Got ich? - What does ich look like, how to treat?

J

Jacob

[I noticed this morning that my regal tang which I bought last week after the meeting has a bunch of white spots on it. I am new to this, what is it? Anything to worry about? Is it the dreaded ich I have heard about? How to I treat this, whatever it is?]
 
[Yeah it sounds like ich to me, it should sortof resemble grains of salt. What else is in the tank, fish, coral, invert?

Here are two articles to help you understand the parasite and treatment methods better:
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-08/sp/index.htm
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-10/sp/feature/index.htm

Copper is generally the recommended method of treatment, but I advise against it for most tangs. Hyposalinity is much better for them and is quite effective. However a refractometer is required for hypo.
Please read the articles and post back any questions you may have.]
 
[Amanda, Thanks for the links. I will definately read those right now. I have a small frag, won in the auction at the meeting (no idea what it is), a couple of small mushrooms, BTA, cleaner clam, cleaner shrimp, yellow tang, yellow belly damsel, blue damsel, tomato clown, ocellaris clown, clarkii clown, velvet damsel, and flame angel.

737mech, I does look like grains of salt stuck to her body. She doesn't appear to be breathing faster than the others and the spots are more or less on the back half of her body and not near the gills. I haven't seen her scraping herself on anything. I do have one cleaner shrimp and feed a variety of foods including, mysis, brine, blood worms, flakes, pellets, lettuce. I have tried seaweed salad sheets but nobody touches it, which surprised me because the blue damsel and yellow tang really tear into the lettuce. I will have to try some nori.

I have a small 10g with a hatchling red-eared slider turtle in it. I can but him back in his little lagoon that he came in and temporarly use his tank as QT for the regal.

Thanks for the help to both of you.]
 
[You can pull out the Regal for treatment, but it is quite likely that the parasite is already in your substrate/LR and waiting for the opportunistic moment to grab the rest of your fish.
Untill you can get a larger QT set up, lets try a few other things first. As for a larger one, a large rubbermaid tub works great.
You can increase the temp in the main tank to about 82, no higher. The salinity can be lowered very slowly to about 1.022 if its at 1.025 right now. Be sure this change is done slowly over a matter of several hours.
You can soak all food in garlic supplement. I use the chopped garlic that comes in a jar near the produce section, just suck the juice out of the jar. You can also buy garlic at the LFS.
Check and see if your LFS carries Pepso food made by Jungle and feed it twice a day.

You probably wont see the parasites in the gills without taking the fish out and looking for them :) ,its very likely they are there though.
There is a good chance of nipping this in the bud without the hospital tank, but do get one running so you are ahead of the game. All of your fish are at risk, so its better to treat them all at the same time.
Hopefully one of your local reefers will have a refracto you can borrow just in case.

LOL! George, if I could think as fast as I type, I might be ahead of the game!]
 
[Thanks Amanda. I have the regal in a 10g I just bought, figure I should have something on hand now that I am really getting serious about this hobby. I have several rubbermaid tubs on hand. Are you suggesting that I set it up with filter and a power head, bare bottom, and move all of my live stock out until the ich passes through its life cycle in the main tank?

If so, how long should I leave them out? Do I need to move out the BTA and other inverts or just the fish? I appreciate all your help with this. :smart:]
 
[If the other fish show no signs of ich over the next 5 weeks, then there is no need to move them. If they do, I would set up a rubbermaid large enough for all of them and QT for 5 weeks after you see the spots disappear.
Yep you can set the rubbermaid up with filter, powerhead, heater and PVC for hiding. Since you already have the rubbermaids, be sure they havent been exposed to any chemicals and give them a good rinse before setup.
The other inverts are fine in the main tank, they are not succeptible to this parasite.
Glad to hear you got the Regal out ok. Be sure to put some PVC elbows in there large enough for him to swim through, and to give a place to hide.

No problemo, Im glad to help :nod:]
 
[Ok, it has been a week now and my regal has no more spots and is much more active. I know that I need to keep her/him/it in the QT for 4 more weeks and to raise the salinity slowly.

Question: For how long do I keep the salinity hypo? When should I start raising it back up?

Also, how well do inverts do in hypo? I was thinking of putting a few of my Astreas and bluelegs in there to keep it clean.]
 
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