[Reef Pilot]

Quarantine works best with new fish before adding them to the display tank and using an already set up and fully cycled QT. If you have to set up a new QT, then you will be dealing with cycle problems/risk, which will just cause more stress to your fish. And not to mention the stress of catching them and tearing apart your display tank.

So your best option at this point is probably to just feed them well, garlic, selcon, etc, and maybe try some reef safe remedies that others say have worked. And hope that your fishes' immune system kicks in and fights off the ick or velvet. Hopefully you have ick, not velvet. You may lose the new fish and the weaker ones, but hopefully your stronger long term fish will survive.

I learned my lesson with not QTing a year and half ago, and now use a QT for 2 months (hyposalinity) on any new fish. Have done that twice now, with total success.

The good news, though, when I did have my ich outbreak, is that I did not lose any of my long time fish, only the new fish that I had added. What happened, is that the new fish showed the ick symptoms, and some of the long time residents got it too. The tank went through a couple 4 or 5 day iterations, where it seemed the ick would subside, then come back. The new fish got it real bad just with the 2nd iteration, and died. But the long time residents were still eating well, and didn't seem to have it as bad. They got better, and subsequent iterations showed fewer symptoms until the ick finally disappeared altogether (took about a month or so).

My theory is that the long time residents had an immune response and were better able to fight off the subsequent iterations of the disease. And when the new fish died, the disease didn't have easy to affect hosts to keep the cycle going.

I know the tank is ick free now, because I have since added new fish several times after quarantining them, with no recurrence of the disease. I should mention that I had a wait time of over 6 months before adding new fish to the display tank after my initial episode.