Fighting Ich Sucks If You Can't Catch Fish

[MarkoD]

Is the fish eating when you feed it?

If it is, don't worry about it, it'll overcome it on it's own.

My achilllies had ich for like 4 months. Never did anything but feed it. It's all good now

[Seth81]

Yeah I'm in the same boat, my tall tank makes it impossible to net fish. Trap has only worked once for me, and I will not sacrifice my corals.

I found that as long as they are eating (I soak everything in Garlic & have strong UV filter) then they will come around.

I personally think that the stress of hunting down and netting one particular fish to put him in QT gives the fish worse chances of survival then just feeding garlic. 2 out of 2 times when I cought fish with Ich and moved them to QT and started copper treatment the fish died in QT (and yes my QT setup was good and I dosed copper very carefully).

[howdy20012002]

I would not say for sure that if the fish is eating that Ich won't kill it.
I don't believe that to be true at all.
it also depends on the parameters on your tank and if anything is stressing the fish.
In a stress free environment with good water quality, fish will typically overcome ich.
and corals will not survive hyposalinity nor will any inverts
best bet is try to ride it out, feed garlic and try to give a stress free environment and good water parameters as much as possible.
good luck
Nesl

[Coralgurl]

I killed more fish in qt than I've lost to ich so I don't qt my fish. It is playing with fire as there are more serious diseases that will wipe out your tank by introducing a sick fish to your dt. Some will tell you it's a matter of time and it will happen.

I chose the garlic and selcon combo myself and have not lost anyone yet. I used herbtana once, didn't seem to do anything.

Chasing a sick fish will stress it and it's tank mates and make its recovery that much tougher. if you are going to put in a hospital tank to treat, you'll need to put all fish in as well and leave the dt fallow for a min 6-8 weeks to rid the ich from the tank. Treating one fish then returning is pointless as ich will still be in your tank.

Good luck with whatever you decide to do

[Salt2Death]

With a huge mix bag of reviews and opinions, all of which are great, I think I'm going to ride out the storm as it be.

The loss of fish has be severe and at this point I don't believe there is anything short or total tear down that would help. Not to say that many fish didn't survive but it killed many too fast to control it.......

Big water changes, syphon sand (as I only has 1-2" in display), make sure rock work stay clean as well. Frequent equipment cleaning, raise the temp, and pray to the fish Gods that all will get better


Sent Via The Pirate Ship...

[howdy20012002]

if Ich is killing fish that fast, i would say there maybe something wrong within your tank.. either stress or water parameters.
or it is another disease - brook or velvet can look similar
velvet can wipe your tank out very fast
if it is velvet, waiting it out will not work..every fish in your tank will pretty much be dead.
but if they are already showing excessive signs it is too late to treat anyways.
sucks ass when you start having such losses
if you do lose all your fish, make sure you don't put any fish in there for at least 2 months or you could very well go through the exact same thing.
good luck

[Coralgurl]

That sounds pretty horrible!!! Agree it sounds like something other than ich. Are you able to take pictures of the affected fish so that someone can offer a solid diagnosis? Or describe what you are seeing on the fish?

[daniella3d]

ich can kill that fast and that bad as well. People always think that ich is something mild but it can burst into plague proportion if the conditions are right and kill everything as well as any other parasites.

Of course the only way to be sure is to do a scrape and ID the culprit under a microscope.

This should always be done before any treatment is started as the treatment is very different for ich, velvet or brook. Copper won't kill brook efficiently but formaline will.

Formaline won't kill velvet fast enough.

Chloroquinine will kill pretty much everything safely, if you can find it and treat in QT.

One thing is for sure, if one does a proper quarantine on all fish, then never ever will that person have to deal with any parasite. Peace of mind.

Originally Posted by Coralgurl

That sounds pretty horrible!!! Agree it sounds like something other than ich. Are you able to take pictures of the affected fish so that someone can offer a solid diagnosis? Or describe what you are seeing on the fish?

[Spyd]

You can also go to the grocery store and purchase garlic puree. I used that and just mixed a bit in with their food. As long as they are eating, they will be fine. Most smaller fish are fairly immune to ich all ready so that explains why they are all alive. Foxface are also very tough fish and will survive no problem. It is really tangs, angels, etc. that have a harder time fighting it off. Just keep them eating. If they are not, then it is time to move them as soon as possible, if you can....

A bottle trap tends to work if you need to catch a fish. Cut the back end off a gallon jug, poke a couple holes through the end piece and the jug and put a rod through it. I use acrylic rod. That allows the cut off piece to swivel open and closed. Leave the trap in there for a day without touching it. Next day put some mysis in there and eventually fish will swim in there and that's when you swivel the trap shut. It took me 5 minutes to build one and I caught the fish I wanted out in about a day.

[reefwars]

this is just my opinion but i dont think your tank was mature enough to make the fish feel comfortable is my theory, from what i read you started with all dry rock(100%) only 1 month ago ??


in order for fish to feel comfortable and not stressed their surroundings have to be what they usually are use to.

so with dry rock not even one month old chances are you dont have a large supply of vegetation and natural food?? theres pprob not an abundance of clean up crews like stars or pods.

nitrifying bacteria is one thing but in order to complete the loop and make it workable there needs to be some life present.



i had this talk a while ago with someone about a 6line wrasse, for example your usual wrasse hunts all day , while it may take prepared foods it still hunts.

when it cant find food or even see food available it creates a panic(fish dont know what we know) as they freak out and look harder for food and none is there they start to stress.


i dont believe in that if you feed a fish lots he will fight ick i believe that food heps but doesnt guarantee it , the more a fish stresses the worse it gets.



i would do the same as you now and wait it out , i wouldnt even necessarily wait for a fallow period i would look more into adding things to make it more of a full enviroment.



i took some fish the other night off a friend there were 4 of them , they were covered in ick , the next day after being in my growtank not a spot on any of them i didnt even have a chance to feed them , in fact my tank is now over populated as i added 14 fish last week from someone elses set up so were talking almost 20 fish in a 50g tank in a span of one-two weeks while some were badly sick.

all the fish are fine now with no ich visible , the only thing i figure like i have for years is besides food you need to give them the full enviromnt they are used to in nature.

im not saying its not possible that you could have introduced marine velvet only you would know that but im saying that maybe theres a small underlying issue that is working against you.

good luck buddy im sure youll pull through this it happens to us all and once your over this small hump things have to get better right?



cheers