Six line wrasse eats ich off other fish????

[wickedfrags]

ich is an internal parasite, not an external one. Cleaner shrimp, cleaner wrasses ect. do not help with ick but will clean other parasites.

[christyf5]

I swear by neon gobies. They're captive bred and easy to feed if theres nothing to pick at.

I was under the impression that ick (Cryptocaryon irritans) was an external parasite. It adheres to the skin of the fish, makes its way into the mucous layer and into the epithelium. While at this point anything attempting to "eat" the parasite off of the fish would be ineffective, the initial "spots" found on the fish as tiny salt grains would be halted from completing the life cycle.

[justinl]

+1 for christy's suggestion. while neon gobies aren't quite the parasite eating machines that cleaner wrasses are, they aren't completely dependent on parasites as food; in fact they take to prepared foods quite well. cleaner wrasses die probabl 99% of the time in captivity because they are so damn picky... and even if they do eat prepared foods (rare, but not unheard of) they still die well before their time. It seems that they can only get the right diet from a steady diet of parasites.

cleaner shrimp are sort of hit or miss (more often the latter) it seems. might just depend how well fed it is and how complying the fish feels.

I could see a sixline eating external parasites if it were hungry enough but it certainly isn't anywhere near conclusive... if i were you i wouldn't bother with that route.

[Johnny Reefer]

FWIW, I had a Cleaner Wrasse that ate small Silverside bits like they were it's last meal. Not sayin' all CW's will do this, but one could get lucky. I guess I was a lucky one. Recommend observing a store feeding. And for the record, yes the CW I had died, but that was during a crosstown move. I had the little guy for a year and a half prior to that.

HTH and cheers,

[SATELLITE]

when i noticed that my fish had ich, i used selcon and garlic guard on all food and let it soak. did this for 1 week and for me this works very well

[fishoholic]

Originally Posted by SATELLITE

when i noticed that my fish had ich, i used selcon and garlic guard on all food and let it soak. did this for 1 week and for me this works very well

I have been using both for the last 4 months, it helped a bit but the fish still has spots.

I didn't want to get a cleaner wrasse because of their low survival rate.

A neon goby? I saw some at the LFS today maybe I'll go back.

I realize that my tank will always have ich in it and I know that the only sure fire way to get rid off it is to do what Kabong suggested. Since the other fish do not seem to be affected by the ich and since I don't have that large of a QT tank, I feel like I have three options.

1) Pull out 200 pounds of LR and corals (PITA) and catch the Lavender tang QT her and after she has healed and gotten rid of the ich sell her

2) Buy a fish to help her fight off the ich and mabye she'll heal on her own

or 3) I can do what I have been doing which is nothing (other then garlic and selcon which isn't really helping) and learn to live with the fact that after a year and 1/2 of having her (ich free) my lavender tang now has ich

So a neon goby you say....

[christyf5]

Ya know, for the $14.99 or whatever that you'll spend on the neon goby I'd just try it anyways. Depending on how far advanced the ich is, it may not help but will probly help slow the life cycle if nothing else. And if it doesn't work you've got a new fun little fish in your tank It beats tearing the tank down for a first try anyways.