The Ichy Mess

DRC Archive General Saltwater Discussion
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Honestly have you read information presented on the site which Ian linked to which I have given you the URL for. There is a page on marine ich and a page on hypo.

[quote=“logans_daddy, post:19, topic:941”]

It is possible that once someone introduces a fish that has gone through hypo into their tank an outbreak of marine velvet will occur and they could lose all of their fish

Jon, what do you mean by this? Are you implying that marine velvet could be impervous to the QT process or are you implying that marine velvet could be already in the DT? If its the former, then why do you QT?[/quote]

Hypo salinity treats ich, period. It is not what should be used to treat other diseases such as velvet. Qt does not imply hypo salinity, the two terms are not synonyms.

As you stated before if you put a fish in QT and simply observe it for a week before popping it in your tank it does not mean you will have prevented any disease from entering your tank. Many of the pests do not harm the fish significantly and become visible to the human eye unless the fish is stressed.

I do not QT because I think it solves all of my problems and gives me the perfect display tank and makes my animals bullet proof. I put my fish through a “hyposalinity” treatment to remove ich and carefully monitor them during this period keeping an eye out for other problems. I am still working on my QT procedures and do not have all the answers.

I present this information for the benefit of Ian and others that may read this. All I am presenting my opinions and the facts I have found which would refute some of Shawn’s statements. I have not laid out here exactly what to do and strongly encourage anyone to read the above information Lee has presented in his articles and seek out more sources as well. I do not believe Lee has all the answers and I disagree with him on some points. I try to obtain multiple reliable sources for any information before I believe it and I am always willing to hear a different take on things. I have spent far too long explaining my stand on this topic though.

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[quote=“Gordonious, post:21, topic:941”]
I present this information for the benefit of Ian and others that may read this. All I am presenting my opinions and the facts I have found which would refute some of ShawnÂ’s statements. I have not laid out here exactly what to do and strongly encourage anyone to read the above information Lee has presented in his articles and seek out more sources as well. I do not believe Lee has all the answers and I disagree with him on some points. I try to obtain multiple reliable sources for any information before I believe it and I am always willing to hear a different take on things. I have spent far too long explaining my stand on this topic though. [/quote]

What I mean by that is I don’t want you, Shawn, to think I am just posting for the sake of arguing with you. Don’t want to seem like I’m just anti anything you say. :wink:

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Wow, one day and 2 pages of arguing. :stuck_out_tongue: It is a very controversial topic though, and almost always brings up some “discussion”. Here is my take on the situation. I haven’t qt’d any of the fish in our DT. I know that if I do have a qt tank I probably would not monitor it often enough to be useful, and I would rather get the fish into a healthy environment ASAP.

This doesn’t mean that I don’t think that you can eliminate Ich from a system by QT and hypo. The scientific principles of letting a tank go falllow for an amount of time and treating incoming fish with hypo should eliminate any occurrence of Ich from your system. My only problem with this method is that to have it be actually successful, you would need to QT any incoming coral for 8 weeks as well, otherwise your efforts are for nothing. Why is this? Because almost every coral comes in attached to a rock or calcareous skeleton of some sort. This means that Ich can hitchhike in on the skeleton/frag-plug/rock that the coral is mounted on and spread through your system.

Since I know that I would neglect the QT system in favor of keeping our other 2 tanks stable, I don’t bother to QT since it will not be effective. I favor keeping a healthy tank as my prophylactic and even thought I have introduced fish to our tank that are showing sings of Ich, we have never had a fish show signs of Ich after being introducted. This may have something to do with the amount of corals in the tank that would eat Ich (as it has been shown that some do), or just the fact that our fishes’’ immune systems are good, but its true.

Even thought I agree with Shawn and Jon partially, I do have to vehemently disagree with something Shawn is implying. I don’t know about you guys, but I try to keep my tank as close to natural conditions as possible. Saying that Scientific research about the Oceans isn’t applicable and hobbyist advice should be taken over a scientific article is just stupid to me. You are going to take the advice of someone who has absolutely no training in how to carry out experiments, has no review of their work or findings over someone who has had at least 4 years, more likely 8 of scientific training, has been taught how to carry out an experiment, has to have their research and findings reviewed by experts in the field in order to get published? Yes our systems are different, but I will take information out of a published peer reviewed journal any day before I take the advice of a hobbyist or an author. I can show you books from 30 years ago by respected authors in the aquarium hobby that said that corals were impossible to keep. Why wouldn’t you believe them? It just seems to be quite ironic that you preach following advice of amateurs over proven scientific findings. If that is the case, why do you bother keeping corals? The day that there is a peer-reviewed scientific journal on aquarium husbandry is the day that I will respect the opinions of “Authors” and “Hobbyists” as much as I respect the opinion of a scientist.

