Another case of "Is this ICH"

I just bought a Flame Angel last Friday and he went into the QT. Looked and acted fine through the weeekend. Then on Monday, he looked like this (sorry for the bad quality pic):



He had 3 ICH like spots above his gill as you can kind of see.

On Tuesday, two of the spots were completely gone, with just the top one still there, but less visible (not protruding as much). Yesterday, the top one was still there, and you can see how far it was protruding here:



There was also one very small spot on the other side, closer to his tail. Another weird thing was later last night, the spot was again protruding less and could barely notice it.

I have not done anything yet. I have a 10 gal BB HT I could move him to if needed for a hyposalinity treatment (I read angels don't do as well with copper treatments). He does not seem any different than when I got him. Breaths the same, does not "scratch" anywhere, eats the same, etc.

Thoughts?

 

And now today, the spot is gone:




Any ideas anyone?

 

It looks like Ich.Ich goes through its life cycle in stages.

Life Stages of Marine Ich

1.TOMONT STAGE: May last anywhere from 3 - 28 days or even longer depending on water temperature. You can not see ich in this stage, it is attached to the substate.
2.THERONT STAGE: The free swimming stage lasting anywhere from 1 - 3 days.
3.TROPHONT STAGE: This is the only stage that you can actually visualize the parasite. At this stage it is attached to the fish and feeding on the fish, lasting 3 - 7 days.
4.TROPHONT FREE SWIMMING: The last stage where the parasite has fallan off the fish to begin it's reproduction cycling in the substrate.

If the fish is eating and not showing signs of distress I would just leave it alone.Moving it to another tank will add stress thus making it weaker.You should feed it a variety of healthy foods and frozen angel formula's are great.You can also offer it Nori.I would look into getting some selcon or garlic to add to its food.A healthy fish will be able to combat the parasite.

 

What treatment are you using for a 5 day QT?

 

Thanks Vinny. I did spend a decent amount of time researching marine ICH, and figured it was the trophont stage I was seeing; just not sure why two of the them were only on the fish for one day.

The fish is eating well and behaving normally. I do have both selcon and garlic that I switch between, and feed a good variety of foods. So I do think the fish is doing a great job fighting it off.

?? I QT my fish for 6 weeks, sorry if I wrote something that said I only QT for 5 days . The only fish I have treated to date is my Tiger Wardi Goby who I treated with PraziPro. Other than that just inspect daily. This is the first fish I have ever had any issues with.

Edit: Actually, I bet you are seeing the LR and sand and assuming he is now in the DT. My QT is a 46 bow w/ LR, sand, skimmer, powerheads, etc. This will be a predator tank after all of my other tanks are stocked. This is a much easier QT to maintain than a 10 gal BB of course, and should be a lot less stressful for the fish. Especially for the sand sifting goby and Lawnmower Blenny , who would not have done well at all in a normal BB QT.

I have a separate 10gal BB that is ready to be used as a HT whenever needed (not needed to date).

 

The question is, where do I go from here. The angel is still in the QT, where I planned to keep him for 6 weeks. However, I obviously want to avoid bringing ICH into my DT.

-If the fish is looking healthy in another week or so, should I move him to the 10 gal HT and do a hyposalinity treatment for 4 weeks? At the same time, I would leave the QT fishless for 8 weeks.

-Or do I just keep the angel in the QT, making sure he keeps eating and behaving normally and then move him to the DT after 6 weeks?

Thanks for the help guys.

 

I'm not convinced from those pics that it was truly ich. It could have been a fungus or bacterial infection. it could have been a scrape from the rocks etc. Those pics just arent clear enough to say for sure.

But either way, if you have him in QT, you should just do hypo and prazipro while he is in there. No reason to take any chances.

 

I have never had a fish with marine ICH before, so I could not be sure one way or another. I can do PraziPro in the QT he is in, but not hyposalinity due to the LR and CuC. I would need to move him to the HT to do that.

Thanks for all of the help though!

 

I saw keep him in the QT and continue feeding and observing. I'm not super familiar with marine ich either but do know that sometimes fish will get spots from different types of things other than ich. If he's eating and you're feeding a variety of foods, just continue to watch him. He looks pretty healthy to me. I wouldn't stress him by moving him to another tank at this point....I have had fish that have had spots show up and disappear but I think ich is really more pronounced and you'll typically see several spots from what I've seen where people have stated it's ich.

 

Thanks OFK I do feed him a variety of foods, and he looks very healthy to me. There have not been any additional spots since the ones I posted. Just finishing week 3 of 6 for QT, so half way there before he goes in the DT 8)