white spots on clown

[archimonde]

I have 2 False perc clowns, lately they have some white spots on the body.. the spots come and go within 1 day..

 

I am not sure if its ich or not but appearantly they both behave and eat like normal..

 

anyone experience in this?

[Physh1]

Sounds like ich to me but a very mild case. Check your temp fluctuations during a day. If it has huge swings that could cause it. Do some general tests to verfiy water quality. Have you had any tank problems lately?

 

Cameron

[archimonde]

I doubt there's something wrong w/ the water.. xenia looks really healthy and if anything goes wrong.. my xenia would be the first to show some signs... the weird thing is that white spots appear on the body and disappear in the same day... and it keeps doing that for 4 days now..

 

I am not too sure if that's ich or not..

[BKtomodachi]

Yeah, it can be ich thats battling with the clowns systems. For example, if you have a pH swing every morning, the clowns get a bit stressed and the spots can show up. Then they go away through the day...

[MillerLite]

I would go ahead and quarantine the fish. I had the same problem with my clown, eventually the ich stayed. I waited too long however to do the QT since the clown seemed to do Ok with it. In the afternoon like your fish, the ich went away. I would recommend QT'ing them now and placing them in the QT tank with copper sulfate. Treat them fora few days with this and then add carbon and do a water change when the ich has all left . You will need to keep the fish out of the tank however for 3-4 weeks to be sure all the ich in your reef has died without a host. I had to quarantine my clowns once before and this worked just fine.

[ifynanceu]

Try Using Kick Ich from Ruby Reef...Works Awesome and you don't have to remove the fish...Invert/Coral safe!!

[MillerLite]

Man, my spidey senses warn me of possible danger here in adding any type of medicine to the tank. Not totaly disagreeing with ify since I dont know anything about Ruby Reef and it very well could be reef safe. But I would look into this stuff before you add it, especially since you have such a small volume of water. In a much larger tank, maybe it wouldnt be such an issue since you can always reduce the dose and the solution will be diluted. But in small volumes, dosing tanks with medicine to prevent injury to your organisms can be very tricky. Do some research on this and see if anyone here or over at reef central has used it before adding? What is the active compone of Ruby reef that provides its medicinal qualities?

[ifynanceu]

I personally used it in my reef, that's the reason I suggested it...I guess I should have made that clear to prevent question. I had nothing but positive results and no loss of any sort. It is used in moderation over many days to insure that the ich is dead completely...

[zooyork0710]

i have a false perc and noticed a tiny white spot on his tail. its not spreading(so far). he's pretty healthy. ive only had him for about two weeks. water is good. he eats like a champ and his energy is great. any ideas? anything will help. thanks

[tdkarl]

ZooYork, Looks like you found some good info on your ich issue.

[ReefTankForMe]

I also have a clown that I think has Ich. It has one spot right now, on its side. The water tests fine. The fish is acting completely normal. Can it recover without treatment?

[archimonde]

yeah.. if the fish eats and behave normal.. you shouldnt worry about it too much..

 

ich on my clown is gone w/o any treatment..

[ReefTankForMe]

yeah. I will let it be for a week or so, then maybe try a freshwater dip

[BKtomodachi]

FW dips are only for the very experienced to do correctly.

 

Ich is in your system... and if your fish are healthy they can keep it off.

[ReefTankForMe]

I ran a carbon/floss cartridge for 3 days and the spot on the clown went away. So that is an easy cheap step for people to try.

[rnosal]

Here are some nice articles that might help everyone. Ick might seem to be gone from your fish but most likely still in your system. They have a very strange lifecycle, only one part of the lifecycle is visable, and sometimes thats even to late to save the fish.

 

http://www.marineaquariumadvice.com/aquari...ium_fish_1.html

http://www.marineaquariumadvice.com/aquari...ium_fish_2.html

http://www.marineaquariumadvice.com/aquari...ium_fish_3.html

http://www.marineaquariumadvice.com/aquari...ium_fish_4.html

http://www.marineaquariumadvice.com/aquari...ium_fish_5.html

[MicahD]

Hey, If they are still eating then i have the perfect salution, go to the supermarket buy some ginger root, grind up the root with blender or cheese greater, at it to there food and i garentee you will see results within 24 hours, mite take 3 days of feeding to completley heal but it works,

[MillerLite]

I agree with rnosal. For whatever reason, clowns seem to be able to continue to live for a while despite contracting ich. From the first signs of the disease however, I would recommend taking immediate action and not allowing it to progress. In my experience, clowns can often live with ich for several months. The reoccurence with ich seems to occur with decreasing water quality and upon a good water change, the symptoms seem to disappear. Eventually however the ich will spread to the internal sites of the fish making treatment very difficult if not impossible. The fish will most likely die from the disease eventually if not treated. The other downside to letting the disease continue without treatment is that now all of the other fish in your tank, and the fish you may wish to add to the tank, are now susceptible to the disease. These other fish may not be as hardy. The only sure way to rid your tank is to remove the host, basically all of the fish from the tank and allow the tank to go for 3-4 weeks without fish to be sure that all of the ich is gone. Of course, QT the fish and treat with any of a variety of ich treatments, my favorite being the copper sulfate.

 

One note however, I found my bicolor blenny to be exceptionally resistant to ich that killed my skunk clown. He has been living alone in the tank now after the clown died, for over 6 months and I have not observed a single spot of ich nor has he shown any change in behavior. It could be that this species may prove to be more resistant then even clowns.

 

Interesting...

[slickchick]

I have noticed that my clown has gotten a couple white spots when I am not keeping up with water changes. As soon as I do a water change, the next day the spots are gone. This is just a reminder of how important the water changes can be plus not jumping to medicate and do various other stress-inducing treatments at the first sign of trouble is important too. If I keep my tank in top condition, my fish are able to fight off disease naturally.

[nanojake]

We lost a clown over the weekend. I had noticed a couple of small white spots near the tail for about 10 days. They seemed to come and go like you all are describing, it was eating well and acting normally, so I thought everything would be OK. I was out of town over the weekend and my wife fed the fish - everything was fine on Friday. She said that the "tail looked pink" on Saturday night. Fishy was dead by noon on Sunday. All water params seemed to be in order. Does this sound like ich? The second clown looks 'fuzzy' to me. Should I get him out of there?

[archimonde]

nanojake,

you should get ur fish out asap and treat them with copper.

I've lost 1 of my clown fish and a royal gamma since I first posted this threat.. it was heart-broken to see my royal gamma died.

Usually healthy fish can fight off ich naturally, with cleaner shrimp, and garlic to boost up their immunity.. but its better to treat it in a QT tank before we feel sorry..