sorry, but another ick question

[kpatrick]

I know this question has been answered several times before but I havent had an outbreak of ick in two years so I havent really paid much attention to it in the past. I added my Hippo tank to my tank yesterday after being in the corenteen tank for a couple weeks and now it looks like he has come down with a pretty good case of ick. I checked water conditions and the alk was a little high but everything is was in check. I tried a fresh water dip on him last night and first thing this morning but the spots havent "popped" (I was always told they should immed. pop if you do a dip) This morning I looked around the tank and it looks like 2 of my PErcula clowns have a couple spots on them now. I have added garlic to their food to help boost their immune sytems (i know some people say garlic doesnt work) but what is the fasted, safest way to get rid of ick before my tank crashes. I do have some inverts so i dont want any copper treatments.


Thanks in advance!!

[kreblak]

With SW Ich (AKA "White Spot"), there is no fast method for getting rid of the disease. You are dealing with a parasite that has an extended life cycle consisting of four phases, and it is vulnerable to medication only during one of them. So that you may know your enemy, here is how SW Ich works:

1. It begins as a microscopic, free swimming, ciliated, protozoan that must find a host. Once it does find a host fish, it attaches and become parasitic, leeching nutrients from the fish. Ich's favorite places to attach are the gills, fins, and body.

2. Once the parasite has fed sufficiently, it encysts, forming the characteristic white spot. During this phase it matures.

3. Once the encysted parasite has matured, it drops off the fish, leaving an open wound succeptible to infection, and falls to the substrate. There it remains encysted, but begins to divide into 200 to 600 new protozoan parasites. It then ruptures....

4. The newly hatched protozoans now have 18 hours to find a host or die trying. In an aquarium, the odds of the finding a host skyrocket compared to in the wild due to the enclosed space.

The entire life cycle can take anywhere from two to six weeks, and is dependant on water temperature. Now that you know the life cycle, you can treat for Ich. Ich is vulnerable to medication ONLY during the free swimming phase. There are two medications that I know of that may be used with invertabrates in the tank. The first is NO-ICH MARINE and is available from www.drsfostersmith.com I have used this personally with phenomenal results. The second is KICK ICH from Ruby Reef. I have not used it, but many others have with excellent results. The important thing to remember during treatment is to continue treatments for at least 3 weeks after you can no longer see any symptoms of Ich. All it takes is ONE of the little buggers to start the cycle all over again, and one becomes two hundred very quickly!

As far as garlic goes, some say it works, some say it doesn't. Corax suggested it to me, I tried it, and I say it works. I soak frozen Ocean Nutrition cubes in garlic juice before feeding. Even if it doesn't work, the fish like the taste, so what's the harm?

Now, you mentioned FW dips. FW dips will work on the encysted Ich, but it isn't instant, and it doesn't cause "popping." What happens is that the encysted parasite is less able to regulate water loss and/or intake than is the fish. The FW dips causes the parasite to begin absorbing water rapidly, and it unattaches as a result. This is hard on the fish too, however, and if the fish has been in the FW for more than three minutes, and there have been no results, remove him before he begins to stress.

There are also a variety of natural cleaner species that will eat the white spots. Neon gobies and cleaner shrimp will both do a good job ridding a fish of encysted Ich.

I have combated Ich with all of the above. Quarantine tanks work best, but when the show tank becomes infected you should attack from all fronts. Get some medication, get a cleaner shrimp, and use FW dips sparingly. Ich is curable, you just have to be vigilant and patient. Inspect your fish often, and remember to continue treatment after Ich is no longer visible...I cannot stress that enough. Good Luck! ;)

[kpatrick]

thx for the reply!!
I have a cleaner shrimp and so far he doesnt seem to do much yet. I will continue to use garlic and I will try to locate the medication you suggested as well. My fear is that by the time I get home from work today the Hippo tang will already be dead. I havent had an ich out break forever but if I remember right, last time my fish died pretty quickly of it (2 days or so). I plan on getting more cleaner shrimp as well but I had to wait until I removed some of my other agressive fish out of the tank which I just did a couple days ago. should I hold off on other shrimp until the ick is gone or are they ok to add while I am medicating the tank???

[kreblak]

SW Ich usually does not kill inside of two days. My Ich outbreak lasted for about 6 weeks (I treated for 9 weeks), and my fish had many visible cysts during the first week, but there were no fatalities. You may have Velvet (AKA Coral reef Disease, Oodinium). Do the fish appear to have individual white spots, about the size of a pinhead, visible primarily on the fins? That is the appearance of Ich. If they appear to be "dusted" with small whitish-gold flecks, then you have Velvet. They look and behave incredibly similar, but Velvet kills much more quickly. No-Ich Marine states on the container that is was designed to treat both SW Ich and Velvet, but I have only used it for Ich. I know that Drs. Foster and Smith's website offers express shipping so that you can order today and have the medication by Wednesday.

