MRFish55 has offered me the use of his empty 180 gal. (Thanks Dave) So, I`m going to set it up tomorrow in my garage and move all the fish over. Starting to make up SW right now. I wouldn`t move them if I didn`t have adequate space for them, but a 180 is plenty big enough. I`ll put a bunch of PVC pipe for them to hide in and I have an extra skimmer, so I think this is the right thing to do.

I agree. It's not easy to get nice fish up here in PR so when we do get them we have to try and make sure they stay alive :mrgreen:

Now I just have to catch them all! :doh:

When I had to catch all my fish out of the big tank. I drained all the water out rather then have to rearrange the rock work.
It took 6 large rubbermaid tubs and 3 maxijet 1200 powerheads but I had all the water out, the fish in the quarantine tank and the water pumped back in within an hour and a half and not 1 rock had to be moved :biggrin:

Yup, that's exactly what I'm going to do. Corals in a tub and then all the water out.

One of my guests just noticed something strange. The ich infected SF Tang was hovering amongst the school of Chromis who were pecking at him just like a Cleaner fish. I hadn't noticed it until now. I googled Chromis and they are indeed a cleaner fish. Huh?

Oh man that sounds like so much work!

Hope it all goes well.

I am starting to worry about my guys now too. Its getting really bad. I don't have the choice to Qt though. I could do one fish at a time but no room in my condo for a proper QT.

In the very beginning I was going to stock my 200 with just a pair of Crosshatch Triggers and nothing else. They would outgrow it though so I scratched that idea. Then I had kind of decided just a pair of Blue Throats. Scraped that idea though as you can see :D

All this was because I didn't want to deal with ich again!

Feel your pain man.

I never even moved any of the corals, just pumped water out, retrieved fish off the bottom and pumped the water back in.

Don't forget corals are out of the water for hours at a time at low tide

Yeah I knew that actually but never heard of them doing it in an aquarium! Cool! Well kind of....I guess cool would be not having ich right now :neutral:

Yeah I know but I'll have to move a few rocks anyway because the fish can get right underneath them and I won't be able to get at them. The corals on those rocks will have to be moved. The rest can stay.

As I do yours. Good Luck! Hope your fish beat it.

Me too :neutral:

A few of them are absolutely COVERED in ich right now (Hippo, Powder Brown, Tusk). Its never been this bad. But they continue to act normally. I am quite surprised.

If it gets much worse, I will have to do something. Most likely will mean QTing and selling them or finding free homes with people who want to QT them. Hope it doesn't come to that though.

he's at GOLDS, lol, in the back tank

The Ich epidemic wasn't getting any better. I was running a 25 watt UV sterilizer 24/7; a diatom filter for several hours every day; large water changes every 3 to 4 days; soaked food in garlic and Selcon; and provided nori every day. I lost my Chocolate Tang, and the Sailfin and Harlequin Tuskfish are in bad shape. A fellow reefer was good enough to lend me his spare 180 gal which I set up in the garage. Today I transferred all the fish over to the 180 where they will remain for 8 weeks leaving the display fallow. I began treating them with Cupramine and am keeping my fingers crossed, hoping I don't lose any more fish. It was a big job, but I felt it needed to be done. Thank-Yous go to MrFish55 (Dave) and Marie for all their help. It is very much appreciated.
Does anyone know what the shelf life of Cupramine is?

I have lots of eggcrate sitting here as well if you want to cover the QT (last thing you need now is any jumpers) hope the move went well and they have a speedy recovery.

Way ahead of you Dave. Got eggcrate on the tank already. :lol: Move went very well. Drained the tank, moved the fish over, did some rock and coral rearranging while I was at it. All in 1.5 hours. Then I sat back and had a beer. Was worried about my fish so I had a couple more. Then they tasted so good I had a couple more and now I'm half-****ed and feeling great. :drinking::drinking::drinking::drinking

Here's to hoping everything goes better from here
*cheers*

Thank You and *cheers* to you too!

Well, it's been 24 hours since the big move and everything is looking fine. Never lost a coral or a fish. I put a bunch of PVC pipe in the treatment tank along with some fake, plastic corals and plants. So the fish feel relatively safe. I've got an extra skimmer I can run on this tank. Is it advisable to run a skimmer when treating with Cupramine? The bottle just says to turn off UV sterilizer and remove all chemical filtration.

I think you can run the skimmer. I have in the past when treating with copper but I have only ever treated one fish with copper, so I don't have much experience.

Glad to hear its going well!

Happy Tuskfish!
Sydney is certainly feeling better. He was actually playing tonight, swimming on his side at the surface all around the tank. At first I thought he was screwed up but then I realized he was playing. After about 5 laps of the tank he stuck his head out of the water and spit water into the air. He did this one more time and then spit water again. It was hilarious! I ran for the camera but he wouldn't do it anymore. I'll keep the camera by the tank in hopes he'll do it again.

