First post...and its the common ICH :/

[miamireefer]

HEy Folks,

Name is Nick. Well this is the 3rd board I am registered too and I seem to find so many differences of opinions on the same ole subject time and time again... So I say why not try and hear anothers perspective.

Heres the case:

90 fowlr- Current Occupants: gold striped maroon, 22" sfe

Well I decided to add another fish and knowing better about qt-ing I didn't.... I added a mimic tang and well you guessed it...I am assuming it was ich although it didn't stand out on his boddy...more like sprinkles. but not bulging off his body.. by the second day when I was going to attempt a QT I found him stuck to the overflow dead..yanked him immediately and I have done a 15% water change to avoid any possibility of an ammo spike and continued to monitor what affects if any would hit my maroon. Well he has nothing...visible at least....It's been 2 days now since the tang has been out and I have stil yet to see any affect on the fish..acting the same as usual as wellas the eel but the eel with as thick a coating it has is pretty impervious to any ich..99.9 % of the time.

Now my concern.....IS the ich always going to be in the tank or will it die off since I cannot host... I don't think when people say ich is in the tank forever becase its beneficial that they keep a host alive but how does a parasite have such intelligence to keep that 1 fish alive.. it's simple logic to me that it feeds until that host is dead and to search for another.. If I leave the fish in with no aother additions for about 6 weeks with the use of a uv and 15% water changes (whether they do anything or not other than replacing trace elements) can it be assumed the cycle was indeed broken?

For future I am going to setup a 15 long QT and get whatever fish I choose next to place in there and feed them to bring there health up and also give me a chance to view if something will indeed exist and if ich I will hypo.

Thanks guys and sorry if I am rambling in some parts of the story but this is the second time ICH has hit me...first time it wiped out 6 fishes totaling 300 dollars...definitely not pleased about it but again my fault...this time arund again my fault for knowing better but I didn't get nailed that bad.. both times involve a tang.... I love their beauty but hate their sensitivity and fact they are ich magnets.

Thanks again all,

Nick

[thesaent14]

nick i am miami drop me a pm with youre number ill give you the cure for that and if you can just type here the resepy i don't type much in inglish but youprobably can do it and help some one ells like it help me sice i am using the prep food i make i have not seeing ich in my tank


manny

[Stevej72]

Nick Welcome to TR

[miamireefer]

Thanks guys for the welcome..... but I see no one has any thoughts to share...


Manny whats up..It's Nick who you met the other night ...remember sold you a 29 gallon.... I have used the food you gave me and works great but remember that helps withthe immunity of a fishes system.

My question is geared towards fish that can avoid an infection and the possibility of remaining in the tank and the ick cycle being interrupted and die off since they cannot attach to a host..

I want to see what others think... And I have read steven pros articles as well but I have read others and again.. ALL mixed opinions and different results for different sudies conducted.. what a pita for such a common parasite.

[thesaent14]

lol wow i am burn man give me a call i am up now lol

[CarmieJo]

Hi Nick,

to TR. I have read that you can break the ich cycle. But everything I have read indicates in a tank without a host for at least 6 weeks. I've never read anything about with a fish in the tank. I just was reading something the other day that was really good. I will look and see if I can find it. If so I will post the link.

[CarmieJo]

Go here http://www.google.com/search?sourcei...aryon+irritans and then just follow the links for parts 1 - 5.

[miamireefer]

cool thanks for the link....currently at work but will read it at first chance.

[V]

Hey nick!

3 things we need to narrow are:

Was it Turbeularium, black specks coined "black ich" , which is a flatworm infection, black spots are irrations cause by the infection itself.

Was it Crypto Irratans, white spots coined "marine ich or white spot" which is a fast spreading parasitic infection.

Or was it Amyloodinium, a ruff textured infection of raised dots coined "marine velvet & gold dust" that spreads in the water column mainly!


I'll post up crypto since that what your inital thought was. Follow any links the guys give you to get a well rounded grasp, which i belive u have already, & if you believe its one of the others, drop in the request & i'll post them too!


Cryptocaryon irritans : This species is an obligate ectoparasite, which simply means that it needs a fish to be a parasite of, and a parasite is simply any organism that feeds or benefits from another plant or animal without giving anything back in return. This species of parasite takes one of four distinct forms as it goes through its life cycle. In an infected tank, each one of these forms are most likely present at any given time. If we can kill or stop any one of these forms, we can irradicate it from our tanks. The life cycle and time line of each stage:


1 : TOMONT STAGE: This is where the parasite forms a membrane while attached to the substrate and goes into its reproductive mode, this can take from 3 to 28 days depending on the temperature of the water.


