how to properly introduce a new fish

[Jzhou]

At this point all I can really say is do what you think is best. You seemed pretty set on the idea already.

 

[Anthony.Luciano710]

so if i do hyposalinity i will have to go through that whole nitrogen cycle again. if thats the case then nevermind. i dont care about anything in the rocks exept the nirogen bacteria

You should always monitor your water when your fish is in QT. Though some bacteria won't die, most will. The same is true if you use medication.

 

[KathyC]

even if i was aloud to i cant catch them. i rather just do hypo salinity on the whole display tank. theres nothing that important on the rocks they were bought as base rocks with no living pods or anything.

The bacteria should not die off during hypo.
BUT, all of your inverts will as well as any pods, worms in the tank. You will have to monitor your ammonia levels DAILY.

Can you move the inverts into a small tank if you are going to go this route?

DO read the link I posted - the directions for properly doing hypo are in there. You need to get the tank down to 1.009.
Do you have a refractometer- if not you need one, a hyrometer will not do as you MUST be at the correct SG to get the results, too high and the Ich will continue to live.

Also keep in mind that if any of your fish DO die during hypo treatment - you just may well end up having to break down the rock work to get the deceased fish out of there

Remind us - how long has this tank been set up?

 

[KathyC]

http://atj.net.au/marineaquaria/hyposalinity.html

Read this

Sleep on it and decide in the morning

 

[Anthony.Luciano710]

yes i plan on removing all inverts and corals. i had a fish die once behind the rocks and it didnt cause any ammonia problems it was just phosphates because i let it dissolve. and im still battling phosphates but i think im winning because the algae is going down alot. i have 2 firefish. 1 red scooter dragonet, 1 madarin dragonet, 1 naso tang, and 1 blue hippo tang. do you think these are strong enough to live thorugh hypo salinity. i have a hydrometer but ill try to get a refractometer. and the tank has been set up since november 5th 2010.

The bacteria should not die off during hypo.
BUT, all of your inverts will as well as any pods, worms in the tank. You will have to monitor your ammonia levels DAILY.

Can you move the inverts into a small tank if you are going to go this route?

DO read the link I posted - the directions for properly doing hypo are in there. You need to get the tank down to 1.009.
Do you have a refractometer- if not you need one, a hyrometer will not do as you MUST be at the correct SG to get the results, too high and the Ich will continue to live.

Also keep in mind that if any of your fish DO die during hypo treatment - you just may well end up having to break down the rock work to get the deceased fish out of there

Remind us - how long has this tank been set up?

 

[KathyC]

A dead fish will not cause phosphates to rise but it WILL cause an ammonia spike and keep in mind, you won't have a crew in there to 'clean up' the body

 

[Anthony.Luciano710]

ok i did it... i had no choicei had to do hypo salinity on the display tank. the second i put the net in to try to catch a fish they would hide behind the 200+ pounds of live rock. there was no way i could catch them. not even the dragonets. even the got away. and the firefish both swam across the whole 6' tank in half a second. i had no choice

 

[Lenny718]

yes i plan on removing all inverts and corals. i had a fish die once behind the rocks and it didnt cause any ammonia problems it was just phosphates because i let it dissolve. and im still battling phosphates but i think im winning because the algae is going down alot. i have 2 firefish. 1 red scooter dragonet, 1 madarin dragonet, 1 naso tang, and 1 blue hippo tang. do you think these are strong enough to live thorugh hypo salinity. i have a hydrometer but ill try to get a refractometer. and the tank has been set up since november 5th 2010.

Wow! All those fish and the tank has only been set up since Nov of this year. Sorry but it seems that you like to rush things, have you thought of a new hobby? Your fish are unfortunately all going to die anyway so maybe you should just have a 6ft goldfish tank?

 

[Anthony.Luciano710]

its upgraded from another tank and all the rock was cured

Wow! All those fish and the tank has only been set up since Nov of this year. Sorry but it seems that you like to rush things, have you thought of a new hobby? Your fish are unfortunately all going to die anyway so maybe you should just have a 6ft goldfish tank?