Good to hear, everytime I get a reply to this thread in my email I almost hate to look in case its bad news

Every morning I hate to look in the tank, not knowing what I'm going to find. The move went very well though and the fish have responded to the Cupramine quickly, which is surprising to me becasue I always under dose a little with this stuff. Maybe it's just the Ich cycle though; I'm not sure. The corals in the DT all came through with flying colours too. :clap2:

Glad to hear.

I am also always worried to open this thread and see whats happening. QT is so scary to me :neutral:

So, the fish have been in QT now for 8 days. Everything is going pretty well, aside from the fact that I'm going through salt like crazy. Between the 225g, 90g, and 180g and 3 sumps I have about 600gals on the go, and I'm having to change about 30 gals of water in the QT every 3 days to keep the ammonia levels down. It's kind of a catch-22: You want to feed the fish well to keep them healthy but at the same time it's hard to keep ammonia down. If I don't change some water frequently the ammonia level rises quite rapidly. I'm treating with Cupramine right now. I'm trying to find some info on using ammonia inhibitors such as Amquel in conjunction with copper treatment, but can't anything anything. Does anybody know if this can be done? Or will it cause adverse effects?

Pod Explosion!
 

The display tank has now been empty for 11 days and in that short time the pod population has just exploded. I can't believe how many there are. :shocked!: Every square inch of the tank has some, and the sump has even more. The fish are going to have a feast when they get back in.

I have used Amquel with copper in the past. I never really thought of it much, just did it. I don't think it caused any problems. All it does is make it hard to test for ammonia. If I use it, I end up just adding some day and night everyday to be sure. Its relatively cheap compared to doing water changes.

LOL I just gave the tank a good dose of Amquel today. I figured if it was dangerous to use with copper I would have found some info on that.

Any updates? How are they doing?

Well, Kinda good and bad. I thought I had the Ich beaten. I hadn't seen any sign of it for over a week. The two-week copper treatment ended Tuesday. Then yesterday I noticed a few spots on the Bannerfish, so it's still there. I guess I should continue the copper a little longer, but using this stuff makes me very nervous. I'm going to try hyposalinity as well I think. They are all eating well and look good. Thanks for asking.

I have been told in the past not to do hypo and copper at the same time. Not sure if you meant your plan was both at once and maybe its fine but I would look into it.

Good luck. Sorry to hear its come back :(

Man I HATE ich so much!!!!

No, not simultaeously. I've got the salinity at 1.022 in the QT. Will start hypo after copper treatment.
Yes Ich sucks! I'm so glad my SF Tang recovered. He was absolutely covered; looked like someone rolled him in salt. I thought he was a goner.

The new tank has been empty of fish now for 17 days, and it looks so barren and empty I decided to post some pics that were taken just before the Ich breakout got real bad.



http://i371.photobucket.com/albums/o...k/IMG_3264.jpg


http://i371.photobucket.com/albums/o...k/IMG_3425.jpg


Just a few days after this was taken my Sailfin was so covered in Ich it looked like he was rolled in salt. I really thought he was a goner, but he's been Ich-free for over a week now.

http://i371.photobucket.com/albums/o...k/IMG_3286.jpg


Wussy Tuskfish too scared to come out for his photo.

http://i371.photobucket.com/albums/o...k/IMG_3278.jpg




And one of the Chocolate Tang who didn't make it. (RIP) Although I only had him a short while, I miss him. He was a beautiful fish with quite the personality. :cry:
http://i371.photobucket.com/albums/o...k/IMG_3298.jpg

No sign of Ich in the last 6 days...(crosses fingers). I discontinued the Cupramine and after a large water change am lowering the salinity. All fish seem to be healthy and fit. The Tuskfish is voracious. He literally attacks his food now. He can devour a cracked open clam in minutes; grabs it and shakes the crap out of it. He and the Foxface seem to have made peace (at least in the QT).

Thats great news... Hopefully everyone stays healthy and ich free

Well? are they headed back to the display yet? or you going to give them an extra couple weeks to make sure.

2 more weeks, just to be safe. Not going through that again.

WHOOO--------HOOOOOO!!!
Next weekend all the fish go back into the display. Fish have been in quarantine now for 46 days, and all are healthy and fit. (no losses while in QT) Haven't seen a trace of Ich since the end of March. Although I love my corals and other inverts, a tank without fish in it just seems kind of empty. In hindsight, I think I may have saved my Chocolate Tang if I had removed them and treated them a little quicker. :sad:

Give me a call,I'll give ya a hand :drinking:

Congrats man! Some serious patience you're showing there (or you're keeping yourself too drunk to care!)