The fishes got the white spot

[darrelww]

My LPS tank has 5 fishes in there, I discover they got the white spot. So what can I do? and I am new to salt water. My tank is 20 gallons. Thanks for help!(scary)

[Garrett]

Move all fish and either use copper or hypo and let your displsy go fallow, or take all coral out and use.copper or hypo in it

[NoobtoSalt]

What type of fish? Sounds like too many fish in20 gallon but depends on the fish

 

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[Garrett]

Ya, little overstocked but i did the same thing on my first twenty and upgraded real quick. There is no reef safe option. If you have a place to put coral id do that and nuke display with copper that way ypu s

Dont have to reloxate fish for 8-10 weeks.

Hyposalinity and copper are the only proven cures for ick. Also the coral would be able to fair in a smaller tank

[NoobtoSalt]

The main reason I stated that was that the fish are likely stressed from being in a smaller tank. Moving the fish into another tank at this point IMO is not something I would suggest. They are already stressed so moving them to another tank is just going to cause them more stress. Just feed with some sort of a garlic supplement along with your food and hope for the best at this point. I've lost a ton of fish from Ich so I'm no expert by all means but that's what I've done in the past. I had an achilles tang live for only 2 days, looked amazing in the store and broke out with ich as soon as it got home in the tank. I've also had velvet but (knock on wood) I hope that never happens again. Good luck on whatever you do. There will be all sorts of suggestions and there really is no specific right answer to this from my experience.

[Gill]

Move all fish and either use copper or hypo and let your displsy go fallow' date=' or take all coral out and use.copper or hypo in it[/quote']

 

Don't use copper in the display!!!!

[Gill]

Proceed with cation Noobto salt is no longer a noob and he is right, moving your fish into a quarantine could easily kill them. I currently have my display in hypo because after having ick in my system for years I was finally fed up. Thats right I said years!!! In that time I only lost 2 fish to it.

 

My advice is to take your time, do tons of reaserch and then decide what to do. Unfortunately you are facing a hard decision. Like noob said post up your stock list it may help us to give you better advice.

 

P.S. feeding your fish well and riding it out is a real option, but that hinges on your stock list.

[cellowithgills]

+1 Also never hurts to soak their food in some garlic extract. That's all I do now if I see signs of illness and it usually helps the fish fight it off.

[Cirenus]

What do you have as far as substrate goes? Do you have live sand? Crushed coral? If it is live sand, you will never get rid of it unless you, take all fish out, and either wait 2 months, or empty water, and clean the sand, and then refill it, and let it sit for 30 days. Ich will infect your fish, and fill up, then drop to your sand bed to lay eggs, which sit for upwards of 10-60 days. The eggs will not be able to live once they hatch if their is no fish for them to feed off of. They will drop back to the sandbed, and go dormant for 30 days if no food is present before they starve. When rinsing the sand, use non salt water, and make it cold water, it will kill the ich from shock if you go this route.

[Cirenus]

As far as your fish go, you can do the dip method to help knock the parasites off before moving them to a different tank, the dip method is essentially a quick dunk in some Low salinity saltwater, the quick change in salinity will cause the parasites to fall off from shock, while not hurting your fish since it is a quick dip.

[Gill]

As far as your fish go' date=' you can do the dip method to help knock the parasites off before moving them to a different tank, the dip method is essentially a quick dunk in some Low salinity saltwater, the quick change in salinity will cause the parasites to fall off from shock, while not hurting your fish since it is a quick dip.[/quote']

 

Dont forget about PH. You will hurt your fish if you dip them in freshwater unless you use a buffer to raise the PH of the freshwater.

[beardedsmurf]

Don't use copper in the display!!!!

 

This cannot be emphasized enough.

 

DO. NOT. USE. COPPER. IN. YOUR. DISPLAY. TANK. ***EVER***

 

(If you plan on ever having corals in that tank ever again... If it's fish-only, then have at it, but do not ever add any corals later on because that copper will not go away.)

[Derbird]

Oh man that is a bummer :(. First question, are you sure its ICH? There are a few different parisites that make white spots and they have different treatments (of course DOH!). Do a few google serches and look at the forums old threads to be sure its ICH and not some other nasty.

 

This is a subject that has a huge amount of dissagreement on how to deal with the outbreak. Best advice is to do as much reaserch as you can stand, then do that much again and then decide which if any course of action is best for your situation.

 

Hypo seems to have good results but only works if it is ICH and not any other parisite. Fresh water dips will kill the cysts on the outside of the fish but not any internally. Copper works but as stated above must be done in a deticated tank the will NEVER EVER house coral or inverts. And as Noob stated doing any of the above will stress an already stressed out sick fish. There is no easy answer here :(

 

I have also read you shouldn't do more then one treatment at once. Not sure why but I have seen it said enough that I thought it must be important.

