my dottyback has ick

[Metznreef]

i added a perc about a month ago and it died like 2 days later. ever since then my dottyback has been having ick on and off and he has it pretty bad now. before i added the perc he never had it though. i have checked mt water many times and everything is great. my corals all look great and i don't think it's water quality. are there any reef safe ick medications?

[Salim]

I heard of a garlic based additive that is reef safe but It doesn't look like I saved the url. I'm sure a search here will come up with something on it.

 

Salim -912 days to go.

[spoondigity]

Most LFS's will carry a garlic substance that you can use to supposedly boost the immune systems of your fish when they are sick. I have heard positive remarks about this. You can up your tank temp slightly to increase the life/reproductive cycle of the ich and this is supposed to kill them off faster. Also, very slowly reducing your salinity can help to kill it off but all of these options you would want to ask your LFS about regarding what your specific corals and fish can tolerate. The very best option is to transfer the fish to a hospital tank where it can be medicated (i.e. coppering the water) and/or the other things I listed can be done without worrying about them effecting the rest of the life in your main tank. A warning on this, don't copper your primary tank whatever you do. Not that this helps your current situation, but in the future you may consider having a hospital tank and any new fish that you buy can spend 2 weeks to a month in that tank under supervisioin before moving to main display. This will hopefully prevent diseases from making it to your primary tank. Finally, if all of your fish end up dying off in your primary tank from ich, DO NOT put anymore fish in the tank for a month. This is the standard cycle time most consider needed to let all ich eggs die off in the tank.

 

Hope you can save the little guy!

[sjpresley]

I have added garlic to my fishes food (both dried nori and to frozen stuff) before offering it. The garlic doesn't actully boost the fishes' immune system. It does stimulate the fish to produce a thicker mucus layer which makes it harder for ich larvae to attach to the fish.

 

I found a number of adds on the internet for "reef safe" remedies. I investigated many and e-mailed "experts" that had used a number of them. I posted a long message about it months ago. I bought a product called marine-max which has two components (anti-oxidents and disease preventing probiotics) neither of which is medicinal/chemical in nature and it will not harm and inverts. I used it and noticed in just a couple days the number of ich spots on my angel (Centropyge flavicauda) had dwindled to a couple on the fins. Within a week it was gone and it has been now for months with no reappearance. My fish never had it bad. It seemed to be more a factor of stress from his introduction into my reef.

 

A few notes. DO NOT BUY KICK ICK. It just makes your fish sicker so that they are not suitable hosts for the parasite. Usually, the Kick Ick kills your fish before the ich would have. [i haven't used it, but asked a number of people and never even heard a rumor that it worked even once.]

 

Don't raise the temperature of your tank. That will stress a bunch of other animals much more than the ich. Besides, if you aren't using something sure to kill the ich, all you are doing is helping it breed faster. Don't lower the salinity if it is in an invert tank. That will stress/kill many more animals than the fish and ich requires a much lower salinity to die than most inverts. People try these things to feel like they are doing something. And they are doing something, stressing everything in their tank (even making other fishes more susceptible to ich) and probably converting a small problem into a disaster. If your fish is hardy and your tank in good shape there is a good chance he will be fine with a little help from either garlic additives (try to get this absorbed in the food for max benefit) or something like marine-max or reef-vital DNA (which has been proported by many to help clear up minor ich cases).

 

Good luck.

[reefguru21]

I find that Kent's garlic X-tract is the safest way to controll ich or ick in a reef system. Don't usecopper-based medications they can destroy the tank. Do partial water changes for about 2-4 weeks and reduce the amount of light and period that the lights are on because ick need light to reproduce quickly. also fresh water baths might help as a last resort. I would first try the garlic supplements. Good luck dottybacks are really great reef fish.