help me save my clown from ich! (kinda long story) please help!

[devolette]

okay, so we have a 55 reef and it had a hector's goby, spotted mandarin, lawn mower blenny and a clown fish. they were all extremely happy and healthy fish. we decided to get a school of three blue reef chromies and we haven't set up a quarantine yet, and it finally bit us in the butts. we noticed all our fish had ich and started research, decided to go with hyposalinity. so we go on craigslist, get a 70 gallon tank for them, put them all in there and we wanted to wait a day to start hypo to hopefully reduce stress. (we had a penguin 500 on our reef from the old 29 gallon tank we had just in case we wanted to start a frag tank or something with it and so we are using it for this, we got lucky having that ready) so all the fish are in the 70, except hector, the ich got to him quickly and he died in the reef. he was my favorite :[ anyways, two chomies were dead the next day and all of them looked miserable. we checked the parameters and everything was where it should be. the mandarin looked savable so i caught him and tried to re-acclimate him into the reef but he literally died in my hands. then the lawnmower died. so now we have two fish in a 70 gallon.. so we moved the clown and the chromie to a 20 long and the chromie didn't make it through the night. ammonia was a bit high after that so we did a water change, then another, then another, and now it's almost 0. the pH was at about 7.8 and nitrites have been 0 always. bill (the clown) was doing great, eating his food i had soaked in garlic guard and doing just fine for a day or so, we've been slowly lowering the salinity at this point. so yesterday he was okay until i turned the lights on, then he was in the position he sleeps in all day, which is on his side and he was gilling hard and not interested in food at all, which for him is crazy. i had accepted his death and was just watching him closely, sadly. i decided the only thing i could really try at that point is to slightly raise the pH. i did so with sodium carbonate. moved it up to about 8.2 (kind of accidentally did it to fast :/) i left him for the night hoping for the best but knowing he probably won't be with us in the morning. so i get up to check him in the a.m. and he's still doing the same thing, looks a bit better though. and not to mention his ich looks much much better today. then when it was time for lights it opted to leave them off and about thirty minutes after they were supposed to come on he's swimming about?! what is going on? should i leave the lights off? sorry this is so long i just feel its necessary to say everything at once. he wasn't interested in food but he usually doesn't care for it until about nowish so i'm about to try to feed him again.

thanks and sorry for the length of this, nicki

 

[Reefing Madness]

Your doing way to much all at the same time. But now that you have him in a tank, leave him there. The stress you put on them moving them about is insane. In QT there is no reason to use lighting, you can leave it off. Slowly lowering the salinity to 1.009 will be great, and it will wipe out Marine Ich, not to worry there.

 

[devolette]

what do you mean when you say too much all at the same time? like moving the chromie and clown to the 20? 'cause other than that i don't know what i did extra or too much of. i did accidentally raise the pH a point fast.. those water changes did have to happen but maybe trying to save the mandarin was stupid..? i for sure panicked when i did that. i'll never have diseased fish in my display again, especially after this. Curing Fish of Marine Ich and the hyposalinity link in there is what i followed. and thanks for the light info, that's my main question.

 

[Reefing Madness]

Yea, moving the fish to much, doesn't help. From one tank to the next is all i'd do with a stressed out fish with ICH. From the DT to a QT then almost immediately back, will stress the crap outta the fish. That and if they are already sitting still on the bottom, thats really hard to bring em back.

 

[jasonrodreef]

Moving around is not good on fish causes more stress. Even if it is the same exact water its not there home this only harms them more. A possible fresh water dip and placement back in display could help to remove ich. Yes back in display as the others are already sick and ich is in the display reguardless BUT WARNING fish that are not eating and laying on floor should not be dipped. Sold swimmers healthy eating with acouple spots yes .. Do water changes on system something cause the stress, lowering salinity and all the extra work doesnt help..causes more stress.. Sorry i know its hard to watch fish die but water caused the problem so do water changes and feed your fish extra keep them fat to fight. Only thing i do is try and feed the effected fish more food till the ich drops off...Once a fish stops eating its dead. I have only seen one or two fish stop eating from sickness and start up again BIG fish never anything small.

