Ich Wars II

[kestrel]

Good Night/Morning all,

Well after controlling the ich last fall and thinking I had the upper hand with more frequent water changes, reduced ambient light at night, and feeding garlic-soaked food, it came back around Christmas.

I just finished freshwater dipping my tang and flame angel. They are back in the tank now, so we'll se how they are in the morning.

I found that waiting for lights out made catching the angel possible, and the tang was down-right easy. All I had to do with the tang was lift his sleeping rock, and guide him into the net. That is, while holding a flashlight in my mouth. The less light, the better it seemed to work. Of course it must have been one hell of a shock for him to wake-up in a freshwater dip If anyone else needs to catch fish, this seemed to be a good method. I would think it is less stressful without going back into the lights, too.

Wish me luck in this battle. I've still got a lot of garlic and water changes to go.

Daryl

[reiple]

Hello.

I have been having trouble with Ich and I find (surprisingly in my case) that situation whenever I place weak fishes (where I doubt the source. As in maybe caught with chemicals.) or fish with damaged internal organs (they do look perfectly healthy outside) These fishes tend to be easily attacked by Ich and Rust diseases.

Some net caught and adapted fish tend to be very hardy (20 years ago Ich cases were rare with my fishes. Back then they are net caught) and I even experienced in the past a whole tank (with domino damsels, african and percula clowns and dartfishes) of fish dying while a sensitive koran angel actually surviving.

There are no captive bred marine fishes in the Philippines (would be expensive since it's cheaper to catch) so I dunno about those but I assume they are hardier.

Sad but like humans (say damaged by radiation or pollution) fishes with damaged organs will always have these trouble.

Good luck (on the war with Ich)

[Mr.JennM]

Daryl, have you figured out what the cause of the ich is?

I'd argue that it's present in all systems but low stress, good diet, and good water quality should enable a fish to keep it at bay. If you are providing all of these and still having issues, SOMETHING is stressing the fish that you may not be aware of.

pH - is it steady or does it fluctuate?
Temperature - same question.
Voltage - could something be leaking electricity into the water, even at low levels that you can't feel, it will stress fish to the point of disease.

Sooner or later with most people I've spoken with about such ongoing issues, we fall upon the cause. Sometimes it takes a bit more head-scratching than others.

There's no good reason for you to be waging an ongoing battle with this -- but there is some reason.

Just some food for thought.

Jenn

[JennM]

DOH I just realized that Scott left himself logged in.

That was me answering, not him.

We now return to your regularly scheduled identity crisis.

Jenn

[kestrel]

Jenn,

Thanks for the reply. Like I said, I thought I had it figured out. I probably caused it at Christmas when Santa gave me a sebae anemone and a Devil's Hand. Good thing he also gave me an RO/DI unit. Water quality should continue to improve now.

Difference this time was that the garlic didn't seem to be as big a help.

Thanks
Daryl

[JennM]

Not sure I follow you. The coral and anem shouldn't have "caused" ich...unless something died and fouled the water but then you'd have bigger issues to deal with...

Jenn

[Doug1]

Perhaps the stress of adding them , and playing with stuff, tweakin the tank, whatever

[Alice]

It's possible that some ich cysts came in on the coral's base rock and has infected the tank.

I think it's probably more likely that you've had a low-level ich outbreak going on since the fall, low enough where the fish might only show a spot or two, maybe an occasional scratch, that has gone undetected. If you were feeding garlic for the first outbreak, how long did you feed it after the fish quit showing symptoms? If you didn't feed it long enough (say 28-35 days) after they last showed symptoms, the ich could have been in the dormant stage for that long, with a few surviving, and have now built up to a large enough population that your fish are having a big outbreak.

If you're going to fight this in-tank, keep up the garlic feeding for 4 weeks after the last show of symptoms (do a search for Horge's article on garlic here on TRT) and when you do water changes, make sure you scrape down all the sides of the tank and as many other hard surfaces as you can to eliminate as many of the parasites dormant cysts as possible. You might also want to think of temporarily running a UV.