 

What ever you do try to reduce the stress of your tank and try some garlic extreme or similar. Also I agree with others that five fish seems like a lot in a 20 gallon unless they are tiny. This is most likely adding more stress to your tank.

 

Good luck with the battle and keep us posted.

 

Oh and just to be sure

 

NEVER EVER UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES USE COPPER IN YOUR DISPLAY TANK OR WITH ANY ROCK OR EQUIPMENT YOU MAY EVER WANT IN YOUR DISPLAY TANK

[Cirenus]

Dont forget about PH. You will hurt your fish if you dip them in freshwater unless you use a buffer to raise the PH of the freshwater.

 

the PH wont matter since it is a quick dip, you are not holding the fish underneath the water, just dunking in and out once.

[Derbird]

the PH wont matter since it is a quick dip' date=' you are not holding the fish underneath the water, just dunking in and out once.[/quote']

 

PH does matter since the bath will last 30 minutes. I have never done a freshwater dip myself but here is a good how to thread on another forum (yes I have been unfaithful (scary))

 

http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/f15/freshwater-dip-marine-fishes-27019/

 

Edit, they have a nice write up on ICH too

 

http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/f15/marine-ich-myths-facts-27003/

[YUP]

As far as your fish go' date=' you can do the dip method to help knock the parasites off before moving them to a different tank, the dip method is essentially a quick dunk in some Low salinity saltwater, the quick change in salinity will cause the parasites to fall off from shock, while not hurting your fish since it is a quick dip.[/quote']

 

I was under the impression that you use freshwater for the dip treatment. Cause the Marine Ick cannot survive it and will go into shock and fall off. Plus, there is alot of different responses on how long to leave your saltwater fish in the freshwater dip. From most websites i have read, 5-10 minutes max. Which, i would think is plenty long enough to shock the ICK into submission(enforcer).

 

Anyways, Like NOOB said, why put the fish into a more stressful environment and im pretty sure a saltwater fish would think freshwater isn't cool.(flame)

[Cirenus]

I've seen people do the dip method in several different ways, some just dip it once, and usually thats enough shock to make the parasites drop off. Like someone said earlier though this is just to kill the external and not the internal parasites.

[Gill]

I was under the impression that you use freshwater for the dip treatment. Cause the Marine Ick cannot survive it and will go into shock and fall off. Plus, there is alot of different responses on how long to leave your saltwater fish in the freshwater dip. From most websites i have read, 5-10 minutes max. Which, i would think is plenty long enough to shock the ICK into submission(enforcer).

 

Anyways, Like NOOB said, why put the fish into a more stressful environment and im pretty sure a saltwater fish would think freshwater isn't cool.(flame)

 

The ancestors of all boney fish evolved in freshwater, this gives saltwater boney fish an advantage in freshwater that crustations (such as the ick parasite) do not have. A lower salinity is actually less stressful on most saltwater fish as it has the ability to contain more oxygen. Chemicals such as Ammonia are also less potent at a lower specific gravity. Many saltwater aquariusts who keep only fish always keep their salinity at lower levels. I do agree that a freshwater dip is stressful though, especially since you are catching the (presumably) in a net and then putting it into a very small container and then into the net again so that you can get them back into the tank.

[Gill]

............

[MVPaquatics]

The ancestors of all bony fish (osteichtyes) are actually probably ostracoderms (400-500 million years ago). They branched into jawed (gnathostomes) and jawless fishes (agnatha - only hagfish and lampreys still extant). Jawed fish split into osteichythes (bony fish) and chondrichythes (cartilaginous fish). Osteichythes further expanded into sarcopterygians (lobe-finned fish) and actinopterygians (ray-finned fish).

 

The majority of this took place in the ocean, not freshwater. Ich also has different species. Freshwater ich is Ichthyophthirius multifiliis, while saltwater ich is Cryptocaryon irritans. They are totally different but just act in similar ways...I don't believe they can move around (IE if you have freshwater ich, your saltwater fish should be fine).

 

Dips kill the ich purely by osmosis. The pH effect is (or should be) very minimal (if you used pH to kill, it would kill the fish too). We use osmosis to our advantage here. By adding a marine fish to freshwater, you are essentially pumping both animals (ich and fish) full of freshwater (osmosis causes the water to rush into the fish/ich). It kills because it takes much less time to "pump up" and flood the ick with water vs. the fish. This is also why the fish becomes more and more stressed over time...There is a fine line between killing the ich and harming the fish. Conversely, when adding a freshwater fish to salt water dip, this causes both animals to LOSE water. You are dehydrating them. Again there is a fine line between killing the ich and harming the fish.

