishless. That way you kill all the ich on the fish, and all the ich in the tank.

Quarantining fish for a month will not guarantee a fish does not have ich, even if it shows no outward signs of it. But normally, within a month, if you have a diseased fish you'll see it. The stress from the new environment, new food, new everything... is usually enough to bring everything out in the open. It's really no different than us - if I get super stressed out, I'm pretty sure I'll be getting sick soon!

Also, you mentioned "heat treating" the tank. I'm thinking you're referring to the "heat the tank up to speed up the life cycle of the parasite" treatment. All that does, supposedly, is speed up the life cycle (metabolism) of the parasite - just as it does everything else in the tank. It doesn't kill it.
 
I have never experienced an ICH problem before(Knock on fish tank):cool: I just had a related question. Is there something that causes ICH to happen such as unstable water conditions or mishandling. How is the ICH parasite created in our tank-bred species. Can you have an ICH problem with a fish even if there have not been any recent introductions to the tank in a long while. Is it similar to getting a cold from a poor immune system. Will fish-vitamins and a good diet help the fishy immune system. Just kinda thinking out loud.
 
In theory, ich shouldn't be present in tank-bred fish. But once a tank-bred fish hits your local fish store, most likely it's thrown in with all the other wild caught fish. Even if it's not, normally the tanks are all plumbed to a common water source. So much for a parasite free fish - assuming the original breeder takes care to keep their systems isolated from ich.

Ich can exist in a tank and if the fish are healthy, you may not ever notice a problem. Think I read somewhere (wish I could remember where) that if you have a tank that has had no additions to it, and had no outbreaks of ich for 2 years, you can assume your tank is ich free. I'll try and track down that tidbit of info, so don't quote me on that... I'm going from memory here!
 
In theory Ich (free swimming stage) can hitch a ride on a coral or anything that comes from a tank at the lfs. This is a very SMALL possibility, but it does exist.
 
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