I THINK I HAVE ICH!!!!

[awigpot]

My new chocolate tang has these 4 white dots on it's head that protrude outwards. thinking it is ich........so how do i treat it with a reef tank. I have heard that you treat with a cooper based med but can't use it is you have a reef tank.......help!!!!! anybody have a no fail treatment that has worked for them???

amanda

 

[JennM]

If it's only 4 dots, do not panic.

If you can, get a cleaner shrimp (not a good idea if you have any large wrasses, hawkfishes or other fish that prey on ornamental shrimp...). A cleaner will usually take care of a few spots.

Enrich the fish's food with garlic and/or vitamin C. You can get commercial preparations for this, or some use Kyloic garlic liquid gels available at GNC. For the vitamin C I'd use a commercial preparation. Thinking behind this is that it boosts the fish's immune system and possibly repels the parasite.

DO NOT TREAT YOUR DISPLAY with copper meds - you will ruin your tank.

If the fish does not clear up in a couple of days, you may wish to consider a freshwater bath for the fish, 5 minutes in fresh RO or distilled water, to kill the parasites on the skin. Once per day for 5 minutes, until symptoms clear.

If it gets way worse, you might want to consider treating the fish in a hospital tank. Copper is a harsh medicine, but when it is indicated we use Cupramine by Seachem. Again - this does NOT go into your reef tank, but into a hospital tank. Watch water parameters carefully and do test for the concentration of copper with a test kit that will register the type of copper you use. This method should only be used as a last resort.

The best prevention for ectoparasites and disease are good water quality, good diet and low stress. Since you mentioned the fish is new, it probably became infested as a result of the stress and trauma of moving to your tank.

Hope this helps,

Jenn

 

[Terry B]

Cleaner shrimp will not cure ich! I have seen plenty of tanks with both cleaner shrimp and cleaner wrasse completely overrun with ich.

Feeding the fish vitamins and garlic certainly won’t hurt anything, but it is far from a reliable cure. Cupramine is by far the best copper-based medication available. However, hyposalinity is safer and every bit as effective.

The best prevention is to quarantine every fish BEFORE it goes into the display. Good water quality, a varied diet and a low stress environment are all important to fish, but they will not prevent fish from getting ich. Fish don’t get infected unless the parasite is in the aquarium. They don’t have to be stressed to get ich.

Do yourself a favor and learn about quarantine and hyposalinity!
Terry B

 

[JennM]

I suppose cure is a relative term. I believe that ich (and other bacteria and fungi and parasites) are present in all systems (or their potential is in all systems), and all they are waiting for is an opportunity.

These things live on, in the fish themselves, as well as dormant in rock and substrate. You'd need a completely sterile tank to eliminate the possibility.

It's like people and germs - they are all out there, we are exposed to all kinds of pathogens daily, but if we are in good health, well rested and eat a healthy balanced diet, we'll manage to fend off most afflictions. Ditto with the fish.

IMO there is no "cure" per se, only keeping the pathogens under control to the point where the fish can exist free of infestation.

Jenn

 

[Terry B]

Sorry to disagree Jenn, but your thoughts here are contrary to all scientific evidence. Yes, there are pathogens which do probably exist in all cycled aquariums. This would include vibrio species of bacteria. However, you cannot classify all potential pathogens as sharing the same behavior or mode of transmission, because they do NOT. Cryptocaryon irritans has been more than well studied and it has been repeatedly shown that it has to be introduced and can be eradicated from a system. It does not spontaneously appear or somehow mystically exist deep inside the fish waiting for the right moment to strick. Ich is an obligate parasite. This means that it does not feed on anything other than live fish and it cannot complete its life cycle without a host fish for the trophont stage of the parasite.
Stress and diet have nothing to do with preventing infection with this external parasite. If fish are not in good health then they may not recover but all teleost fish are susceptible to infection. A fish cannot develop acquired immunity to an infection without first being infected. Ich has little in common with the behavior of a virus.
There are clinically proven cures that do eradicate ich so there are cures. It is also known that the parasite can be starved out of a system if all fish (source of food) are removed. Usually 30 days is long enough.
If you are willing to let go of the myths and misconceptions and get some real knowledge of Cryptocaryon irritans then I would be happy to suggest where you can find some scientific journals to read on the subject.
HTH,
Terry B

 

[Anonymous]

To succinctly answer the poster's question, no, it cannot be safely treated in a reef tank.

