cisco1717

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kathy c said they do but my ? is: After you take out all the fishes and qt them in a separte tank what happens to the ich in the display tank with the corals & inverts. will ich die out, can they survive in Live rocks and sand or do they really need a host to live.
 

D1J8Z

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Any healthy fish will be able to fight ich, consider it a common cold. If your loosing fish do to ich consider your system unstable or maybe try a new LFS.
 

cisco1717

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i just looked at the link that kathy c was so kind to show. very informative and just as i thought, like a person you dont get a disease or parsite unless u contracted it from someone or somewhere. And am no expert but fluctation in temp or bad h2o parameters do not create parasites it just weaken the immune system which can make you ill
 

marrone

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Any healthy fish will be able to fight ich, consider it a common cold. If your loosing fish do to ich consider your system unstable or maybe try a new LFS.


So true....

I wouldn't equate ich to the common cold. Plenty healthy fish get ich, and unless treated, die from it. Remeber even if the fish is able to fight it off, basically live with the ich, there is still ich in your system which can overwhelm a fish at some point in time, especially if it's stressed out, injuried or harrassed.

Just because you lose a fish, or a bunch of fish, to ich doesn't mean your system is unstable or your fish aren't healthy. Many people have introduced ich into their system, whether through an infected fish or LR, and have lost fish from it. There are also strains of ich that kills pretty fast, matter of fact there was a strain going around about a year ago that wipe out a lot of people fish.
 
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D1J8Z

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I wouldn't equate ich to the common cold. Plenty healthy fish get ich, and unless treated, die from it. Remeber even if the fish is able to fight it off, basically live with the ich, there is still ich in your system which can overwhelm a fish at some point in time, especially if it's stressed out, injured or harassed.

Just because you lose a fish, or a bunch of fish, to ich doesn't mean your system is unstable or your fish aren't healthy. Many people have introduced ich into their system, whether through an infected fish or LR, and have lost fish from it. There are also strains of ich that kills pretty fast, matter of fact there was a strain going around about a year ago that wipe out a lot of people fish.

Any fish being stressed out,injured or harassed is at a high risk of death with or without ich. If the same fish with ich was not being picked on there is a good chance that fish can properly fight the disease providing high water quality including stable temperature, adequate shelter, and nutrition
 

juiceguy

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from what i understand about ich is that all fish carry the parasite, it is when the fish is stressed out and its immune system is weaken that it manifests itself. usual causes are large temp swings and water parameters.
 

aquagardener

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I've been in the hobby for about 3 years now (not counting many years of freshwater aquariums before moving into saltwater). I've done the dance with ich many times, just about always equated with adding someone new to the tank and sometimes just from the stress of switching tanks. Anyhow, I've come across a product that helps to get rid of it quick (as long as you treat at the first signs of it). I have a tank full of soft coral and this stuff doesn't hurt any of them. It is called Marine Max from a company called Tropical Science. It's worth having on hand just in case... I also use it when I do water changes... (and no, I don't own stock in the company or get any kind of kickbacks!)
 

marrone

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Any fish being stressed out,injured or harassed is at a high risk of death with or without ich.
Maybe maybe not, it all depends on the situation. Remember all you have to do is remove the problems, that is causing the fish stress or the fish that is harassing it, and the fish will be fine. In the same situtation, in a tank that has ich, there is a greater likely hood that it will die from the ich, even if you remove those conditions. Healthy fish get ich and unless treated, die from it.

If the same fish with ich was not being picked on there is a good chance that fish can properly fight the disease providing high water quality including stable temperature, adequate shelter, and nutrition

It maybe able to fight the ich better than a fish that is stressed but that doesn't mean it's going to be able to beat it. Also you're not fighting off a diseases, ich is a parasite. Many healthy fish, in great stable systems, die from ich. A lot of people go on the principle that their system is good, the good water quality, fish is health and eating, and don't treat their fish when they come down with ich. A lot of them wind up losing the fish.
 

marrone

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I've been in the hobby for about 3 years now (not counting many years of freshwater aquariums before moving into saltwater). I've done the dance with ich many times, just about always equated with adding someone new to the tank and sometimes just from the stress of switching tanks. Anyhow, I've come across a product that helps to get rid of it quick (as long as you treat at the first signs of it). I have a tank full of soft coral and this stuff doesn't hurt any of them. It is called Marine Max from a company called Tropical Science. It's worth having on hand just in case... I also use it when I do water changes... (and no, I don't own stock in the company or get any kind of kickbacks!)

This has been posted many times, Marine Max isn't a treatment for ich. It doesn't kill the ich just builds up the fish immune system. You need to keep treating with it even after the ich is gone, which if it did the job you wouldn't need to.
 

marrone

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http://www.bestfish.com/saltich.html


"saltwater fish have a number of natural defenses against ich, and if the fish are healthy enough and the outbreak mild enough, sometimes the fish may cure themselves, just as they would in nature."

and yes anyone can google

"the outbreak mild enough, sometimes the fish may cure themselves, just as they would in nature."

What do you consider mild? In a closed system the ich can mulitple very fast, especially if you're adding fish which become new hosts. As for curing themselves, well in the wild they can swim away so the ich doesn't reinfect them or keep it to a point where the ich doesn't overwhelm them, something very hard to do in a fish tank.


Did you read the whole article?

"1.015 seems to inhibit the breeding cycle of the parasites. Giving the fish a two minute freshwater dip may eradicate parasites from the outer layers of skin and gills. ."

Well we know ich can and does survive at 1.015, just look up Hypo. Also a 2 minute dip in fresh water does little to nothing to remove ich spores that are embedded into a fish skin, eyes or gills.

