Novice Error leads to disaster

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jacpaq2000

Aquarium Advice Activist
Joined
Jan 5, 2015
Messages
144
I'll begin this thread with the back story, about 2 weeks ago I bought a tridacna clam on live Aquaria because of some kind of sale they where having and, when it got here about a week later, I let it acclimate then put it strait into my display. This later turned out to be a HUGE mistake! Anyhow, last Monday everything was going fine in my 75 gallon reef tank. My yellow eye kole Tang was swimming about healthily and my maroon clown was playing in his anemone as usual. Everyone was eating fine and there was absolutely no aggression to be seen. The following morning I wake up to my yellow eye kole Tang lying face down in the substrate with a fairly large chunk of his tail fin missing. I notice he is still breathing and don't really understand what happened or what I should do. I then notice that one side of my clown is completely covered with white spots that I assume to be ich. After this, I move all the fish (accept my snowflake eel) from my main display into a 10 gallon hospital tank I have. By the end of the day, the Tang is dead, my clown seem fine (still appears to have ich) and my blue chromosome appear to have no signs of illness. It has been about a week and I am now noticing white marks on my clowns fins (almost like it is pealing) and despite treating the hospital tank with copper based medication I have not seen much improvement in his condition. After all this, I have come to the conclusion that my clown contracted the ich from my failure to separate my clam from my main display before adding it in but there is still a lot that is unanswered. For one, what happened to my Tang? He went from being perfectly happy one day to dead the next. What I think might have happened is my snowflake eel took a bite out of his tail fin on accident and that might have put him into shock? Also, why is it that only the clown is showing signs of ich but not any of my other fish? It's not like he is under any different amount of stress. And finally, where do I go from here? What I'm currently planning on doing is keeping my clown and the 3 blue chromis ok the 10 gallon for a month or so as to allow the ich in the main system to fulfill its life cycle but idk if there will be any problems with the small size of the current holding tank. Also, how long should I treat my fish and can my eel catch ich as well? I remember reading eels can't catch ich but I'm not sure.

I know I have a lot of questions but if anyone has any advice what so ever that would be fantastic!

Thanks :)
 
First I'd look at the parameters in the system.
Ich comes on from stress. Tangs are quite susceptible to such. Though clowns are pretty hardy, can be just as easily stressed and be ill.
You can only visibly see ich during the third phase of its life cycle, the cyst. When they go away, we think they are cured. The reality is that the cyst burst and the sandbed is filled with many more of the parasite in the beginning on the life stage. This is why we end up pulling all fish, if possible, during the 6-8 week treatment period since this is the length of time ich can survive without a host during the two non-cyst life stages.
When it comes to the chunk out of the tang tail, though a possible scenario it is most likely searching to an easy finger to point at the problem. Similar to people finding crabs eating a fish on the bottom that is struggling to breathe. The crab is doing its job and catches the blame because it 'was caught red handed'. Most likely a member of your clean up crew took a chunk out of the tang or was the result of a territorial disagreement rather than an accidental bite...your eel won't bite by accident.
 
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