Getting Rid of Ich

[Mike E 6453]

Well I just had ich in one of my tanks and now I seam to have it in the other also. They are in seperate locations so it didn't go airborne or anything but I need some help getting rid of it. Unfortunatly I don't have a quarentine tank. I tryed using Greenex before and all my fish died, so that stuff is out of the question. I've heard of using hypersalinity, and some other medicines. I wanted to see what you all might reccomend. Is there any good medicine out there that won't hurt the reef tank? I think it is ich from what I have seen on the internet. It looks like they have little sparkles on them. It is still in the early stages, but I need some help killing the disease.

My tank is 28g, w/ 20lb live sand, and 20 reg. sand. I have about 40lb of LR, 2 powerheads that are 200gph a piece, a protein skimmer 300gph, and a penguin filter that i run naked, unless i do a water change. The tank has a cleaner wrasse, clown, 2 damsels, peppermint shrimp, emerald crab, and star fish.

Let me know what you guys think. Thanks for all the help.

Mike

[Phishnoob]

I feel your pain. One tang came home with ich and it got bad and it was a total wipe. I am fishless for six weeks to let the life cycle go through and minimize future chances of this happening.

One thing I believe Spanky recommended was a UV sterilizer and I have that running all the time. Also, I am not sure if this helps or not but my tank return goes through floss and a bag of carbon which I trade out weekly.

Phishnoob

[Kevin1000]

Time to buy a QT tank - a small 10 gallon tank cost about $10 - throw in an inexpensive heater and a cheap filter and you are your set. In a pinch you can use a 5 gallon bucket.

There is no "reef safe" treatment that is consistently effective against ick. The two effective treatments are copper and hyposalinity. Both require use of a QT tank. If you use copper I would recomend cupramine - if you use hypo - make sure you use a refractometer.

Heres a link that may help

http://www.petsforum.com/personal/tr...marineich.html

Don't bother purchasing a UV sterilizer - might kill a few of the theronts but little or no chance of eliminating ich.

Hope this helps

[Mike E 6453]

Ok, so I get a quarantine tank and put just a filter, I don't need a powerhead or protein skimmer? And they stay in this tank for 6 weeks. Do I need to get the shrimp and star fish and crab out? Or just the fish? And how much salt should I have in the tank? What level in other words, and how do I tell if it is working on getting my fish better? Is there any way to tell when my real tank is ready or ich free?

Mike

[brifirst]

I used Kent Marines Rx-P, You put in and then run the skimmer real wet to get it out quickly, it worked pretty good. No dead fish or corals. I put a UV on at the same time so im not sure what really cured it, good luck. Remember ,its all part of the hobby.

[Kevin1000]

You do not need a powerhead or a protein skimmer - powerhead would be nice (move one from show tank) but not necessary.

You should quarantine all fish - do not need to Qt any inverts.

Leave your show tank w/o fish for approx 5 weeks - the ich will die w/o fish to feed on.

IMO hyposalinity is better than using copper. Easier on the fish and easier to administer. If you decide to go with hyposalinity - you need to adjust salinity down to 1.009 (12-14ppt) - I would not do this without using a refractometer - a hydrometer is not accurate enough.

Hope this helps.