Best way to treat ich with inverts?

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Kshupe

Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Joined
Jun 18, 2011
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I have a small blue tang that has ich pretty bad and I'm afraid I'll lose him if I don't try to treat it. I have a cleaner shrimp and he doesnt even attempt to clean the tang, but I have starfish and some other inverts so I can't treat the tank. Any safe natural ways to try and get rid of it? Any help is appreciated.
 
Kshupe said:
I have a small blue tang that has ich pretty bad and I'm afraid I'll lose him if I don't try to treat it. I have a cleaner shrimp and he doesnt even attempt to clean the tang, but I have starfish and some other inverts so I can't treat the tank. Any safe natural ways to try and get rid of it? Any help is appreciated.

The best way is to put him in a small tank away from your reef. And treat him there. Then treat your tank with something reef safe as a prevention like probiotic marine formula by precision aquarium.
 
NO
There is noway to treat and kill ich with inverts
You can only hope the tang beats it this time and then every time he gets it,,because it will return more often than not..
 
Kshupe said:
I have a small blue tang that has ich pretty bad and I'm afraid I'll lose him if I don't try to treat it. I have a cleaner shrimp and he doesnt even attempt to clean the tang, but I have starfish and some other inverts so I can't treat the tank. Any safe natural ways to try and get rid of it? Any help is appreciated.

Also just found this. http://www.thatpetplace.com/pet/group/9805/product.web
 
I don't think any of that stuff really kills ich....
What size tank and what other fish are in it?Casey is right about removing and treating ,,that really is the only way ..
To kill ich you need to starve it...ie. remove all fish for 8 weeks minimum ,,,no fish,no host,no ich ..inverts can't be hosts(carriers yes,,but not hosts)
 
FTMMWS said:
I don't think any of that stuff really kills ich....
What size tank and what other fish are in it?Casey is right about removing and treating ,,that really is the only way ..
To kill ich you need to starve it...ie. remove all fish for 8 weeks minimum ,,,no fish,no host,no ich ..inverts can't be hosts(carriers yes,,but not hosts)

I Agee best move is to remove and treat.
 
Granted, I've never had a salt tank, but is treating ich in salt really that different than fresh? I don't use meds to treat it but rather:

raise the temp to 86

add an airstone to increase oxygenation

gravel vac every 2-3 days to remove spores from substrate

keep this routine going for minimum of 2 weeks

Ich is in the entire tank, not just on the one fish exhibiting symptoms. It doesn't make sense to me that you would remove the fish to treat it when it's not really getting rid of the ich entirely. Can you explain why it is treated so differently in a salt tank? Thanks so much!
 
The ich can stay alive and dormant for up to 8 weeks so removal of the fish to treat is vital. The tank will sit fallow which will allow the ich to actually die off. In sw we dont' really gravel vac as it disturbs the sand bed. :)

Youre right in that the ich is in the tank, and not just on one fish. He cant use ich treatments because of the copper and most people have no luck in using the heat method in sw. It won't kill the ich and it will just re-emerge at a later time.
 
Thanks, that was very helpful to me. I love salt tanks but am still too fearful to venture over to the dark side..... :oops:
 
Aww come on over, it's nice and salty here on this side! LOL I made the jump myself from fw to sw and I love it. Once you get the hang of it and the right equipment it's not that much different. :)
 
It really isn't that difficult ,,,,don't over complicate it..I think we all started in FW ,so you'll be over here soon enough:lol:...
,,and yes ,,SW ich is completely different than FW ich
 
First it is not ich if it is in saltwater, it is white spot disease and a completely different pathogen.

I have not found any of the 'reef safe' meds to be either, consistently reef safe or consistently effective as a med.

It is always debated, and I am sure it will be here as well, but I have talked to multiple people who have used garlic to treat white spot in a reef. Scientific studies have shown that allicin, a chemical in freshly pressed garlic, can actively kill parasites. The best form is not the bottled stuff in the LFS, it is freshly pressed garlic juice used to soak the food. I have also talked to people who used New Life Spectrum's Thera+A formula to do the same, but I would use freshly pressed garlic either way.
 
I have read that too(about allicin),,isn't it in only one stage of life though?
It has a few stages that it is untouchable ...
Steven Pro has some wonderful articles about all this ....great reads
 
I think he wrote the article that is usually linked in these discussions, which doesn't stand up IMO.

If you keep feeding it you can get rid of it. In FW ich it is the same way, the meds only treat one stage. Stop too soon and it comes right back.
 
carey said:
The ich can stay alive and dormant for up to 8 weeks so removal of the fish to treat is vital. The tank will sit fallow which will allow the ich to actually die off. In sw we dont' really gravel vac as it disturbs the sand bed. :)

Youre right in that the ich is in the tank, and not just on one fish. He cant use ich treatments because of the copper and most people have no luck in using the heat method in sw. It won't kill the ich and it will just re-emerge at a later time.

+1
It doesn't get better then that lol.... I too tought that marine ich and freshwater ich can be treated the same, and boy that's a big mistake.....
 
Not sure what doesn't stand up to you ,,but that could be a long winded discussion ,,and i'm just not into that...
I personally think my sig says it all....Its a win win IMO
 
The references in the article I am thinking of do not support the idea that garlic doesn't kill parasites. In fact one reference specified that it does kill ich. That is why the article doesn't stand up IMO. It doesn't prove or even support the whole idea of the article.
 
I've decided that if my tank gets ich I'll just treat the fish separately and if it returns move the fish to a FOWLR where they can be free of it forever.

Good luck treating it, but as of now there really isn't a way to treat an invert tank and free it of ich.
 
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