Another deadly store

[jason1985]

Friday I put a purple tang into my tank, he looks perfecly fine all weekend swimming around looking happy. Last night I come home from work and he is covered in ich. This morning I wake up and my YELLOW tang is dead, both clowns have ich on them and the PURPLE tang is covered in more ich.

How can ich just from my PURPLE to my YELLOW tang that fast and kill the yellow tang over night.

Prior to adding the Purple tang friday the clowns and the yellow tang looked perfectly normal!

This is the 2nd time I lose all my fish in 3month period!
I cant keep spending all this money on fish so I can flush them down the toilet!

[Krypt]

What happened is that you already had ich in your tank before getting the purple tang, it's just that no one was stressed and they could fight it off. Adding new fish can be very stressful to the tanks current inhabitants. They have to assert their territories and chase the new guy. It's alot of work and this leads them to lose slime coat and their immune system goes down.

Once their immune system goes down and the ich gets a foothold, it's time to intervene and begin treatment in a separate QT for all the fish.

[jason1985]

I do agree and I would of treated with coper. Problem is I didnt have the stuff on hand to setup a QT nor did I have the coper, plan was to have that setup tonight after work that all depending on the fact that I could actually net the fish from the display tank.

I can't beleive the Yellow tang died overnight, last night before bed he didnt even have 1 spot of ich on him and this morning he was covered and lifeless

[Greenmaster]

Ich lives in the sand... it sounds like you had a major infestation waiting to take over... once the conditions were right BOOM! Your tank is now visibly infested. I would remove the fish from the display for 2 months as Ich cannot survive for that long without a host once it has cleared up I would add in the fish again. But this is the reason you should have a QT tank.

[jason1985]

Lesson learned!
It's so hard to catch the fish without having to remove the live rock.
If I didn't have coral in my tank I would of simple added copper to the main display tonight when i got home.

I don't know what to do, I dont even know if any of the fish will still be alive by the time I make it home from work.

[0o.Kelsey.o0]

The yellow tang and the purple tang are also both in the Zebrasoma family so they are even less likely to get along and more likely to fight. Maybe there was a battle to the death last night.

Also even without coral the liverock and sand would absorb the copper and you wouldn't be able to keep inverts in the tank ever. Plus i believe they absorb it so much that it doesn't do much for the fish.

[jason1985]

What are the chances of the still living fish to recover from the ich if I treat them with copper tonight?

I was thinking of filling a 30gallon rubbermaid plastic bin with pre mixed clean water heated to match the display tank and run copper.

Could this work?

[tjm80]

I'm in a similar situation as you, but only about a week ahead of you. I filled up my hospital tank with water from the DT. You want at least half of the water to come from the DT IMO. I put all my fish in a 20L and began treating with coppersafe. It's been 8 days and no spots since day 2 or 3 and my DT is sitting fallow. 6 weeks and 6 days to go...

[jason1985]

I think that's what I will do, Fill the 30gallon rubbermaid up half with DT water and half new mixed water, set temp and try to get the fish from the DT into the Hospital tank.

This all depending if the fish survive between now and then

[tjm80]

I went ahead and used 100% DT water and immediately put a heater in it to maintain the temp, then had to take out all of my LR to catch the fish. That way I didn't have to wait on the temp to adjust. Also you might consider getting an aquarium rather than the rubbermaid. The sides of those bins tend to buckle under the weight of the water. I'm curing some DIY live rock in one right now and it's so warped I can't even fit the top on it anymore. Not to mention it'll be really hard to observe your fish during treatment in the rubbermaid.

[jason1985]

I would go with glass aquarium but for now I dont have the time to fidn one unless I go buy a new tank for QT and to me its just not worth it right now. I will do the best as I can to try and save my purple and nice clowns and if not well for next time i'll know what I need!

[jason1985]

On my lunch break I just ran to the local FS and bought the seachem cupermine and another heater. Lets hope the fish are still alive when I get home! I feel like I have a big job ahead of me tonight!

[austinsdad]

Are you QTing your new fish?

[jason1985]

The guy I buy my fish from QT the fish before he sells them, he kept the Purple tang for 20days in QT before I finally went to pick him up.
Once I got home I drip acclimated for a few hours and in he went looking happy for the frist 3 days!

[cmor1701d]

Using DT water is forcing your fish to try and resist the parasite in dirty water. There is little to zero beneficial bacteria in the water column. Your fish would be better off in 24 hour aged new SW matched to SG and temp.
Daily 10% -20% pwc will then help maintain pristine water conditions which are most important in helping fish fight any disease.

I'm a firm believer in Hyposalinity. It takes as long to get to Hypo conditions as it does for the copper to become effective. Also, you don't contaminate any equipment with copper.

I also keep a filter in my sump so I can get my QT tank running in a matter of hours if necessary.

Good luck to all of you fighting the Ich battle.

[jason1985]

Tang and clowns are still alive, just called the house to check up!
Can't wait to get home and setup the QT and hopefully make the little guys feel better with a little cupermine

[Smartech]

I came home to a split heater and my water temp was 98
Can't believe this happened
Second heater in a month
First one stopped working all together
Second split and boiled my water
Still have 5 fish left but I highly doubt they live past the night
Going to flip on my LFS in the morning
Also going to call Marineland the manufacturer of both heaters
And loose on them too
Lost over $1000 of fish today and that really sucks
All my shrimp, snails, starfish, wrasse, and coral died
Clowns, black eal, and yellow tang still kicking

[Smartech]

I think manufacturers should stand behind their products.
Split heaters shouldn't even be an option.
Anyone ever had that happen to them?

[jason1985]

My purple tang and clowns and still making it in QT right now. The yellow tang's gills are still going but he has what looks like a big bruse on his back and looks like internal bleeding as he lays on the bottom of the tank. Mayne purple kicked his *** last night? I wonder if he's going to make it

[tjm80]

I was under the impression that the copper wouldn't kill the "spots" or the little cysts that fall off, but would kill the swarmers when they are looking to re attach. That's why I used DT water, and all spots were gone in 2-3 days and my fish haven't shown one symptom of ich since the last spot left.