Good luck; ich is such a major pain

Alice

[TerryB10]

To start with ich is NOT present in all marine aquariums. That statement or opinion is contrary to scientific evidence. I see a reoccurrence of symptoms much more frequently when people treat with garlic rather than hyposalinity or copper.
You can prevent continuing this cycle by quarantining all new fish for a minimum of three weeks prior to adding them to the display. Stress does not cause ich it only makes the fish more likely to get a visable infection.
If you really want to get rid of it there are only two proven consistently reliable treatments: hyposalinity or copper. Either requires that you remove all the fish to another tank for treatment. You can use hypo right in the display if it doesn't contain inverts, live sand, or live rock. I recommend hyposalinity over copper because it has many advantages. You will need an accurate hydrometer (not a swing arm type) or refractometer. Keep an eye on the pH and alk daily. The treatment level is 16ppt salinity or less. I recommend 14ppt which translates to a specific gravity of about 1.009 depending on your water temperature.
Terry B

[dark horge]

Ya know...

I've seen an old article of mine repeatedly mis-cited in arguments about garlic as a treatment for cryptocaryosis.

Garlic shows promise, but until someone can get a decent handle on the actual processes involved in its action, and subsequently the dosage, it remains just promise.

If garlic works against Cryptocaryon irritans parasitizing fish, and there's a heck of a lot of evidence that it does, then we have to at least ask what it's doing to other protozoans in the tank, particularly the useful ones. Corals like to 'farm' protozoan snacks in their mucus, and these same living snacks act as a defense against disease, 'boxing out' against pathogens that might colonize the mucus (or keeping in check the populations of mucus-resident microorganisms that if allowed to ruyn rampant would turn pathogenic).

THEORETICALLY, if garlic effects shedding of the parasites from the fish, then continual treatment of ALL fishes in the tank might eventually starve the parasites. With no fishes to latch onto, the parasites will, in 14-72 days (length of time depending on who you listen to, and your level of paranoia)

The proven method for treating cryp (or ich if you like) is FW bath, hyposalinity, and isolation for ALL fish for 14-72 days. I think Terry has pretty much coverd that angle.




hth,
horge

[reiple]

I am not any kind of authority on this but for info....

Garlic has Allicin which is a natural antibiotic. Allicin fights and destroys a wide variety of microorganisms including colds, influenza, vaginal yeats infections and other afflictions in humans.

More importantly allicin keeps red blood cells from clumping too easily and this prevents potentially harmful blood clots.

Garlic also has Ajoene a compound released when garlic is chewed (aha! fresh against processed garlic oil!) and is believed to be good for preventing atherosclerosis (hardening of arteries).

Additionally garlic has selenium. Selenium is a cancer fighting compound, anti-oxidant, counteracts harmful oxidation processes.

Garlic also has Fructans, a carbohydrate based substance which may stmulate the immune system to protect against diseases.

Overall I think garlic is useful because of it's antibiotic, antioxidant and immune system effects. However since a majority of these substances are only released FROM FRESH GARLIC, it will be hard to make doses and maybe someone more scientic can take this up.

Otherwise it's really good for pasta.

[TerryB10]

For anyone that is interested I wrote an article in the March issue of Aquarium Fish Magazine about my thoughts on the use of garlic.
Terry B

[dark horge]

Terry,

Post a brief synopsis, thou niggard!!!
Not everyone has access to AFM, myself for one.

(Eh? What's that? There's a standing ban on commercial posts in TRT?
Is plugging for a magazine a commercial post? Hmmmm...)

[Jimbo]

In the past have had problems with the outbreak of cryptocaryosis. Garlic certainly can do the trick. It has helped a many tang. As far as negative effects. Well Horge makes several valid points. Some observations when using garlic is that almost all inhabitants of my tank would eat more aggressivly, even sps's polyp extension would be greater, but if the garlic is harming them maybe this is just a short lived observation. Have used extract from a big jar of garlic I bought from bi-mart. Soaked the nori in it over night. Funny that other fish that would not ordinarily eat the nori would eat the garlic soaked stuff. I only use garlic if something seems to be wrong with a fish.

Temp swings can be very hard on tangs and can be the leading problem with outbreaks of cryptocaryosis. Of course if you don't have them in your tank to begin with....

[Doug1]

I see no problem with the articles, just dont post the want ad pages