 

[the Wizard]

I have a sailfin tang that has developed several tiny white dots on both sides. They are very very small, and almost appear to be bubbles, if that makes any sense? You guys think this is ich? He seems to be fine so far, although he is hiding a bit more than usual.

 

[Anonymous]

I have treated ich with good results with freshwater dips. I adjust the pH of RO water with baking soda to match the tank, as well as temperature. I then add enough tank water to bring the salinity up to 1.005 to 1.010. I do this in a large glass bowl with a plexi lid. I go 10 minutes but you need to watch the fish. The sooner the better for this treatment. I then repeat every other day until gone.

Regards, Eric

 

[TheZooFarmer]

It is nearly impossible to treat that tang once it has ick, well in a 55 gallon tank that is. The Tang will most likely be stressed to no ends until the ick kills it.

How can you come on this board and ask for advice but not follow any of it? No Tang deserves to be housed in a 55 gallon tank. Especially a chocolate tang that is over 4" in size.

And do you know why you rarely see a chocolate tang offered for sale in LFSs? Because they have an extremely high mortality rate. And I am not talking when the customer brings the fish him, most all of these fish die in the LFS.

So maybe this thread should stop treating the symptom and instead treat the cause.

 

[Anonymous]

The only tang I know of called the chocolate tang is the mimic tang, which is quite hardy in my experience. Is it that fish?

the Wizard- I have had scares in my tank where a fish is suddenly covered in white spots, and then I look a few hours later and they are all gone. I think whats happening is they are going thru some passageway in the rock where there are a lot of vermetids with their mucus strands holding detritus or bubbles extended, and the fish swins thru them and the stuff adheres to its sides. My best guess, anyway.

 

[Anonymous]

I'm with Terry on this one. You can surely eradicate ich in any tank and you can certainly cure any fish of it. You must fight a two front war though. The only way to rid the reef of ich is to remove ALL fish for at least 30 days. I looked at an empty tank for almost two months to be certain.

The fish will benefit from freshwater dips, temp and pH adjusted. The low salinity dips at 1.005-1.010 might harm some of the parasites, but IMO those dips will not kill all of the ich on the fish. Freshwater will shock the parasites to death. At least 5 minutes...any less is worthless.

Once the fish is in QT, it should be able to take an SG of 1.010 or even a hair less. My QT is just below 1.010 with two clowns and they are great. This is much safer for a tang than copper, which will kill off the bacteria in its gut that helps digest veggie matter. However, this treatment will not kill ich on the fish, it will only kill the free swimming ich and prevent the developement of cysts on the tank bottom.

Bottom line...If ich is in the tank, then any little stress will cause an outbreak...If no ich is in the tank, then all the stress in the world might kill the fish, but it won't create ich that isn't there.

Terry, have you read that ich CAN lie dormant on the fish itself for a period of a few weeks? The theory (tested in a "real" study) is that the parasite wants to feed on the host for as long as it can before braving the deep to reproduce. If the fish becomes stressed, the ich senses that the fish is under stress and tried to hurry up and get off ASAP before the fish dies. So a fish can look normal but have many hidden parasites. I have seen this happen when a fish in a sterile system became covered in spots a few days after introduction. It brought the ich with it, unseen, and then the stress of QT brought it all out at once.

Manny

 

[Anonymous]

Manny, I generally agree, except with the length of time to leave a tank fallow. 6 weeks is the bare minimum I would allow, 8 are far better (with a slightly elevated temperature to speed up lifecycle).

Also, you and I agree absolutely on the issue of stress bringing about "unseen" parasitic infections. It is my firm belief that we would do better to create a situation in which the animal, as in nature, is most able to fight off ALL infection (not just that of C. irritans), rather than try to keep our systems free of this specific pathogen.

gk, spot on with the f/w dips, too, though there are many who feel that this is too stressful. Hyposalinity will do wonders, and in the case of Amyloodinium, f/w dipping is one of your most powerful tools.

 

[cdeakle]

Zoofarmer,

Her total tank volume is 75 gallons and I have found more than one reputable source (liveaquaria.com)that recomends 70 gallons as a tank minimum. I'm sure that he would like more swimming area just like I would like a bigger apartment but its more than livable.

Try answering questions without being so negative for you one day I'm sure might need some assistance from the rest of us.