"It is very important, however, not to mistake a temporary reprieve for a complete cure. Quite often, ich symptoms subside for a week or two, only to return a hundred fold with the next wave of parasitic swarmers.In another common situation, the ich and fish reach a sort of "stand-off", where neither the fish nor the parasites get the upper hand. The fishes natural defenses keep the disease under control and the symptoms disappear, but there are still plenty of parasites in the aquarium. Any new fish added are quickly overwhelmed by parasites and die in a few days."

Some fish do seem to become immune, or just seem to live with it, but if the parasites become to many, especially when adding new fish, even the ones that seem immune may come down with the ich and die from it.





And yes anyone can google, and find what you want, whether it's right or not.
 
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aquagardener

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This has been posted many times, Marine Max isn't a treatment for ich. It doesn't kill the ich just builds up the fish immune system. You need to keep treating with it even after the ich is gone, which if it did the job you wouldn't need to.
my experience with Marine Max is that when I spot a fish with a spot of ich, I give the tank a dose and watch... if that's the end of it, I don't treat anymore. I do try to add it for the general health and well being of my fish when I do a water change (about once a month)... but even if it is just boosting my fishes immune systems, I don't see that as a bad thing. Once upon a time I was regularly plagued by ich, but thankfully, not so much anymore and generally not to the extent of losing fish from the occasional outbreaks.

PLUS... I don't have to stress everyone in my tank out by sticking the net in there and chasing fish all over the place so I can pull one out to quarantine. I haven't mastered the art of fish hypnosis to get them to willing swim into the net YET!!!

please take no offense to my reply.... I'm just relaying my experience with a problem and a product that works for me and maybe will help some others out too... I don't claim to be an expert, but I do the best I can to respect the animals I care for.
 

KathyC

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kathy c said they do but my ? is: After you take out all the fishes and qt them in a separte tank what happens to the ich in the display tank with the corals & inverts. will ich die out, can they survive in Live rocks and sand or do they really need a host to live.

Gotta throw in a correction here Cisco to your original question-
I did not say that inverts carry ich, to my knowledge they do not and that is why it is not suggested that they too get moved to a QT tank when you have to treat for ich. You only need move the fish to a QT.

Regarding corals - I said that it is possible for corals that are moved from an ich infected tank to bring the ich with them.

We've all seen the question ...."I haven't added anything (meaning fish) to my tank in X amount of time, where did I get ich from?" ..and then we sit here and suggest to the lamenting reefer that maybe their fish got stressed, or their parameters are off, or ask if there was a temp swing or 12 other things...when maybe all they did was purchase a coral that came from a system with ich in it...
I am NOT suggesting that is always the case when a new fish hasn't been introduced, but it is food for thought. We know we have to leave a tank fallow for 6-8 weeks after we take out the fish. We know ich is a parasite ...
?noun 1.an organism that lives on or in an organism of another species, known as the host, from the body of which it obtains nutriment.
so, no - it cannot live without a host (the fish), but we also know it doesn't die off immediately once you remove the fish (or life would be oh so much simpler!)
The ich is still in the tank for x period of time..here is a quote from ATJ's site that discusses ich..
C. irritans has a four stage life cycle, as shown in Figure 1. The parasitic stage (trophonts) is the one that results in the appearance of white spots all over the fish. The trophonts burrow under the skin where they feed on body fluids and tissue debris. When the trophonts first infect the fish they are small but grow as they feed and so the white spots are initially small but get larger as they mature. Once mature, they drop off the fish and sink/swim down to the substrate where they encyst and begin to reproduce. In this stage they are called tomonts. After a number of days in which the tomonts divide, the cyst ruptures, releasing the tomites. Tomites may differentiate into theronts, the infective stage, which actively seek a host to reinfect.

Point is, once the trophonts fall off the fish they lands somewhere in your tank..unforunately most of us have rock and sand and CORALS down there where the tomonts land.

So yes, IMO you can transfer ich from one tank to another on a coral.

Google "fish ich" and you will find 2,730,000 links (no kidding!)
I'd like to see this discussion get away from the fish themselves and what works/doesn't work and get it back to the OP's original question about ich in regard to inverts (we already know about that) but mostly about transfering ich through coral trades/sales.
I'd like to know what you folks think about that?
 

regal

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......Healthy fish get ich and unless treated, die from it....

???Fish with ich should be treated or they would die??? Some of my fish get ich every year esp. the surgeon's fish. I don't treat them. No UV or special diet. They have been fine for years.

Fish Count:
Regal angel
Flame angel
Blueface angel
Hippo Tang
Sohal Tang
Powder blue Tang
Chevron Tang
Spawning pair of GSM
Midas Blenny
6-line wrasse
Flame hawk
 

marrone

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???Fish with ich should be treated or they would die??? Some of my fish get ich every year esp. the surgeon's fish. I don't treat them. No UV or special diet. They have been fine for years.

Fish Count:
Regal angel
Flame angel
Blueface angel
Hippo Tang
Sohal Tang
Powder blue Tang
Chevron Tang
Spawning pair of GSM
Midas Blenny
6-line wrasse
Flame hawk

Yes everyone has tons of the fish, loaded with ich, and they live forever. As a matter of fact ich never kills any fish, it's the water, just like Pierce said. :splitspin
 

aquagardener

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I know firsthand that water from an ich infested tank added to an "ich-free" tank will contaminate the clean tank. So if you know your coral is coming from an infested tank, I'm hypothesizing that since the corals have water on and in them, it would be a really good idea to quarantine long enough for any of the freeswimmers to die off without a host fish.

This theory sends instant gratification right down the drain and also requires a high quality setup for the quarantine system to keep the coral alive for that 6 to 8 weeks.

Does anyone quarantine corals? I don't know of any of my reefkeeping friends that do. I guess we all just play the odds by buying from reliable sources with healthy tanks and keeping our own tanks as healthy as possible.
 

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