2 : THERONT STAGE: This is where the newly hatched parasite is free swimming in the water and is looking for a fish to attach to. It only has between 24 to 48 hours to do so or else it will die.


3 : TROPHONT STAGE: This is the adult parasite which is attached to a fish and actively feeding and the one that we can visibly see on a fish. This stage lives from 3 to 7 days.


4 : TROPHONT FREE SWIMMING: This is where the parasite has dropped off of the fish and is free swimming within the water looking for a suitable place to attach to so that it can form itself into the Tomont or reproductive stage, which can take up to 18 hours.

HOW?

So now comes the obvious question, how did it get into my tank? Well, it was put in there by you. If you put a fish, some sand, rock, inverts, anything that came from an infected tank straight into your tank, including the water those things came home in, then you run an extremely high chance of adding it to your tank. Remember, all it takes is just one of any of the parasites stages to infect the tank. Even if the fish looks just fine, it could still be carrying the Trophont stage, the water it came home in could be carrying a free swimming stage, even certain inverts can be carrying a Tomont stage, as well as whats in the water free swimming. Sand and Rocks can carry the Tomont stage also. So now what are we supposed to do with that bag of water and the fish or sand/rock that we are so proudly holding? PUT IT IN A QUARANTINE TANK!!!! yes, even the sand and rocks, anything that came from another tank should be quarantined. Here is a link that will guide you in what is needed and how to set up and use a QT

TO LATE

Okay, you just found out the hard way, and now its too late, the parasite is in your tank, so now what? Well, now its time to kill the little commies. With the use of the quarantine tank that you are now going to go buy and set up, we can get rid of the parasites that are on the fish and those that are in your aquarium. This is going to be done with a two way attack, meaning that we must separate the fish from the aquarium by placing them into a quarantine tank. Yeah I know, its really hard to catch all the fish now, but to bad. It HAS to be done.

The reason it has to be done is that we are going to use the treatment method of hypo salinity, which means, the lowering of the salinity levels of the water that the fish are in, note that I said, that the fish are in. Which will be in the quarantine tank. You can not use this method on a reef tank with any inverts or corals in it. Dont worry, we will get to the tank itself in due time. Since the whole idea of our battle plan is to wipe out at least one stage of the parasites life cycle, we can attack the Trophont parasitic stage that are actually on the fish, not by direct attack on the adult parasite itself, but by making it impossible to complete its reproductive stage once it does drop off of the fish. This is done as I said, by placing ALL the fish into a quarantine tank and using a hypo salinity treatment. This link will explain exactly what to do when ALL the fish are in the quarantine tank, Hypo salinity solution.
NOTE: You must use a refractometer to ensure proper salinity level is reached and maintained. A hydrometer can be highly inaccurate which could, and most likely will allow this parasite to continue on. If you can not use or get a refractometer, then I would treat the tank with another treatment method such as copper while still having to leave the main tank fallow for six weeks as well. To make it easier to understand, I am going to list one by one, the steps needed to be rid of this parasite now that your tank is infected. Some of this will be a repeat of what I just said, but its worth it.

TREATMENT OF THE FISH

1. Set up and have ready your quarantine tank filled with your tank's water.
2. Catch and place ALL of your fish into the quarantine tank.
3. Adjust the salinity as per what you read in the hypo salinity article with the use of a refractometer, if one is not available, then treat the quarantine tank with a medicated / chemical treatment method.
4. What is happening to the parasite now that it is trapped in a tank with nothing but fish and a low salinity level. Over the course of the first week, most, if not all of the adult parasites that are on the fish will reach the stage where they must drop off of the fish and go into their reproductive stage. This is where we catch them with their pants down.



As the adults swim to the bottom of the tank and anchor themselves, they will form a membrane surrounding themselves in order to reproduce, which they do by division, much like a bacteria does. But the problem is, they are unable to do so at lowered salinity levels since they rely on the osmotic pressure difference (salinity differences) between normal sea water levels and what is formed within their membrane to pass what they need from the outside world through their membrane, in short, since the salinity levels within the membrane and outside the membrane are almost equal, there is no pressure difference to allow any transfer of liquids. In short, they smother to death and are unable to start their division process. They may even be totally unable to form a membrane to start with. With that done, we have broken their life cycle. No possible "babys" that can attach to the fish and start the cycle all over again.


