QT Tank Set Up

[leigh1691]

I'm dealing with my first Ich outbreak in my main tank I was told by my LFS to set up a QT tank quickly. I got a 20 Gal tank, heater, and an inexpensive over the side filter (did not use carbon) and am using CopperSafe (1 tsp. per 4 gallons). I put about 30 - 40 of my bio balls from the main tank in the QT tank and water from my main tank to fill up the QT tank, and then put the fish in (5 small). In less than one day my amonia spiked off the charts. I only had enough water to do a 5 gal. water change and today I am going to do another 10 gal. water change. My question is am I going to have to do 10 gallon changes everyday for three weeks?????? or should this just be an initial problem with setting up a QT tank or does the Copper cause unreliable readings.

 

[robocop]

First provide all the information from the “Before Posting about sick fish Please read” thread…that will give more information to help you.

I would not use CopperSafe if Copper treatment is the treatment you want to use.

SeaChem Cupermin is the best copper product because you can buy a copper test kit to measure you copper dosage with is important. Too much would kill the fish too little would not cure the problem
Also, copper can cause false Ammonia readings. Try the SeaChem Ammonia test kit. It reads free ammonia. You could also use the Ammonia Alert gage that SeaChem makes to detect sharp spikes but I would still use the test kit as it is more accurate in reading small traces of copper.

My preferred method of treatment is Hyposalinity as I’ve had great success with it and it is not a toxin as copper is. You can’t do both though. See the link below for more information about Hypo.
http://www.petsforum.com/personal/trevor-jones/hyposalinity.html

You are going to need lots of patent from here on out to be successful in the game. Your tank needs to be fallow for 6wks minimum in order for the dieses to carry out its life cycle.

Remove any chemical filtration as it would only strip the copper from the water i.e. coal.

You will have to do water changes before every time you add copper so be prepared.

This about as much as I can give you with out knowing more about your tank and the stock you are dealing with.

 

[revhtree]

Good info from robocop!

Be ready to do countless water changes, and at minimum like RBC said, they need to be in qt for 6 weeks. Trust me, this is a must.

Also I would use cupramine copper medicne. It is trusted by most on this forum and is very successful if done right.

Sorry to hear about the ich. Take my advice and do it right this first time, then qt all your fish and you will knock it out. If not done right the ich will be back, and you will be ready to give up. You can do it! Keep us posted!

 

[leigh1691]

First Ich Outbreak

Thanks for responding so quickly.

I've had my chromis and Hippo Tang for about two months. My hippo tang was the first to get Ich about two weeks after I put him in the tank. I got him from a very reputable LFS in the area. I did NOT have a QT tank. I acclamated him with a drip bucket for about an hour before putting him in the tank. (He was my first fish). Then I got the chromis and then the clown. When I noticed that the tang had Ich, my LFS advised me to put him in a medication dip for 1 hour a day for 5 days and also a fresh water dip for 3 minutes a day for five days. I did that and he seemed fine. Well, a couple of weeks later, I bought a Flame Angel and Royal Gramma and acclamated them the same way. After about three days I noticed the tang, gramma and the angel all had Ich. So my LFS advised the QT tank with CopperSafe for Three Weeks for ALL Fish in tank. All fish are eating good still. I checked the water a couple times a week with FasTEST packets for Nitrates, Nitrites, Amonnia, PH and all was good.

I have a 75 gallon tank, wet/dry system with bio balls, 1/2" LS and about 30 lbs of LR

 

[robocop]

You actually have quite a few fish for that size tank. You should definitely consider that the Hippo Tang will need a much larger tank to thrive in when it gets big. Also, I’m not sue how long your system has been setup, but it seems you are moving a little to fast with the bio load. Adding to many fish in a short amount of time can be disasters. I’ve learned for some very bad experiences that patience is the key for success in this game. Well we can’t look back too much now. Short term You should up your live rock with all the herbivores you are carrying. Those tangs and angels rely on algae in there diet and liver rock is usually the best source. Recommended LR is 1 – 1 ½ per gallon of water. How much LS do you have? That medication dip that the LFS recommends is suspect to me. I’ve never heard of that before. Also, please please please QT from now on. It will save you time and money in the long run.

 

[leigh1691]

Still messing with my QT tank. I have done 3 ten gallon water changes in three days on a 20 gal tank and the amonnia is still high. Should I add more bio balls from the main system???? I need to get rid of that amonia. Any suggestions?

 

[quarryshark]

Maybe lighten you feeding a bit and siphon out all uneaten food.
Your water changes may be too big. The fish can handle a little ammonia for a few days and the cycle need to catch up with you bioload. Try doing 5 gallon changes for a couple of day.
Do you have all these fish in a 20 gallon? if so, you need to get a bigger tank, or another 20 gallon to split them up. That may also be the problem.

 

[leigh1691]

Hello,

Well I've now had my fish in the qt tank for about 3.5 weeks. Finally the water conditions in the qt tank stabilized. I now have another question. The fish have all been in treated water with CopperSafe the entire time and to look at them they look fine, they are eating fine. The only concern I have is that my hippo tang, even though he looks fine, sometimes I occassionally notice him scrapping his side on a terra cotta flower pot in the tank. Do Tangs just do this???? or could this still be a problem of ICH after 3.5 weeks of treatment?

