Black Tang has Ich BAD...any ideas?

[WaBlonde]

Best of luck. We had a yellow-eye tang that was coated in ich. We tried to wait it out as he was eating well and we didn't see him rubbing up against rocks or have any troubles breathing. Well, he didn't make it. After that, we set-up a 40 gal QT tank so we can properly treat all fish. Two of our other fish ended up with a little ich from the tang so we put the whole gang in the QT and treated with hyposalinity. They are all happy and healthy. But dag - I sure liked that tang. :/

 

[btkrausen]

Everyone here has the right approach in fighting this constant menace in our hobby, garlic, copper, etc.. are all great. I'm using Brightwells Garlic and that seems to be getting my ICK under control. Anyone that has tangs should really invest in a Cleaner Wrasse. You may go through a couple of them to get one to eat but it's worth every penny! Mine loves ICK!

Just for future reference, cleaner wrasses don't normally eat ich, as its not part of their natural diet. This is a general misconception among the hobby. Ich parasite is located under the skin of the host, so it's not susceptible to attack by cleaner wrasses. There is a good article on ReefKeeping.com, but I can't find it.

 

[Murfman]

Most comprehensive article I have read on ich. Talks about the life cycle, how to treat and "other" remedies; ATJ's Marine Aquarium Site - Reference - Marine "Ich"

 

[J Rog]

i would have him out and in a quartine tank asap. Start dosing to kill the ich. You can easily run down to petco and set up a small quarantine i believe you dose copper to get rid of the ich. i am sure you can find some good supplements. I would not just wait it out thats sketchy on that expensive of a fish.

I agree.. I just lost almost all my fish to ich because i wated to long to try to treat this. I would do what aalvarado87 said and get him in QT ASAP. I tried soaking the food in gralic extract and bought very good food products. But that didn't help.. Do the QT..

 

[Emoney]

Thanks for all the useful info...

Fish was still alive at 6:00am...gonna set up qt tonight and hope for the best!

Keep praying and keep your fingers crossed!

Ty again, and i will keep everyone updated!

 

[J Rog]

Thanks for all the useful info...

Fish was still alive at 6:00am...gonna set up qt tonight and hope for the best!

Keep praying and keep your fingers crossed!

Ty again, and i will keep everyone updated!

Good luck! I hate ich!!!

 

[VegasRick]

copper only works in its free floating stage. And while copper works it is very stressful to the fish, too much will kill the fish and too little will do nothing to the pest. There are less stressful methods such as moving the infected fish to a new tank every 4 days to break the cycle. Removing the stress is key to beating it, along with breaking the cycle
What other fish are in your tank? Is there something that is picking on it? Are the water parameters good?
Stress usually causes an out break. Fish build up a natural immunity to ich. Their natural immune system will surround the theronts with a mucas that prevent them from continuing their life cycle. When their natural immunity is compromised usually through stress, the mucas layer will disappear leading to an outbreak. Copper has no affect on it in this stage. So treating a new fish in quarantine with copper will do nothing to eradicate the pest if it is in this stage.

 

[Reggie]

Murfman's article link is a good one. If you have spare tank (for quarantine), go for the hyposalinity treatment: ATJ's Marine Aquarium Site - Reference - Hyposalinity Treatment

 

[nixer]

ouch i just got a black tang i would die if it got ich

 

[KLR]

This is what finally worked for my fish when it once had ich..

I fed it food soaked in Garlic Gaurd and any other garlic coated foods. Then i caught the fish and QTed it,In a 5 gal tank I dosed small amounts of copper as the bottle said for 2+weeks. Then a fw dip and back in the tank. All of the ich died on the fish after this

 

[twinspots_goby]

I'm so shocked when Emoney mentioned about Liveaquaria and his black tang. I have a black tang and he just got ich 2 weeks ago from introducing a new copperband butterfly from Liveaquaira. The ich started from the butterfly and then transferred to my rabbitfish and then my black tang in two days. It wasn't too bad though. I didn't do anything specially and just kept feeding my fish with rod's food and all my fish are eating properly including my butterfly. A week later I see all my infected fish are recovering nicely, and now I don't see any ich on my black tang and my rabbitfish, and just several spots here and there on my butterfly. Best luck to you, Emoney. I hope your black tang can pull through. That fish is too beautiful to lose.

 

[florida reef]

Hyposalinity or copper treatment. Both of which require the fish to be in a q tank.

 

[btkrausen]

Keep in mind that the non-Divers Den stuff comes from a wholesaler just the same as most LFS get. You get a much higher chance from Divers Den since they are quarantined and held for a few weeks at their facility in Wisconsin. From reading posts in the past, even LA won't guarantee their DD fish are pest free.

Even though I don't practice it, your best bet is to always quarantine your fishies.

 

[nixer]

Keep in mind that the non-Divers Den stuff comes from a wholesaler just the same as most LFS get. You get a much higher chance from Divers Den since they are quarantined and held for a few weeks at their facility in Wisconsin. From reading posts in the past, even LA won't guarantee their DD fish are pest free.

Even though I don't practice it, your best bet is to always quarantine your fishies.

all of their fish come from wholesalers. its just that they put a timy bit of extra care into the DD stuff

 

[btkrausen]

Yeah, thats what I was going after. The Divers Den stuff gets quarantined in Wisconsin, so there is generally a better chance that the results will be better than coming straight from the wholesaler.

 

[get_armbarred]

I soak flake food in garlic juice for a min then feed