 

[Lenny718]

its upgraded from another tank and all the rock was cured

Oh OK, you scared me for a second :tongue1:. Take a deep breath relax and read the link Kathy has posted. I still think you should get all your fish out of the DT even if it means having to remove 200 pounds of rock and set up a QT tank and treat with a copper based med correctly. In my humble opinion copper is the best treatment for marine ick.

 

[Anthony.Luciano710]

but i also hear people say that the tank will always have ich and the fish just wont get it unless there unhealthy. is this true? and so far all i did was take out all of the coral and inverts i didn't actually lower the salt level yet. so i really don't know what i should do. but now maybe i will just have to take out all the rocks and it will be a good time to re aquacape too.

Oh OK, you scared me for a second :tongue1:. Take a deep breath relax and read the link Kathy has posted. I still think you should get all your fish out of the DT even if it means having to remove 200 pounds of rock and set up a QT tank and treat with a copper based med correctly. In my humble opinion copper is the best treatment for marine ick.

 

[dj ze]

removing your fish and treating with copper in a separate qt is the best option but it seams to me like your better off learning how to deal with it now because your going to be in the same place in the future. i would remove all the corals bring the salinity to 1012 no less so you wont lose any bacteria and treat eather with hikary ich-x or protomarin coral the protomarin is realy good but you have to order it online you can not store it doesn't last long on the shelf must be fresh it works but you must dose a little more than the recomendations both have malachite green witch is pretty toxic

 

[Anthony.Luciano710]

ok but now if i just leave the ich living in the system and only treat the infected fish will the ich die out if it cant infect a fish in 6 weeks? also how do i introduce new fish if i just let the ich stay in the tank?... by the way i know he was infected in my tank because the lfs i bought it from treats all there fish with copper and i saw the white spots about 5 days after i bought it.

 

[Paul B]

First of all hello KathyC and Marrone. Nice to "see" you .
It think we will always have these ich posts because as you know it is not an exact science, the ich cycle is a science but there are way too many different types of paracites and way to many tank configurations to come up with a definate "do this, or don't do that."
As you know my tank is very old and it used to be an ich magnet of unbelievable proportions. In the early 70s I had to keep copper pennies in the tank to keep ich at bay. Eventually I learned to keep ich off of my fish but not before losing more fish than I care to remember.
You are correct that even healthy fish get ich (although they fight it off better) but there are different stages of health for fish. Looking good, living long and not having any marks is great but the fish still may be in much poorer health than when it was in the sea. I have found that fish in excellent health or breeding condition have a much better chance of becomming immune from ich. Not just good health but breeding condition health. Most fish will not get in this condition by eating regular commercially available aquarium fish foods. If your fish are not spawning or making spawning jestures, they are not as healthy as you think. If you do much diving you will see that fish in the sea spawn constantly, every few weeks and males (so much like human males) will spawn all the time, every day if they could.
(this is where I will get myself into trouble)
Fish in that condition, from my own experience do not get ich.
OK stop laughing or screaming.
Remember, not good health but breeding health.
How can I say that? As I said from "my" experience with my 40 year old reef tank I have discovered how to get fish into that condition and I know that if they get out of that condition they will get infected with ich. I have been noticing it for many years in my tank. If one of my fish (even a 15 year old fish) is near death from something unrelated to ich like an accident or just old age it will get ich and probably die from it. My other fish will not get it, never.
I can put any fish in my reef from a LFS or the sea and that fish may die from ich but no other fish will get it. I am not talking about observing this for 10 or 20 years, closer to 30. Unless I can figure out another reason why my fish do not get ich I have to stick with my breeding condition theory. There has not been ich observed in my tank in over 3 decades on an established fish.
But I do agree that fish that are not breeding will get ich and probably die from it in a few days. Ich will always be in your tank if you introduce it especially if you put something in there at least every few months.
Of course fish like tangs and most butterflies will not spawn in a tank so you will not notice this behaviour in that type of fish but it will be noticable in most damsels and bottom dwelling fish.
I presently have bangai cardinals, bluestripe pipefish, fireclowns and two pairs of gobies spawning now.
The fireclown is about 16 years old and has never contracted anything.
So it is a possable maybe if the fish will contract ich. It can, but it may not.
But I can just about guarantee in the original posters tank of less than one year old, the fish will almost definately get ich if they are not quarantened. Tanks that young are almost never very healthy.
Just my opinion and I am not the God of ich.
Have a great day.
Paul

