Malachite green

[jennytheleopardgrouper]

Hi all, my baby regal tang has developed ich (gasp). I'm currently waiting for him to swm into an easy to scoop position so I can give him a dip in malachite green. He's very active still, and eating like a pig.

My questions are:

How much malachite green do I use for say, 5 cups of water? I thought I'd check here if anyone mixes theirs with less or more than they recommend.

Second, I'd like to quarantine him but my quarantine tank is full of angry damsels right now so thats out of the question. My concern is that the malachite green left on the skin and lungs of my tang may be detrimental to the life (mainly the shrimp) in my main tank. Is it okay to just dip the tang, them put him directly back into the main tank?

Thanks!

[i have crabs]

i dont think matchlite is a good way to deal with the problem thier is a good chance youl od and kill him tangs dont cope with matchlite well,if hes really covered i might help him long enough for a real treatment to start working but it might just stress him out and make it worse i would recomend copper but you need to have a qt tank you can devote only to fish,buying a 67g qt tank to use copper was the best thing i have done to prevent serious problems in any of my main tanks.

[monza]

I think you should do a lot more reading/reasearch on Ich. There is lots of info and be prepared to read lots. IMO do not use mactchlite green.
Sorry I can not just give you a simple answer, they are many opinions on how to treat it and prevent it.

My advive now would be make sure your water parameters are as pristine as possible and add some sort of garlic or garlic extract to the food you are feeding the fish.

Good luck, Ich sucks but is rather common and a frustrating part of the hobby.

Dave

[Matt]

My best advice on MG ... drop it in a plastic bag and take it to the fire department for disposal as hazardous waste. It is pretty well established that this chemical is bad for you (never mind your fish). Bad for your skin, lungs, and possibly a carcinogen. There must be better ways to deal with Ich.

[jennytheleopardgrouper]

Okay, well can anyone recommend something else? My water parameters are great, I'm feeding garlic daily and I have 2 cleaner shrimp. All my fish are fed mysis, Prime Reef flake, and Nori on a daily basis. I can't see what else I can do that would be preventitive.

My tang is absolutely covered in ich, and what I've been doing hasn't helped at all. Has anyone had luck with Malachite Green, or any other treatment? Any input would be appreciated, I don't want to lose my tang.

Thanks

[Doormatt]

Have you tried a freshwater dip? That should get a bunch of them off.

[monza]

I guess you didn't like my suggestion of reading some info.
So I would suggest hyposalinity.
But you'll need some good info, so here it is:

http://www.petsforum.com/personal/trevor-jones/marineich.html

What size is your tank, what else is in the tank. How long and how small is the tang.

Dave

[jennytheleopardgrouper]

Hi Monza, yes I agree that reading up on ich is a really good idea, and I've read quite a bit on it. Problem is that everyone has different ideas on what should and shouldnt be done to treat it, and much of the time their info isn't necessarily species-specific. (Thank you for the link though, I've read it)

I just thought I'd ask people who have actually been in my place what works, from personal experience...'tis why this site is so helpful.

Thanks everyone for your input, much appreciated. [/img]

[i have crabs]

using hypo in a tank with inverts is not possible and it will kill any live rock you have in thier, i used the hypo treatment for the first case of ich i ever got and it got rid of the ich but caused a big bacterial infection wich killed more fish than the ich the nitrates flew through the roof when the rock died so 2 buckets of salt later and a refractometer i desided next time it would be copper,wich i now have a 67g qt that i use copper in before any fish go in with any others

[Edmonton Eskimo]

Are you positive that it is ich? Velvet can look a lot like ich and is much more deadly. Are your fish gasping at all? If not then it is ich. Paraguard by seachem is a good choice for ich. You will need to use a qt tank however. I have made the giant mistake of not qting my fish and I will never introduce another fish into my tanks without qt. Anthony Calfo said it best "to not use a quarantine tank is like playing russian roulette, everyone loses in the end some just get to play longer than others." That is probably the truest statement I have ever heard in my experience as an aquarist.

[i have crabs]

i tryed paraguard before the hypo and over 2-3 weeks it barley even held it off let alone fix it and also the main ingredent is machlite green anyway which you can od and kill your fish with

[Maverick]

I'll get slammed/flamed for this , but I have had luck with KickIch . I know a lot of reefers don't believe in it, but it has worked well twice for me . Once on clowns and now on my Regal.

He was covered in Ich . Now he is fine. I have him in a 33 QT tank. Going through the complete treatment and he'll go back in the main tank. I did learn that yuo have to double the recomended dosage for it to work though.

Brent

[monza]

Another link to a thread about ick.... very long.

http://reefs.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=74926&highlight=ick

The reason I did not offer up a opinion right away is so many people have so many ideas that you have to do what you think is best. There are only two 'proven' ways to kill ick, copper and hyposalinity. It's a science not some mystery. It's a animal/parisite a obligate protozoan, they know it's life cycle and how to kill it. People will say they this and that worked for me, yet they get it again so no it did not work the tank still has ick. It can't be seen so thats OK for most. Then some thing happens in your tank, your fish stress and wow ick is back.

You can patch it with a band aid so it looks like it's gone or kill the parisite for good. I'd rather not depate it, so I told you to read lots. The more you or anyone reads the right info regarding ich I think you would agree. Do a search on reef.org if you don't agree and let the endless threads debate the topic for me.

My last post I gave you my opinion on what I would do and also asked the details on your tank. For larger tanks removing one fish is all most impossible and the parisite would still be present in the water so removing one fish would be useless. I still need all your tank details but I'm sort of assuming it is smallish and I'd remove all fish into a QT tank and let the tank go fallow(sp?) for the required 5-6weeks. You have damsels in your QT tank so get rid of them or get a new tank. Do the hyposalinity in the QT tank and be very strict about Qt'ing all new fish. Here's another good link and it's way long this is part one of five. http://www.marineaquariumadvice.com/aquarium_fish_1.html

ICH SUCKS how is the fish and how big is it? I've tried most cures and IMO do what the pros and marine biologists say.

Dave