captain7359 Posted November 13, 2003 Share Posted November 13, 2003 i have a clarkii clown and a zebra damsel and had a yellow tail damsel until it died today. last week the two damsels had white spots all over, the yellow tail having a worse case than the zebra and the clown showed no signs at all. i did my hw and assumed it to be ick and went to the reef shope and talked with the pro and he said that sometimes the spots are just natural as a result of the fish being stressed in the morning (that is the only time the spots were visible) but he said it may be ick. treated their food for the past week with garlic as a precaution and all has been fine. the day after i started treating was the last they had spots. it's been 4 or 5 days since the spots disappeared so i assumed all was fine until i came home tonight and the yellow tail was dead. now that i have that out of the way my question is if this comes back which i've heard it probally will is it safe to treat the whole tank with copper or some other medication. i have a fish only and don't plan on any inverts for a while(gotta love a college budget). i don't have a quarantine tank and can't afford to loose what i have spent in the past 2 months getting this going. can someone help me remedy this so it isn't a problem for the life of the tank. i plan on treaing with garlic weakly and have hear a big enough dose of garlic to the tank will kill some diseases(yes or no????) any and all suggestions would be appreciated as i'm learning my way. thanks:*( Link to comment
adinsxq Posted November 13, 2003 Share Posted November 13, 2003 tank temp? what is it? Link to comment
captain7359 Posted November 13, 2003 Author Share Posted November 13, 2003 tank temp is at 75 and is pretty steady. always between 74 and 76. Link to comment
Jeff D2 Posted November 29, 2003 Share Posted November 29, 2003 The Garlic doesn't really kill the parasite, It just makes the fish taste funny and increase there slime coat so they wont attach. So adding a bunch of Garlic to the tank would not do alot of good. With Ich I found the danger point is when all of the white dots seem to just go away overnight. A few days after this happens the parasite that dropped off, have there young ones and then your fish get a serious infection of the little buggers. From my experience rapid temperature change / water quality are the 2 main reasons for infection. There are tons of messages on this Forum, read threw all of em to get a bit better idea of possible fixes for your problem. hth Jeff Link to comment
fawkes027 Posted November 30, 2003 Share Posted November 30, 2003 If at some point you do plan on having inverts - do NOT use copper. It gets in your substrate..your rocks...the seals on your tank (if you have them). Link to comment
captain7359 Posted November 30, 2003 Author Share Posted November 30, 2003 thanks. did some hw and figured my plan of attack. i've been using the garlic as a preventitive and also figurted out that my blue and yellow tangs have a fungus infection(which killed the blue this morning) so i went to the lfs and got ruby reef and am in the process of doing a diy uv sterilizer. the uv should kill all the bugs from now on out so hopefully all wil be good. Link to comment
fawkes027 Posted November 30, 2003 Share Posted November 30, 2003 Good luck. I'm battling Ich right now myself. I tried garlic with no relief to the fish. So I've transplanted them into a hospital tank and am using cupramine. Link to comment
captain7359 Posted November 30, 2003 Author Share Posted November 30, 2003 i'm using garlic elixr and it has seemed to work on my clown and zebra damsel, they've been fine through the last 2 outbreaks with no signs. i don't think the tang's had been on it long enough for it to work before they got hit. i feed it once or twice a week on mysis shrimp and 3-5 days straight when i get new arrivals. make sure you let it set for 30-40 min on the food or it doesn't help. the ruby reef i put in yesterday didn't kill my shrimp or anything else so far. teh fungus looks like it might be getting a little better but i gotta wait a week before it's gone to really see. i think it's ruby reef that makes kick ick. don't know how much good has been said about this but it might be worth looking into. Link to comment
brahm Posted November 30, 2003 Share Posted November 30, 2003 I had this problem a little while ago and front what I heard, most of the "reef safe" ich relief stuff is worthless, The only way to go is hyposalinity or copper using cupramine. I tried anther product a and had terrible results (lost my box fish). Check out the disease treatment section on Reefcentral there is a guy atj who swears by hypsosalinity and has been doing this for dozens of years. Link to comment
captain7359 Posted December 1, 2003 Author Share Posted December 1, 2003 did you have any luck with the hypo salinity. i heard that stersses the fish out even worse than any treatment?? i didn't bother with the kick ick stuff as i am getting a uv unit shortly, but if the hypo works i could use that till i get the uv. Link to comment
fawkes027 Posted December 1, 2003 Share Posted December 1, 2003 hyposalinity doesn't stress the fish. It actually makes it easier for them breathe as they're not struggling to keep the salt balanced in their bodies versus the water outside. You can stress them however, by raising the salinity too fast after treating them. Link to comment
captain7359 Posted December 1, 2003 Author Share Posted December 1, 2003 how long do you take to adjust the salinity and how far do you drop it. do you have to hold it low for the 6 weeks they say it takes to get rid of ick or does it kill them as you drop the salinity. Link to comment
fawkes027 Posted December 1, 2003 Share Posted December 1, 2003 You need to take a day or two to drop the salinity. It needs to be at 1.009 to kill the Ich. And yes, it needs to stay that way for 30 days. Then you gradually bring it back up to normal over the course of a few days. Link to comment
fawkes027 Posted December 1, 2003 Share Posted December 1, 2003 Make sure when you're doing hyposalnity that you monitor the pH closely and keep it at it's "norm". Link to comment
captain7359 Posted December 1, 2003 Author Share Posted December 1, 2003 is it safe to add new fish in that time or hold off till all is done and over. what about shrimp and other stuff besides fish. are they going to be safe during this time?? Link to comment
fawkes027 Posted December 1, 2003 Share Posted December 1, 2003 You can not do hyposalinity in your main tank. It will kill inverts as well as damage your LR. If you plan on adding a new fish, I'd say do it right before you begin. Otherwise you risk infecting the fish again and having to start the 30 day treatment all over again. Link to comment
captain7359 Posted December 1, 2003 Author Share Posted December 1, 2003 how do i adjust the ph and what is the norm. should i aim to keep it where it is at now or is there an optimal point to keep it. i've heard about adding baking soda or powder to buffer teh ph or keep it up in the tank. is this a good idea and if it is which do i use and how much. Link to comment
fawkes027 Posted December 1, 2003 Share Posted December 1, 2003 You need to keep the pH stable at around 8.2-8.4. You can use baking soda to buffer the water however I don't know how much is required. I do know that it's not a lot. If you add too much baking soda, you can always add a little vinegar to neutralize it a little. Link to comment
captain7359 Posted December 1, 2003 Author Share Posted December 1, 2003 guess i gotta wait untill i get the uv unit done because i don't have a hospital tank. thanks alot guys. Link to comment
captain7359 Posted December 1, 2003 Author Share Posted December 1, 2003 thanks gonna need it.:*( Link to comment
brahm Posted December 1, 2003 Share Posted December 1, 2003 I've read uv unit's do not work well. They way ich works is there are 3 stages, on the fish, in the water, and in the sand.. The UV filter is only good if it can get enough flow and the water is passed through with the parasite is falling from the fish to the sand. UV filters from what I understand are only really good for stopping huge outbreaks as apposed to ridding rich from your tank. Check out these links below might be of some help http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.p...threadid=167243 http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/nov...3/Editorial.htm http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-10/sp/f...ature/index.htm http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-08/sp/index.htm Link to comment
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