 

[Anthony.Luciano710]

Thanks for all that info it was interesting but do you know any way to introduce a new fish such as a sensitive tang without it getting ich?

First of all hello KathyC and Marrone. Nice to "see" you .
It think we will always have these ich posts because as you know it is not an exact science, the ich cycle is a science but there are way too many different types of paracites and way to many tank configurations to come up with a definate "do this, or don't do that."
As you know my tank is very old and it used to be an ich magnet of unbelievable proportions. In the early 70s I had to keep copper pennies in the tank to keep ich at bay. Eventually I learned to keep ich off of my fish but not before losing more fish than I care to remember.
You are correct that even healthy fish get ich (although they fight it off better) but there are different stages of health for fish. Looking good, living long and not having any marks is great but the fish still may be in much poorer health than when it was in the sea. I have found that fish in excellent health or breeding condition have a much better chance of becomming immune from ich. Not just good health but breeding condition health. Most fish will not get in this condition by eating regular commercially available aquarium fish foods. If your fish are not spawning or making spawning jestures, they are not as healthy as you think. If you do much diving you will see that fish in the sea spawn constantly, every few weeks and males (so much like human males) will spawn all the time, every day if they could.
(this is where I will get myself into trouble)
Fish in that condition, from my own experience do not get ich.
OK stop laughing or screaming.
Remember, not good health but breeding health.
How can I say that? As I said from "my" experience with my 40 year old reef tank I have discovered how to get fish into that condition and I know that if they get out of that condition they will get infected with ich. I have been noticing it for many years in my tank. If one of my fish (even a 15 year old fish) is near death from something unrelated to ich like an accident or just old age it will get ich and probably die from it. My other fish will not get it, never.
I can put any fish in my reef from a LFS or the sea and that fish may die from ich but no other fish will get it. I am not talking about observing this for 10 or 20 years, closer to 30. Unless I can figure out another reason why my fish do not get ich I have to stick with my breeding condition theory. There has not been ich observed in my tank in over 3 decades on an established fish.
But I do agree that fish that are not breeding will get ich and probably die from it in a few days. Ich will always be in your tank if you introduce it especially if you put something in there at least every few months.
Of course fish like tangs and most butterflies will not spawn in a tank so you will not notice this behaviour in that type of fish but it will be noticable in most damsels and bottom dwelling fish.
I presently have bangai cardinals, bluestripe pipefish, fireclowns and two pairs of gobies spawning now.
The fireclown is about 16 years old and has never contracted anything.
So it is a possable maybe if the fish will contract ich. It can, but it may not.
But I can just about guarantee in the original posters tank of less than one year old, the fish will almost definately get ich if they are not quarantened. Tanks that young are almost never very healthy.
Just my opinion and I am not the God of ich.
Have a great day.
Paul

 

[dj ze]

you need to take care of the problem that you got first before even considering on adding anything else your to inpatient that is the reason your in this situation you need to take things a little slower patience is the key in this hobby wait at least 2 or 3 months before buying any more fish

 

[Tommy Boy]

You are correct that even healthy fish get ich (although they fight it off better)

thank you. this was exactly what i said, i may not have a lot of posts here but ive been doing this for a while too. not as long as paul but a while non the less.