(That wasn’t a personal attack, just an attack on an idea that I see a lot in the hobby… Sorry Shawn.)

P.S. I am slightly biased in that last part, as I now have over 6 years of scientific training and am working on getting my research for the last 2 years published… I know how hard it is to get anything accepted into a journal.

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Even thought I agree with Shawn and Jon partially, I do have to vehemently disagree with something Shawn is implying. I don't know about you guys, but I try to keep my tank as close to natural conditions as possible. Saying that Scientific research about the Oceans isn't applicable and hobbyist advice should be taken over a scientific article is just stupid to me. You are going to take the advice of someone who has absolutely no training in how to carry out experiments, has no review of their work or findings over someone who has had at least 4 years, more likely 8 of scientific training, has been taught how to carry out an experiment, has to have their research and findings reviewed by experts in the field in order to get published? Yes our systems are different, but I will take information out of a published peer reviewed journal any day before I take the advice of a hobbyist or an author. I can show you books from 30 years ago by respected authors in the aquarium hobby that said that corals were impossible to keep. Why wouldn't you believe them? It just seems to be quite ironic that you preach following advice of amateurs over proven scientific findings. If that is the case, why do you bother keeping corals? The day that there is a peer-reviewed scientific journal on aquarium husbandry is the day that I will respect the opinions of "Authors" and "Hobbyists" as much as I respect the opinion of a scientist.

Ok. First, i take no offense, i never do. Either i did a poor job of explaing my thoughts, or you have misunderstood them, either way, i will attempt to clarify although i still think you will disagree >LOL<

In no way shape or form have i said

Scientific research about the Oceans isn’t applicable and hobbyist advice should be taken over a scientific article is just stupid to me.
.

nor have i ever said

It just seems to be quite ironic that you preach following advice of amateurs over proven scientific findings

I will try to make this clear as day. Scientific data collected throughout the oceans of the world are always a baseline. It would be stupid to suggest otherwise. The distinction i try to make is that there is world of difference between what will work in the ocean and what will work in a 50gal glass box in our living rooms. Im not implying that what you, jon, or anyone else has read in a scientiic journal is inaccurate, im simply saying it may not translate to the hobby the way you might think. I will give you a perfect example that particularly irks me. We all know that corals can be exposed for hours out of the day in the wild. We all know that temperatures swing drastically in the wild over the course of a day. I dont dispute the facts, i never have. I believe where the misunderstanding lies is simple. I dont feel that this data translates well into the hobby. Its my opinion. Someone prove me wrong. Here is what i would like to see. Take an average size tank, lets say 75g for sake of argument. Intentionally simulate the temperature variants found in the wild. Intentionaly simiulate low tide, expose the top 30% of your tank to air for a couple of hours a day. Let me know how that works out for you! Our systems simply arent large enough to accurately simulate the ocean.

I know you and jon are biology geeks, and you guys always misunderstand my point about this. Im not attempting to invalidate any publihsed information collected in a scientific manner. Ill will sum it up nice and sweet for you guys.

As a hobbyist, i would much rather go to another highly successful hobbyist for advice than an oceanographer that spends his day on a ship and diving in the ocean. What would someone who’s life passion is observing and understanding life in its natural envirionment know about sustaining said life in an artificial environment? And before that’s quoted, and you guys jump on me again, im not implying that the would have no understading of the needs of the creature, im implying that they would not know all of the insides and outs of the equipment and practices used to emulate the natural environment. Nothing more. Im not saying its not valuable. Im also not saying it doesnt have its place in the hobby, of course it does. Im simply saying that there is a huge difference.

Here is crude analogy, but i hope it makes my point. If im in to RC airplanes, im not going to go to a pilot of a 747 boeing or an aeornautical engineer, im going to go to a hobbyist. Would the pilot and engineer know a lot of the theory/math behind why my little RC plane flies? Sure he would. Could they talk to me all day about atmoshperic/thermal dynamics and the physics of flight? i bet they could. But it doesnt mean the know squat about the hobby of RC planes. If i wanted to build and fly an RC plane, im going to go to someont that successfully builds and files RC planes.

Just a quick point on the subject. If i recall from what ive read time and time again, it would seem a large portion of the oceanic scientific community has great disdain for us hobbyist.

It doenst matter if you agree with me or not Bellamy, i just want you to have a clear understanding of my POV before you disagree! It’s good to know that you agree(somewhat) with my view on QT!

