Lance's 225 gal tank

Lance · #11 03-10-2009, 01:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GreenSpottedPuffer

Man that is rough. I hate to loose fish too. Thats why I have stopped with QT.

The last QT I did was hypo. 6 weeks no fish in the display and fish in 1.008. Fish got ich about 3 weeks after going back to the display. No new fish added. Tried it all over again for 8 weeks and lost my favorite fish in QT this time. Again, still got ich. Never again. I did a ridiculous amounts of reading and found the longest documented case of ich surviving without a host was just over 3 months. Not all strains can do this and I think its rare but who knows what strain is in the tank...there are apparently hundreds.

Some are thought to have a decent immunity to hypo now too. Why not? Everything evolves. Especially hardy parasites like ich.

I am one that believes if this problem is not dealt with from the beginning at wholesalers and collectors holding tanks, it will get out of hand one day to the point the ich parasite will be a "super bug" kind of thing. May get hard to treat.

Its hard to treat already...hypo is not always going to work and copper destroys a tangs gut fauna. I would never copper tangs personally. I think it takes years off their lives.

Yeah, I read your old thread the other night. I too have been reading everything I can find on Ich, and I still don't know the answer. (Apparently there already is a Super Parasite showing up now).
I quarantine all my new fish in a permanent QT set-up with live rock, skimmer, etc. for 2 to 3 weeks just to observe them, fatten them up, and to make sure they`re healthy before going into the DT. If they do indeed have something I remove them and treat in a other hospital tank. I`ve had good success with quarantining them but not so good when having to treat a fish. Sometimes I think treatment is every bit as bad as the affliction. This time I couldn`t because of the unfortunate arrival times of the two fish I had ordered. In hindsight, I should have set up another QT and put them both in quarantine. Then I wouldn`t have Ich in my system now. I`ve got company coming tonight so there`s not much I can do about it tonight anyway. I`ll think it over tonight and decide to leave them be or remove them all for 8 weeks.