Woke up to ich!

Here's what happened ( I think the cause )

Last night i went to sleep with my window open ( outside temp about 12C ) I woke up at around 5am freezing cold so i closed the window. My alarm goes off at 7:50am and i switched on my heater.

Now before i switched my heater on my room temp was 9C degrees. After i finally got out of bed with the heater on for around half hour i switched my tank lights on to find my yellow tang and lieutenant tang fully covered in ICH. I check the temp but that was fine at 24.5C.

There really covered badly with around 20 spots each.

Now i'm thinking it could of been because of a temperature drop during the night or the 10% water change i did yesterday afternoon. Everyone was fine until i woke up this morning.

I've previously cleared ICH but not on this scale , i didn't have time to do checks this morning so i will do it as soon as i'm home.

Would you agree that a temperature drop would cause ich outrage (Stress)

 

Sure it could.

I'm of the school that once your tank is rid of ich, it has to be reintroduced again.

Any new livestock?

 

I added a new clownfish and a dottyback on Saturday. It's only my tangs which shown ich problems.

 

It very well could have been carried on either of those fish and once introduced to the tank, infected the two tangs.

I actually just found ich on my orchid dottyback last week. What I was told is that you basically have two options:

#1 Get the fish out of your tank, put them in a QT and treat with copper, then keep your DT fallow for 8-11 weeks to starve the parasites off

or

#2 Start feeding HUFA foods and allow the fish's immune system to combat the ich.

I took route #2 with my dottyback and it seems to be working well. He is still eating like a champ (increased the amount of mysis i am feeding) and the white spots seem to be disappearing. Ich is very prevalent in marine environments and can only cause an infection when the fish is stressed/ has a weaken defense mechanism.

The only thing is that I'm not really sure how you would address this with herbivores. You may have to soak your food in a supplement before feeding.

 

I combated it last time with garlic soaking before feeding . I shall do the same tonight and so from there. If not then i will setup my QT tank.

 

Just went home on my lunch break and yellow tang is alot better only 3-4 white spots but my lieutenant tang is alittle abetter but still spotty.

Feed them brine shrimp soaked in garlic... see what its like later tonight

 

Yes you are all going to hate this link by the time I get done today. This is the forth copy and paste this am, but a must read.


Marine Ich - Myths and Facts

 

I read non stop when i had my last ich outbreak and got rid off it successfully so ill try it again .. Thanks for the link again lol

 

Greatly reduced this morning , Yellow tang only has 1 or 2 spots on the fins and my lieutenant tang is recovering well with alot less spots.

 

this is just my "2cents", its my personal experience, its an old post.

I have had an ich outbreak and I can tell you this...it freaked me out completely!!! this said take solace in what im about to tell you and keep in mind this is my personal experience with my relatively "hardy" fish.
I too, once seen the ich thought of running the gun and getting a QT tank...... but i didnt (though this remains a good idea, better safe than sorry) what i did do, was raise the temp slowly to 28 °c (keep in mind the oxygen level of the water, especially at night will be lower so an air stone could be a good idea) and let the tank run at this temp for about a week a week and a half (if i remember correctly).
ich was visibly gone, now this does not mean that its gone all together from your tank, far from it! it lives in your substrate waiting to attack a weak fish, but as long as the fish is healthy and most importantly NOT STRESSED it can live with ich present in the tank and never get it. this has been my case, havent seen another ich outbreak in months.
this said i have been feeding my fish chopped up marine fish with a bit of garlic ever since, is this the miracle cure for ich? does it really boost the immune system of fish? as far as i know there is NO scientific evidence of this....but I do it non the less....
Personally, though ich remains a potentially lethal parasite (and clearly depending on what species you own as some are more delicate than others) i feel there is a lot of tantrum around it, scaring folks to buy this and that to get rid of the demon. in many cases doing more damage than good, as some treatments are copper based and lethal for inverts

dont over stock, keep up with your water changes, make your fish fat and happy and ich will never be an issue. but again this was my personal experience.