 

[Anonymous]

True, she is trying to cure the tang, not asking if it's the right fish for her tank. I think some aquarists get a bit wrapped up in making sure a fish has the "ideal" environment. IMO the tank is too small for him, but livable, especially now, while he is small. However, the stress of living in too small a tank might cause problems down the road with disease and aggression.

FYI 420puff (great name by the way :wink: ), the 75 ish gallon rule and up for most tangs is a tank size consideration. You wouldn't house him in a 20 gallon tank, even if you had a 200 gallon sump in the next room...see my point?

Manny

 

[TheZooFarmer]

Good post manny. But are you calling a 4"- 4.5" Tang small? I consider a 4.5" Tang to be a average or medium sized fish

 

[Anonymous]

Thank you Zoofarmer. By "small" I mean small in a relative sense. It may be a tad cramped now, but give him two more inches and he will be pacing that 55 like a caged tiger. FYI, I only know what I have read about this hobby (albeit a great deal and I might know more than some 5 year reef keepers :wink: ) because I've only kept an aquarium for 6 months. So I find out new things every day. I thought this fish grew a few inches more than 4 and the 75-100 gallon minimum is based on maximum length. It's only logic, and not experience, that leads to the conclusion that a 4" tang is ok in a 55, but will be cramped in it when it reaches a larger size.

Manny

 

[TheZooFarmer]

Manny you are on the right track. I too used to read the hell out of these boards before I jumped into this hobby. This is why I am so passionate about putting out good information and correcting bad information.

But keep in mind you can not rid a fish or a tank of ick if the fish remains stressed and its slime coat remains depleted. As long as the fish is stressed the ick will continue to live and breed. Sure copper and fresh water dips can and will help. But if you return the fish to the same stressful environment you just lowered the fish's chance of survival by 50%.

And what most people do not understand is what copper and freshwater dips actually do. I will try and post a very simple explanation.

Freshwater dips or lowering the salinity. The density of the water is so low that the ick parasite explodes. The only problem is that now you have a fish with hundreds if not more open wounds where the parasite once was.

Copper causes the fish to produce a slim coat in such an amount where the ick parasite can not latch onto the fish. But the dormant ick in the sandbed has not been killed so if you return the fish to the same stressful environment it will get ick again.

If you ask any reputable source in the hobby they will tell you that ick does not kill healthy fish. Not only does ick not kill healthy fish, healthy fish do not even get ick. Ick is brought on by any number of factors all which are induced by stress.

I hope this information finds its way to people that need it.

Jack

 

[Anonymous]

The Chocolate tang is probably Acanthurus pyroferus, which mimics Centropyge angels while a juvenile. Maximum size is 9.8", and the minimum suggested tank size, according to Scott Michael, is 75 gallons.

I don't understand where you guys are getting the 55 gallon tank number, am I missing her tank specs somewhere?

 

[Terry B]

TheZooFarmer,
I know that your intentions are good, but you are promulgating some false notions about Cryptocaryon irritans. I suspect that you are repeating something you have read or heard someone else say. I am going to comment on what you said here.

“But keep in mind you can not rid a fish or a tank of ick if the fish remains stressed and its slime coat remains depleted. As long as the fish is stressed the ick will continue to live and breed.”

It is not that simple. Completely healthy fish that are not unduly stressed can and do get infected with ich. This has been proven repeatedly when they infect fish for the purpose of studying Cryptocaryon irritans and reporting the results in scientific journals. Treatments (i.e copper or hyposalinity) that interrupt the life cycle of ich will eliminate it from the fish regardless of the stress level of the fish. Even the healthiest fish can become infected. Fish cannot develop acquired immunity to a pathogen without first becoming infected. Sometimes fish do develop some level of immunity after surviving an infection, but this is not often full immunity.

“Freshwater dips or lowering the salinity. The density of the water is so low that the ick parasite explodes. The only problem is that now you have a fish with hundreds if not more open wounds where the parasite once was.

We really should separate freshwater dips from hyposalinity therapy as they are two distinctly different treatments. FW dips are ineffective for the most part because attached trophonts (attached parasitic stage) are imbedded under a layer of skin. I think some trophonts which have not yet become deeply imbedded can be removed. However, freshwater dips are not effective for curing ich. One trial determined that troponts were undisturbed after the host fish was in freshwater for 18 hours! The trophonts later matured, fell off of the fish and reproduced.

