Uh Oh!!!!
 

My skimmer must have conked out while I was away this weekend cause I came home yeterday and found it barely running. Well sure enough my regal tang is covered in white spots that are bumpy. It will be impossible to get him out of the tank way to much rock what can I do??? Will treating the tank harm any of my corals or other livestock.

As far as I know there is no remedy that will not harm corals/inverts but cure Ich ... so you will have to find a way to get him and the rest of the fish out and into either copper or hyposalinity in a QT tank ... maybe use a trap if he is difficult to get at or try feeding in a net ... sorry to hear as I am going thru it myself right now as well ( far as I can tell it came in on a rock as water paremeters are perfect ) ... I have setup a QT tank for hyposalinity as copper can be tough on the digestive system from what I have read

Good Luck

Cheers

you can try a pair of neon gobies or a pair of cleaner shrimp.

I have never used it on a full reef but Kick Ick is a pretty good product and have had some success withit.

Thanks for all the advice guys. I have one cleaner shrimp would getting another one and a uv sterilzer help or shouold I go the medication approach??

The UV sterilizer will only help when the Ich is in the free swimming state and this is assuming that you have the right size sterilizer AND that you get all the little buggers to go thru it LOL ... as to cleaner shrimp I have 4 in my tank and I think of them as a beauty salon for my fish ( drive thru style ) ... they can provide maintenance and maybe nip it in the bud early but if he is covered as you say you dont really have a choice ... because Ich has basically a 3 week cycle then the display will have to be fallow ( fishless ) for at least that long preferably 4 weeks or more ... if you go hyposalinity then use the water from the display to start the QT tank and slowly over 3 days or so reduce salinity to 16ppt or 1.009 SG... it has to remain at 1.009 for a full 3 weeks to break the growth cycle then slowly bring it back up to 1.026 or whatever you normally run at. ( remember that temperature will affect specific gravity ( ie. 77F would be 1.10 or 80F would be 1.08 )

or try as Wendell suggested or try copper

Cheers

Here is a link for more info on Ich and hyposalinity as a cure that can explain it better than I ..

http://www.petsforum.com/personal/tr...osalinity.html

Cheers

Feeding nori soaked in garlic has worked for me. Catching a tang, treating with copper in a QT tank for a month and putting it back in the main tank might cause it a tiny bit of stress, which can bring the ich back right after treatment. Feeding garlic is nice and calm and quiet (play ocean music here)......
Try it, they'll like it.

I have a UVS I currently don't have hooked up if you want to borrow it.
I have also used Kick-Ick with limited success, but it is totally safe in a reef
PM me if you want it, I'm close to richmond

Jason

As Brad mentioned, go with the easiest first.

I have always used crushed garlic a few times per week soaked with food. Anytime that I had mild outbreaks it was fixed right up. Also, garlic has the benefit of being cheap, easy, helps to stimulate appetite and brings out the colors of your fish.

Fortunately for me I have yet to resort to any other medications, although I have pretyy hardy fish and outbreaks have never lasted more than a day.

Good luck,

Rob

Well guys good news. I woke up this morning and my headache was gone. The regal tang had absolutley no traces of the white spots left on him. Beleive it or not it was only there for a few hours. Anyways I have raised the temp to 86 and am going to leave the lights off till sat.
Thanks again guys.

Um, why the temp spike? Higher temps mean less oxygen in the water which can lead to more stress in fish.

Well what is the "standard" temp.. My tank usualy runs on the higher side of 86 as well... I have had zero problems. But maybe I am just lucky. And can someone explain the garlic thing to me?? I have no clue on this one.

Thanks

Chad

I would say 86 is too high because of the reason I already mentioned. For a reef, accepted temps run between 77 and 82F. Fish only tend to be cooler for O2 content reasons.
Garlic is thought to cure fish of ich when fed to them. Nobody can prove it, but it works for many people, myself included. You soak their food in garlic oil and feed. Ich goes away. There is a decent article somewhere, I'll see if I can find it.
While I do that, go turn your temp down :razz:

well I think it runs that high standard because of the lights/powerhead etc.. but I will lower the heater and see..

Do you have glass tops?

No, I have a canopy on it. I think I will be putting some fans in there. I have the lid proped open right now. I know it gets even higher if it is not open.

When I added my last two powerheads the temp is harder to control now.

I would say a fan would be a good idea

I know my temp really goes up, but I didn't want to add more fans to the top of the tank so I added them in the sump. now even last week I had to put the heater on to stay at 79.

J

The only thing I worry about when it comes to fans is evaporation.. I do not have a autotop off or drip system in place yet

What size is your tank? The way a fan cools is by forcing evaporation, so you may need to address that. Are you running a sump? How much evap. do you have now? How do you deal with it? And again I'm involved in hijacking a thread...I gotta stop this :razz:

I don't have a top off system either but if you're on it you can add water in the morning and in the evening without an SG flucuation.
Evaporation is why fans are recomended to cool the system. Kinda like sweating is how we cool down

J

I hit 85F yesterday, as it was 30F outside. Being on the second floor with dual 400w halides isn't fun. When it's not super hot outside, my tank seems to stay around 82.9F.

Hehe, the tank is 20Gal. It usualy does not evaporate much because I have a closed canopy. When it does I top it off daily when I get home from work.

Chad, nice and simple. Top up a bit more when you get home and get a fan. Your critters will be happier (at least I think they will :razz: )

OK, I am lowering my temp.. now.. do I have to do this in a certain way? will this not change the SG?

No...if you are using a non-temp compensated hydrometer (like those floaters) you will get a different reading. They are calibrated for something like 75 degrees anyway.

Just make sure you are always measuring salinity with a temp compensated hydrometer or use a temp compensated refractometer.

I have the Aquarium Systems plastic one... Not sure if it is temp compensated?????

It kinda sorta is temp compensating. That little plastic counter weight changes density with temp changes. Not sure how accurate it is.

Well, I would like to get a better one.. but honestly I wouldn't know what to look for.. anyone wanna point me in the right direction?

Sure.

http://www.oceanaquatics.com/measurement%20devices.htm

This garlic oil thing could someone please xplian this to me (I have lowered my temp by the way) Are you talking about ordinary grocery store garlic oil or is there a special kind to get and whats the procedere ??? soak the food in it???

I use regular cloves of garlic and mash them to a pulp. At this point it is really oily. I feed it with nori, so I just wipe the garlic mash all over the seaweed, let it soak for a while and scrape off the larger chunks. Then feed as normal.

I will try it this weekend.. see what happens. I lowered the temp.. its about 82 now.