About the shrimp, they are not a cure, but they do help. If they remove even one cyst from a fish, then that is 200 or so fewer free swimmers you will have to kill later. Cleaner shrimp take a little while to get settled in and set up a cleaning station, but once they do, they will be a great help. My shrimp had his little area staked out within a day, and was cleaning fish after a few days. Plus, the parasites cannot host on an invertabrate, making them all the more useful to you.

Just be careful with your fish, and don't panic. I forget who posted about this, but someone recently paniced when they saw white spots, and immediately did a FW dip. However, in the panic, this person forgot to dechlorinate the FW and to match the temperature to the tank's. The fish died from shock, and/or chlorine poisoning within a day. Write back frequently with questions, that's what we're here for!

[kreblak]

Oh, it is also important for your fish to have as stress-free an environment as you are able to provide. Their immune systems are going to need all the help they can get to combat the disease. Make sure your water parameters are good, and don't over dip the fish in FW. If it stresses the fish too much, than you are doing more harm than good.

[kpatrick]

Luckily I didnt freak too bad and remembered to remove the chlorine! ha
I did not plan on doing anymore FW dips. I talked to another guy at the LFS that has a tang tank in his owm home and he also said not to worry to much that usually the Hippo tangs will get ick when first put into the tank but it goes away after awhile. He suggested no meds or dips but just use the garlic to boost the immune. I dont have a problem buying the meds and using them as long as I know for sure they are reef safe and wont hurt any of my inverts. ( i hate to find out a year from now that I cant get some corals because of a med I used). I planned on getting 3 fire shrimp and 3 more cleaner shrimp (4 cleaners total) what would you recommend for a 125 gallon setup????

[kpatrick]

by the way, water test good. alk is a little high but I just added some calcuim so hopefully it will drop the alk. besides that, everything should be pretty much stress free

[kreblak]

I used NO-ICH MARINE for nine weeks with no harmful effects on my invertabrates. I have several turbo snials, an army of scarlett and blue legged hermit crabs, a cleaner shrimp, several feather dusters, and various tube worms that came in on my live rock. All of them did just fine during treatment, and stayed that way afterwards. I was even using higher than recommended dosages.

As for he guy at the LFS, some people choose not to treat their tanks for Ich. They choose to accept Ich as a part of their ecosystem. That is all well and good, but be warned, even if Ich isn't visible on your fish, it is present in the tank if you don't kill it off. The life cycle will continue, kept in check only by the fishs' immune systems and slime coats. This is what leads to "spontaneous Ich," where a tank that has been healthy for months (or years) suddenly has an Ich outbreak. This is also what leads people to believe that Ich is always present in a tank. Ich is a parasite, and cannot survive without a host. It must be introduced into an aquarium for it to be present. Likewise, if it is eradicated, it cannot come back unless it is reintroduced to the tank.

Often times people choose not to treat Ich with medication because copper is the most effective med against it. Copper is also extremely poisonous to invertabrates and corals in the higher concentrations needed for Ich treatment. You are definately justified in your concern over not being able to have corals in the future because of medications used today. Copper will build up in the tank, and may be poisonous down the road. To my knowledge, NO-ICH Marine and KICK ICH will not harm invertabrates.

Ultimately, the choice is yours. If you choose not to treat, your fish may very well recover and your tank may appear healthy. I can say with a high degree of certainty, though, that at some point in the future, you will see Ich again. If you choose to treat, you run the risk of harming invertabrates in the tank.

I'll leave with this: I have seen no ill effects from NO-ICH Marine. I know I sound like a commercial, but it worked for me, and it worked well. My invets are fine. It is entirely possible that at some point in the future it will be discovered that the active ingredient in NO-ICH is poisonous. Regardless, it is my opinion that it is better to have an Ich free tank than to risk losing your livestock.

[kreblak]

I planned on getting 3 fire shrimp and 3 more cleaner shrimp (4 cleaners total) what would you recommend for a 125 gallon setup????

In a 125 you can have as many as you can afford. Your tank size shouldn't pose any space limitations. I would like a fire shrimp myself. :D Perhaps someday soon....

[kreblak]

There is acutally another alternative for you if you are worried about medication in the show tank: remove the fish from the show tank and treat them all in a quarantine tank with whatever medicine you wish. Let the Ich in the show tank starve to death. Without fish, Ich will die. There is no debate on that fact. What there is debate on, though, is how long Ich can survive without fish. From what I have read, three weeks without fish in a 78* or more tank sould wipe out the infestation.

[kpatrick]

I looked into the meds you used and it comes in a one liter container, if you treated your tank for 5 weeks how many containers did it take???

[kreblak]

The recommended dosage is 2 fluid ounces of NO-ICH per 25 gallons of water. That dose is good for three days before it biodegrades. I have a 46 gallon tank, and was therefore dosing 4 fluid ounces of No-Ich every three days. At that rate, one liter was lasting me roughly a month. I believe that you can get a two liter bottle of it as well. For your 125, you will need that much!

Oh, and I treated for nine weeks, not five.;)