On the other hand, tomonts (the reproductive stage off of the fish that attaches to the sand and rock) are destroyed in a salinity (not to be confused with specific gravity) of 10ppt after three hours. This is how hyposalinity therapy works. The fish are treated for three weeks so that all stages of the parasite develop to the tomont stage where they are destroyed by hyposaline conditions.
Frehswater will cause tomonts to “explode” if you will, but it does not do this to attached trophonts. I seriously doubt that a freshwater dip is going to leave hundreds of open wounds when attached trophonts explode.

“If you ask any reputable source in the hobby they will tell you that ick does not kill healthy fish. Not only does ick not kill healthy fish, healthy fish do not even get ick. Ick is brought on by any number of factors all which are induced by stress.”

This is simply not true at all. Cryptocaryon irritans does infect perfectly healthy fish often enough and it certainly can kill them. Some may survive IF they are able to develop enough of a acquired immunity. This is generally not the case in an aquarium setting. Intervention with a reliable treatment is usually required.

As far as being a reputable source of information on the subject, I believe that at least some would say that I qualify. I do have a number of published articles on the subject. As a matter of fact, I am currently working on a series of articles about Cryptocaryon irritans and have been talking with the editor of Advanced Aquarist online about publishing them after I have finished. I have conversed with some of the most knowledgeable people in the world on the subject and I own a small library of scientific journals dedicated to the study of Cryptocaryon irritans. If you would be interested in reading some of them for yourself then I will be happy to suggest some to you.

Let’s both promote accurate information. The hobby needs all of that it can get and you can certainly be a great help.

HTH,
Terry B

 

[TheZooFarmer]

Terry you seem to be well versed on this topic and your opinion is valued. But let me add/ask you some things.

Keep in mind I kept my explanation very simple. I think that most people including myself do not think of hyposalinity as a 3 week procedure. The only fish that I have seen respond to hyposalinity are large mature (stronger) fish. Would you agree that it is much easier to treat a larger fish then a smaller fish? And since most people in the hobby have smaller fish I believe this is the least successful treatment only because of the smaller fish being treated. And I do not believe in hospital tanks because they are only set up properly 1% of the time.

And after I reread my statement I must correct myself. Healthy fish can get ick when a stress factor has been placed on them. The perfect example would be when moving a healthy fish from an established tank it has lived in comfortably for sometime. I have seen this often with Powder Blue Tangs.

But I have never seen a healthy fish just get ick? There is always a factor you can attribute the ick breakout to. Whether it be water parameter change (temp, PH, Nitrate, etc....),light schedule change, poor or missed feedings, and adding of a new aggressive tankmate or an old tankmate becomes aggressive.

Like I said earlier you seem very knowledgeable on this subject but in order for the ick to attach itself to the fish, the fish's slime coat needs to be depleted. Do you agree with me there? (still keeping my explanation simple)

How can you explain a tank full of fish and only one of them have ick? And I am talking larger tanks 180gal+ with multiple surgeons/rabbits/angels. Have you not seen this? With the ick full blown and waterborne why doesn't all the fish get attacked?

If you say freshwater dips with their change of specific gravity will not cause the ick to explode, then what exactly do they accomplish. If what you say is true I see no purpose for a freshwater dips.

How long do you think can ick survive dormant in the sandbed? And what chance do you give a fish that has been infected with ick removed and treated properly whether by copper or hyposalinity only to be place in the same tank with the dormant ick? What has changed in the tank that will not cause another stress induced ick breakout? Only this time the ick will be far worse and almost always lead to death.

I think your work is great and needed but keep in mind a lot of laboratory controlled experiments only apply to 10-15% of the cases in the hobby. And this is for a myriad of reasons in which I would rather not get in to.

One of the reasons I stopped reading the boards was because it was about 10 different subjects posted 50 times each. Whenever I read a topic on ick (1 of the 10) the first thing I do is check the tank size and the fish type. 99.9999999% of the time the fish has no business being in the tank it is in. Whether the tank is to small, it is placed with non-compatible tankmates, or the fish rarely survives in captivity. Not to mention just poor water quality due to laziness of the owner or some crappy equipment that should not even be sold. I can not tell you how many new customers would come into my store and tell me they do not have a light timer. Or better yet they keep the lights on 24/7.

And like I said earlier I can not remember a single instance where a healthy fish was infected with and killed by ick.

I look forward to your response

Jack