ich doesnt have the power ppl are giving it. if i had a dollar for every time i saw a powder blue tang with an ich spot (that is still alive) id have enough for a frag or 3.

i agree with u paul some of my fish never get ich in spite of it being present in my system. at the moment out of my 13 fish the only fish that has the white spots are one of my angels, and its because of stress. its being harassed by some of my larger fish, eventually when everyone settles down it will come around, or die if the bullying continues.

ich isnt that serious...really stop...this whole hysteria is probably causing more deaths through the process of catching and treating the sick fish by inexperienced owners and because usually the one that has ich is the more sensitive fish, and their will to live goes out the window pretty quick when they're stressed.

 

[Anthony.Luciano710]

Ok it's not that I'm being impatient. I can not catch the fish. I took out all of the rocks yesterday and had 2 people with nets and still couldn't get them. I'm just asking if I just let it lice in the system how can I add a fish in the future without it getting ich. Also does the thing where if you don't add anything for 11 months work because then I rather do that. But everyone I speak to says ich is always in the system so the only way to control it is using a uv sterilizer. But I use ozone which Is supposed to work even better.

 

[Paul B]

Thanks for all that info it was interesting but do you know any way to introduce a new fish such as a sensitive tang without it getting ich?

Yes I know, I tend to ramble. My short answer to your question is "no". There is no way to introduce a tang into "your" tank if there is ich in the water. The tank is young, the fish are not in the best health and I can almost guarantee that the tang will get ich. Sorry, I don't know what to tell you. If there is no ich present in your tank and if you quaranteened everything like should be done in such a new tank, then you would be able to quaranteen it and put it in.
Eventually you will be able to get the fish into excellent health and ich will not be a problem.

But everyone I speak to says ich is always in the system so the only way to control it is using a uv sterilizer. But I use ozone which Is supposed to work even better.

Oxone and UV will not control ich. Most of the paracites are hanging out near the substrait and will never go into the UV sterilizer or device where you are running ozone.

 

[marrone]

Looking good, living long and not having any marks is great but the fish still may be in much poorer health than when it was in the sea. I have found that fish in excellent health or breeding condition have a much better chance of becomming immune from ich. Not just good health but breeding condition health. Most fish will not get in this condition by eating regular commercially available aquarium fish foods. If your fish are not spawning or making spawning jestures, they are not as healthy as you think. If you do much diving you will see that fish in the sea spawn constantly, every few weeks and males (so much like human males) will spawn all the time, every day if they could.
(this is where I will get myself into trouble)
Fish in that condition, from my own experience do not get ich.

Paul, the problem with this is that fish in the ocean, which are spawning, do have a lot of parasites on them, and they're still spawning regularly. Also the part about fish being into "breeding condition", and showing signs of breeding, has to do with more then just what they eat and being in great shape. Having a partner, or potently partner, goes a long way in a fish showing signs of breeding, as well as the fish being mature. I seen some pretty bad tanks, fish having marks as such, where damsels, Clowns and even Mandarins have spawned. Fish in the ocean can live with these parasites because most are consistently on the move, which lets parasites fall off, so the impact isn't as bad, also cleaning fish & shrimp, usually at cleaning stations, do help remove parasites. But even then fish can, and do, get succumb to parasites in the ocean.

But I do agree that fish that are not breeding will get ich and probably die from it in a few days.

A lot will die but some can and do fight it off. As for fish that are in "breeding condition" not dying from ich, or other parasites, well I wouldn't say that is true. They maybe better to fight it off, just as health fish can and do, though so strains of ich can kills pretty fast, even taking down very health fish.

But I can just about guarantee in the original posters tank of less than one year old, the fish will almost definately get ich if they are not quarantened. Tanks that young are almost never very healthy.
Just my opinion and I am not the God of ich.
Have a great day.
Paul

Quarantining fish is a big step in controlling all types of parasites in your tank, not just ich. Also old and new tanks can and do get ich. So just because your tank has been running a long time doesn't mean it's ich prove.