5. If you add up the time of these cycles, you will note that the fish should be clear of the parasite in a little over a week. Are we now going to put the fish back?...NO!!!, to do so now would just infect the fish all over again. The parasite is still in your aquarium. So lets deal with that now. Actually you already have been dealing with that since you first removed the fish. Here is why:

TREATMENT OF THE AQUARIUM

1. This is the easy part. By having no fish in the tank, we can let the tank just go about its daily routine. we can feed the corals, and do our normal tank maintenance.
2. With no fish in the tank, any Tomonts that hatch will not have any fish to attach to and start feeding to grow into adults...........No fish = starving baby Ich.
3. The reason the tank must remain without fish for 6 weeks, is that the Tomont stage can take up to 28 days to hatch out, if it is a different species, it could take longer. With this being the longest stage of the parasite, it will take the longest to "cure". Note that I said 6 weeks and not 28 days. This is just being on the safe side. Why wait exactly 28 days only to find out the hard way that it may have taken a bit longer. Or that it may just well be a different species of this parasite.

Welcome to TR reef to dude!
This has been another public service announment brought to you in part, by the bubble gum on the bottom of your shoe.

[miamireefer]

ok...the stage at which it was showing on the tang if it was in fact ich was in the trophont stage.... now...this fish died on me Monday......

Ok I cannot perform a hypo at this time because I will be out of town for 3 days at the end of the month and definitely cannoit rely on the caretaker to look over the QT in my absence.....

Now my question is if I did decide to wing it with my clownfish and he makes it past 30-40 days in the display tank... can I assume the parasite is erradicated? or even after 72 days for that matter??? I ask because these tanks that are reported to have fought off ich and fish are not affected after months on in one would assume with the life cycle of ich that the reproduction within the tank would be so large in numbers that fish no matter how strong would succumb....

It's kinda why I am hesitant to hypo my clown fish... I do plan to qt every and all future purchases hands down... i can't deal with this crap anymore but it doesn't make sense to me when the ich cycle shoudl easily decimate a tank if not 1 month by the 3rd month.....

my tanks temp ranges with gradual fluctuations throughout the day between 80-82 max...... this should easily speed up the process and if its in fact ICh should infect my clown no matter how strong he/she is. I am not going to add anymore fish as to prove this because with just 1 fish in the tank (eel will not be affected with the slimecoat being so thick) that my clown would be affected at least by the end of one month...

Now....... if it was velvet which killed my tang....died in 48 hours remember which is about the right timeline for velvet to kill the infected fish iis it possible it wasn't able to host on my clown and be considered dead?? I aks because velvets lifecycle without a host is VERY short from what I have read.

Thanks for any and all who take the time to read and respond.

Nick

[Amphibious]

miamireefer, aka Nick,

to Talking Reef Community and Podcast.

HEy Folks,

Name is Nick. Well this is the 3rd board I am registered too and I seem to find so many differences of opinions on the same ole subject time and time again... So I say why not try and hear anothers perspective.

Well Nick you know the old saying, "Third time's a charm" TR consists of a great group of reefers willing to help and a true leader in Rob. Piranha's are not allowed to tear a poster apart.

ALL mixed opinions and different results for different sudies conducted.. what a pita for such a common parasite.

This is one of the problems = "A common parasite". Veriann did an excellent job of explaining how easy it is for us to introduce the little bast*%#@ into our aquariums. I'm really impressed with his post. Usually he speaks another language and is hard to understand but, when he wants to, he can be so eloquent. I'm proud of you V!

A UV Sterilizer, of the right size, will go a long way in helping to keep the free swimming Theront stage at a minimum. Veriann did such a good job explaining the rest of the cycle, there's no way I could improve on that.

Dick

[miamireefer]

Absolutley I agree the explanations or links have been great..Trust me I am not arguing the method in which to take but rather the stages at which ICH goes through and the fish that remain in the tank should succumb at some point to the parasite because of its ability to reproduce in mass quantities.... I would assume if they cannot reach the trophont stage after XX amount of days than its safe to say the cycle was broken and the ich is dead since it could not attach to a host.

ich is ich...its a killer nothing more .....its main function is to feed and if it cannot it starves and does nto have the ability to think or hld off from killing any other fish in the tank...i could be wrong but just seems like simple logic.

[miamireefer]

sooo..... I guess there is no definite answer.... I have read alot of this information before but I am looking for those who have gone through the experience of not hypoing... and in fact the fish have survived and one would have to assume the ICH is dead.. I just see it as simple logic.... but I could be wrong.

[V]

Taking into account the amount that makes it though the stages to actually infect the host makes the "causality rate" hard to predict. Using ways of speeding up the process & then starving them of hosting abilities can indeed create your desired outcome. Given the unspecified numbers already present its not hard to assume the gills and sounding areas are the first areas to be hit. Im also assuming by your comments your clown is yet to display any ill effects like lapsed breathing or side swiping rocks or glass. Which i feel your quest in pinpointing the pivital point in winning the war or correctly identifing the true nasty.

I would still make time for the hypo. At least then you have piece of mind outside of the battle zone to an emermy your still not sure on.