 

[jasonrodreef]

If your clown is still eating feed him keep him fat and eating through the day swim eat swim eat. Watch he will pull though

 

[mike007]

Yea, moving the fish to much, doesn't help. From one tank to the next is all i'd do with a stressed out fish with ICH. From the DT to a QT then almost immediately back, will stress the crap outta the fish. That and if they are already sitting still on the bottom, thats really hard to bring em back.

+ 1 on that.

 

[devolette]

well, he's back. swimming and eating again. i'm amazed. we took all of our fish out because we want an ich free DT. we started this hobby two years ago with a five gallon and have been learning along the way. if i knew that you could have an ich free tank back then, i for sure would have quarantined my fish and corals but i didn't really know how bad parasites really got until i saw them on my fish. so now our DT is running fishless and ich needs a fish host so it will die and the one survivor is going to be ich free from hyposalinity. also, if i knew i could have treated them with medications that didn't harm inverts i probably would have taken that road but i got the info late. i don't want there to always be ich and fish i need to make sure eat certain things. i like the idea of the most parasite free tank i can achieve.

 

[Reefing Madness]

 

[jasonrodreef]

Good keep feeding and changing water.. Even if a tank is "ich free" which i do not believe in,,yet water parameters are off or something is not correct you will get ich or worse. QT for a year but if a fish goes it to a bad system or say a stressful system your guaranteed ich. Best preventative of ich is a well maintained aquarium. Say you change 40 gallons once a month,,,try 10gal once a week you will never have any problems with ich.
Ich is a part of life and healthy stress free fish do not get ich, IF they do it should not be problem with feedings and if bad a fresh water dip healthy fish can get dipped. Stocking tanks to quickly with fish a great way to get ich started even with ich free display.

 

[devolette]

thanks for the info! sorry i'm just now responding, i read your reply a couple days ago and just didn't have the time. now that i really put thought into it though i'd have to put all QT fish into hypo which i don't want to do 'cause i know they can't all handle it. would you put the clown back into the DT if you were me? (raise his salinity first obviously) he's doing just fantastic now by the way, his colors are all back and he only has three or four spots. and another question if you don't mind, do you not quarantine your fish?

 

[Squishie89]

Your tank needs to run fishless for a few weeks, not a few days unfortunately. And if the clown still has spots he should not be put back into the display. I QT all fish, except the mandarin I plan on getting.

 

[devolette]

well i know to kill off the ich i need to do that. and it's now been three weeks without fish. and not to mention i'd have to raise his salinity back so it'd be another week. but i'm wondering if i put him back in while the same strain of ich is in there or whatever would it most likely kill him? 'cause now that i've thought about it and know that it'll always be in there because i don't want to put every fish i get through hypo, i'm wondering if putting him back would be okay. and may i ask what makes you not want to QT the mandarin? i'm trying to learn as much as i can before getting new fish. i'm never going to lose fish to ich again. and i'm still going to QT all new fish, i'm just curious.

 

[Squishie89]

Mandarins just don't do well in QT. I asked a guy at my LFS about it and he never had good luck with QTing them even with daily/weekly doses of pods and food. So it will be the one fish I take the riak on. I am also going to try and do it soon while I only have 3-4 fish in the display.
I just wouldn't risk putting a sick fish in the display. But I can also understand your reasoning.

Sent Via the R2R Forum APP

 

[devolette]

i can see how a mandarin wouldn't do well, especially 'cause they're hard to find in good shape at the fish store. the one we got was a fat little baby, we were lucky. i'm so sad we lost him. i'm actually glad i got that information because i want another one for sure and so i'll probably get it first. we have sooo many pods in there now as well, it'll be a happy camper.