 

[quarryshark]

He could have a little irritation from smalls scars from the parasites, or the copper may be irritating him. If you followed the instructions for the copper, you should be fine. Keep up the good water quality and he should heal in short order.
After the treatment is over, you need to watch the fish for 3 weeks to make sure there is no reinfection.
Good job!!

 

[leigh1691]

Thanks for the quick response. I've been watching my fish in the QT tank closely and notice the scraping and itching happening a lot more. I don't see any physical spots, but I think something is going on again. They have been in the QT tank for a month now being treated with CopperSafe. I just could not imagine how they would have gotten ich after all this time and really started to think about it. I've just thought of something and thought I would get any comments on this. Since the beginning set up of my QT tank I had a horrible time keeping the Ammonia down. After about 1 week of changing the water every day, one of the salespeople at my LFS gave me "Sea Chem Prime" to add drops to the water to help with the ammonia spikes. I started reading the back of the bottle and saw that this Sea Chem Prime also took care of metals in the water??????? Does anyone know if this product could have taken out all of the copper for the last three weeks??????

 

[quarryshark]

Wow! Not sure, but if it takes metal out of the water, well copper is a metal so...
If they are showing symtoms once more, I would hesitate to nuke them with copper again. That could be rather rough on them.
Perhaps you could use hyposalinity this time. I have used thit treatment with excellent results and it is much easier on the fish. Here is an excellent article on the treatment. A good refractometer is required to do it correctly.
http://www.petsforum.com/personal/trevor-jones/hyposalinity.html
Is there still copper in the water? That could also be irritating them.
I would not return them to the main (sorry to say) until you are sure they are cured.

 

[leigh1691]

Well, I went and got a copper test kit last night and tested the copper in the water and instead of it actually being too low, it was a little high??? So I guess the Prime did not remove the copper. But now I am really confused on why my tang is starting to scrap again. I actually decided that since all the fish have been treated for a little over 30 days that it just may be the copper starting to cause skin problems so I just took them all out of the copper last night and put them back in the main tank. If I have to remove them all again then I will just do it at that point. When I put the fish back in the main system they all did pretty well, but immediately the cleaner shrimp jump on the tang and was going to town on something. I'll just wait and see what the next couple of days show.

 

[quarryshark]

Maybe it was copper irritation. Time will tell. Would have been better to run GAC to rid of the copper and leave them in the qt tank for observation for a few weeks, but whats done is done.
Will keep fingers crossed for you!!!

 

[cmor1701d]

I agree with Kurt. Run some carbon and see if that helps. Keep them in QT for a few more weeks to make sure the main tank is fallow of fish for 6 - 8 weeks. That will kill the parasite in the main tank so they don't get reinfested when you return them.

 

[leigh1691]

Hello:

Thanks for all the help with my Ich problem I have had my fish back in the main tank now for two weeks and everyone looks healthy. How long will it take before I know for sure that the Ich outbreak is cured? Also, I have another question, this may be for another forum but I am having a horrible problem with my substrate growing brown algea all over it. My water quality is great, it just looks bad. The last couple of water changes I did good gravel siphonings and it just seems to come back quickly. I have about 70 to 80 small reef cleaners (Crabs, snails, one sea cucumber). The one thing I don't have is a "Protein Skimmer". Do protein skimmers help with this type of stuff or do they just keep the water quality good for the fish????? Any suggestions would be great.

 

[quarryshark]

I have had my fish back in the main tank now for two weeks and everyone looks healthy. How long will it take before I know for sure that the Ich outbreak is cured?

Wow, not long enough. 8O The minimum fishless time is 4 weeks, 6 weeks in the safest time. Keep an eye on you fish, the parasite may still remain in your system.
As for the algae, what are your water parameters? Yes a skimmer does help, but will not eliminate it. Do you use tap water?

 

[leigh1691]

I did have them out for 4 weeks. I had to put them back in the main tank because they were showing signs of distress. I am keeping a close eye on them. Wouldn't I have seen some problems in two weeks if the parasite was still active?????

 

[quarryshark]

Whew, I'm glad to hear you did 4 weeks but its still on the light side of the treatment period. It may not been enough time for all the parasites to go through their life cycle and die off completely, that is the concern. With 6 weeks, you are more assured of that. Unfortunately it only takes one parasite to start the whole thing over again.
I would keep the qt tank up for a couple of weeks, just in case.
Keeping fingers crossed for you.

 

[cmor1701d]

Wouldn't I have seen some problems in two weeks if the parasite was still active?????

There are 3 stages to the Ich parasite. It takes 4 weeks or more to cycle through all 3 stages. The parasites feed and grow for a few days, then drop off the fish. They lie on the tank bottom in an encysted state for several weeks and mature. Each cyst then ruptures, releasing dozens to hundreds of new parasites. This is a short lived free-swimming stage. If the parasite does not find a fish host, this is when it will die. A re-infestation may be minor to begin with but will get worse as time goes by.

Why were the fish showing signs of distress? Were you doing a daily pwc? Were you testing the parameters to make sure everything was in range?

 

[quarryshark]

There are 3 stages to the Ich parasite. It takes 4 weeks or more to cycle through all 3 stages. The parasites feed and grow for a few days, then drop off the fish. They lie on the tank bottom in an encysted state for several weeks and mature. Each cyst then ruptures, releasing dozens to hundreds of new parasites. This is a short lived free-swimming stage. If the parasite does not find a fish host, this is when it will die. A re-infestation may be minor to begin with but will get worse as time goes by.

Well put!!