[miamireefer]

Veriann...EXACTLY.... the effects at which you would expect to see the clown or any fish for that matter have not occurred....if in fact what did kill my fish was ich... But your answer is what I have been looking to hear from someone....I have read literally countless articles but as stated I have seen people have ich infect their tanks kill off say 25% of their population but the remainder still live through the death and fish added later with no ill effects....

Sorry about the constant inquiries but it seems alot of others didn't provide the answer you gave me and makes me feel as if they are sticking to wha they read and the fact being it's the "right" thing to do not everyone follows that golden rule but still has success even after the fact of disaster previously happening. Again I am only saying this pending the outcome of my clown only for the reason of me leaving I am not performing the hypo to ensure nothing. I can only hope that these critters don't give me a rough time, but only time will tell.

Thanks again to everyone for their input and patience

[V]

So....what is your course of action? You say your leaving for a few days, do you have others in your area with the proper nouse that could perform these simple tasks till you get back!

It might also pay in future to keep numbers of a fish specialist handy, makes identifing easier even after the fact! Bag & tag it till you get back!

[V]

Arwww god no, no sticky for anything i post, im annoying enough remember guys & is it just my browser or is carmies post the sticky, cause its always at the top for me!

[CarmieJo]

We should make V's post a sticky. It is a GREAT explanation!

[dreams]

i know this is just anecdotal, but i have used ich-attack in my tank w/ success..i doubled the dosage to one dose in the morning and one in the evening because it only kills the free swimmers...and extended the treatment time past the recommended time

(side note:...i have heard that it will kill xenia & bubble anemomes)

[miamireefer]

done the meds before and was a total waste...imo....and the way I see it is I have to setup a QT regardless.... I did in fact notice a few spots on the head of my clown today. I desperately want to setup the QT and I may do so this weekend and get the clown in their to begin the hypo treatment.... I need a qt anyhow because I am not winging it anymore on future purchases... In a perfect world I would love to see a LFS who QT's there fish for an appropriate time before selling and I would be a customer to them for a lifetime but thats not the case and they wouldn't make any $$$ which seems to be the only interest most LFS's have anyhow.

I plan to use some of the filter floss that is in the display tank as well as the water so acclimation or bacteria in the water is not of concern. We'll see how it goes...

[miamireefer]

Veriann...can i get away with just qt-ing the clown and leaving the eel in the display tank?

[V]

wooha, hold the phone chief!
Using anything from the tank in my optinion is prob a big mistake, filter material & water included.Your introduction within the QT is via your fish, why would you risk introducing more. Clean old fashioned water changes are all thats needed.

Keeping in mind your talking about a clown here, not the most delicate of species known to man. If you dont have glass or acrylic QT dont sweat it, grab a clean bucket or use some other clean vessile that hasn't been exposed to chemicals. Acting quickly is your best chance at heading a problem off before it manifests itself futher.

As for the eel, your going to have to get an optinion from like likes of blub & others that keep things close to this. i have no experience in such things sorry!

[miamireefer]

wait up..i may have worded it incorrectly..

A QT no matter what needs to be cycled... I have NOT used any meds...i hate them...my post about meds was directed to the previous post.

A qt like any tank needs to be cycled but when needed quickly you need some form of bacteria.. This can be done soaking a piece of filter floss in your dt for a day or 2 or using a piece already in there. I can use the water from my dt which is already cycled (btw I am going to use a brand new 15gallon tank as a qt) and place it in the 15 even though I know it is infected with ich but the water column is still going to be in hypo.

Now as far as water changes go.... Do i have to personally measure the replacement water and adjust accordingly to match the 1.009? I am pretty in tune with what to do but want assurance I am doing it right...this will be first time keeping a qt/hypo.. I have a 75w heater and also emperor 400 which may be overkill but it's in my posession so might as well put it to use.

No going back to using clean water wouldn't I risk an ammonia spike since the qt wouldn'tt be cycled?

Thanks

Nick

[V]

This is not dirrected towards you, BUT why is the perception that you need to cycle a QT so strong these days, everyone can throw the "but what about the waste products building -up" come-on, we;re talking about one fish in this case. & simple water changes under the 'dillution banner' can combat that! drop some cycle in if your self preservation is worried about the bactera.
The whole purpose of a QT is the safe housing,treatment & identification of new edditions in an environment thats controlable, even after the fact, meaning you tear it down for cleaning everytime, hence your hard work to ensure your notion of bio-load ready is smashed and needs to be constantly re-established, futher more using the main to re-seed is like playing russian ruilet. Im no scientist, but thats seems like an act of futility to me!
Anyways the QT discussion can rage on, there are easy automation simple tricks than can be applied, even in hyo mode, all of which you can do by using abit of brain power to which u already own by the sounds of it!