 

Fish have the ability to regulate their water intake to some degree. This is how estuarine fish survive. Freshwater fish are constantly excreting dilute urine to expel excess water. Saltwater fish are always trying to take on more water (only excreting concentrated urine), this is why they can go down a bit of salinity to no detriment, as it helps them regulate (there is less of a gradient). Think like if you want to lower your body temp at 70 degrees, it is easier to do from 75 than 80, but 65 is of no help. Salinity is the same, there is a degree where is can help the fish to no put so much energy into osmotic balance, but going too far doesn't help. This is also why adding a touch of salt to freshwater tanks can help some organisms osmo-regulate (especially with nitrite poisoning).

 

Also, ammonia toxicity is based on pH (higher is more toxic) not really salinity. A solution with lower pH has more available protons, and those extra protons are around to bind and covert ammonia into ammonium (less toxic).

[Gill]

The ancestors of all bony fish (osteichtyes) are actually probably ostracoderms (400-500 million years ago). They branched into jawed (gnathostomes) and jawless fishes (agnatha - only hagfish and lampreys still extant). Jawed fish split into osteichythes (bony fish) and chondrichythes (cartilaginous fish). Osteichythes further expanded into sarcopterygians (lobe-finned fish) and actinopterygians (ray-finned fish).

 

The majority of this took place in the ocean, not freshwater. Ich also has different species. Freshwater ich is Ichthyophthirius multifiliis, while saltwater ich is Cryptocaryon irritans. They are totally different but just act in similar ways...I don't believe they can move around (IE if you have freshwater ich, your saltwater fish should be fine).

 

Dips kill the ich purely by osmosis. The pH effect is (or should be) very minimal (if you used pH to kill, it would kill the fish too). We use osmosis to our advantage here. By adding a marine fish to freshwater, you are essentially pumping both animals (ich and fish) full of freshwater (osmosis causes the water to rush into the fish/ich). It kills because it takes much less time to "pump up" and flood the ick with water vs. the fish. This is also why the fish becomes more and more stressed over time...There is a fine line between killing the ich and harming the fish. Conversely, when adding a freshwater fish to salt water dip, this causes both animals to LOSE water. You are dehydrating them. Again there is a fine line between killing the ich and harming the fish.

Your not the only one to take Biology, apparently it's been a while since you graduated though. LOL.

 

This is just the first search result to pop up, perhapse you need a refresher course. http://m.io9.com/5883216/most-fish-actually-evolved-on-land-not-the-sea

[MVPaquatics]

that article has no sources, no citations, no proof. That is what an internet search gets. The author (whoever that is) compares it to dolphins and whales...wow!

 

He brings up 170 million years ago, what happened to the previous 200-250 million before that? HE EVEN SAYS HE DOESNT KNOW! Science is conservative. Most all life started in the ocean, why would fish be different? They try to claim mass extinctions, which did occur, but to say that the freshwater and land areas where unaffected at this time is just crazy. The freshwater and land habitats were barely even beginning their diversification, at this point in time.

 

Everything I stated in my post was scientific fact.

 

 

PS. ick arent crustaceans. People always seem to take offense to being corrected...its nothing personal.

[Gill]

I said it was the first hit for exactly that reason. When I get home I will find you an artical in a pear reviewed journal. I was taught this last year, when did you graduate??? You are wrong and can't except it, this is the defining characteristic of a fool.

[Gill]

http://books.google.com/books?id=YRcAVvmE6eMC&pg=PA162&dq=Bony+fish+evolved+in+freshwater&ei=ne8eUIvGHoPgkATI24DwAQ&output=html_text&cd=2

Encyclopidea of Evolution page 162

 

"Bony fishes evolved in freshwater conditions and were restricted to freshwater for

the first 160 million years of their existence. Evolutionary scientists speculate that

their bones were more important as a way of storing calcium, a mineral that ..."

[Gill]

http://books.google.com/books?id=uF7RZN5LjRQC&pg=PA569&dq=Bony+fish+evolved+in+freshwater&ei=evEeUOScKY7ilQSQi4HIDg&output=html_text&cd=1

Inivation to Biology page 569

"(b) /« bony saltwater fish, the body fluids are less concentrated than the

surrounding environment. ... If the earliest vertebrates — the fish — evolved in

fresh water, as is generally believed, the first function of the kidneys was probably

to pump ..."