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Dont forget, i am a science guy! I have a BS that proves it :stuck_out_tongue: And its a REAL science, not marine biology >LOL< J/K, it was an easy cheapshot!

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Shawn, I understand what you are saying, and I agree that there is a difference. I guess where I disagree is how profound the difference is mostly. I think it is possible to have a highly successful reef tank if you follow what nature does, including tides. What most people dont realize is that the top of the reef looks nothing like our reef tanks. The tops of most reefs are more or less barren because of the intense light, wave action, and frequent exposure. The parts of the reef we actually mimic in our tanks are about 5-15 feet down, where tides dont expose the majority of the reef ever. That is how most of the lps survive in that area, while the sps survive slightly higher where they may get exposed once a year but can tolerate that exposure for the increased light. This is evident when we take the corals out to frag them. SPS and zoanthids, which tend to occour more in the areas that occasionally get exposed than LPS are generally taken out of the water, cut, and then returned, while many people dont reccomend taking LPS out for any amount of time.

The form of these corals follows how they have adapted, and I think if you simulated that part of the reef your tank would do just fine, however it isnt that part of the reef that most of us replicate.

In any of these situations, if you take a wider view, not just a view from a hobbiest than you may see it from a different light. The degree to which marine biology (not oceanography… that is the study of currents, tides and water quality) is applicable to our tanks may be a matter of opinion. In yours it is low, and in mine it is somewhat higher. The point I was mainly trying to make is that if something is scientifically accepted that means that it is correct to the best of our knowladge. What bothers me is when there is scientific knowladge on something such as the life cycle of Ich or its reaction to hyposalinity and people discard that information as useless because it comes from the ocean. The same principles apply to a species, and it doesnt matter if it is in the ocean or a glass box.

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What bothers me is when there is scientific knowladge on something such as the life cycle of Ich or its reaction to hyposalinity and people discard that information as useless because it comes from the ocean. The same principles apply to a species, and it doesnt matter if it is in the ocean or a glass box.

No, no, no. I dont discard it at all. I never said you couldnt kill ich. I challenge the effectiveness of QT fish in home aquaria. Here is a concession i will make, if it pleases thee! If you start with a sterile tank with no LR. You place a fish in hypo in said tank for the entire known lifecycle of ich you will probably have a tank and fish free of ich. My point was that i feel that almost all DT have ich in them to begin with from LR, coral, inverts, etc, etc.

Maybe you guys can enlighten me? Im an openminded person! Ich is viral right? A virus needs to interact with DNA on a cellular level to propogate right? I dont know these things for sure, im not a bio guy, so im asking. Do we know for sure that there arent mutiple strains of ich? Do we know for sure that ALL ich shares the same life cycle regardless of temperature and other factors that come into play with the import of livestock? Ive read that ich can only host on fish, but do we know for sure that it can no perpetuate its life cycle using other life forms such as microfauna? or smaller less known life forms that hitchike on our LR?

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[s]I disagree with about half of what you said, so i will make it short and sweet since i have to go pick up my son.

Our ability to emulate the ocean is going to be directly proportional to the size of our system. Which is why i used an average size tank as an example The large the system, the closer our simulation. I think i made this point before months ago, but i will make it again.

If i allowed my temperature in an average size aquarium to simulate the average peak to valley temperatures in a reef, bad things might happen. First off, like i said, most of us dont keep biotopes. For example. If fish A resides in a lagoon where the temperatue ranges from 74-84 over the course of a day, it has an opportunity to find cooler or hotter water by changing its depth to suite its needs[/s]…ahhhh…you know what? :SURRENDER

This has to be done in person, it needs to be an interactive dialogue. Seacrest out!

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No, Ich isnt actually a virus, it is a parasite that infects the host, replicates and then falls out. It is actually a protozoan of some sort I belive. It is called a disease simply because that is the term used to represent the symptoms.

Ich parasites reporduce in the soft flesh of the fish, and would have a very very hard time entering any sort of invertabrate. Once they enter the fish, they are parasitic and go through their reproductive cycle, part of which they drop out of the host for a time to incubate. The idea that they are dropped out after a time is what makes QT and hypo effective for Ich in particular. The idea is that if you allow a tank to go fallow, when the 14 day incubation is up the organism can only exist for a short time without a host. If it doesnt have a host within this time frame they will die. As long as there are no fish in the tank, this means that the tank will not have ich after a time. With the fish in a proper qt with hypo, once the parasites drop out they are exposed to they hypo salinity which kills them. This is why Ich CAN be eliminated if the correct procedures are followed.

With that being said, if you take care of your fish, they can actually become immune to Ich and you would never see it occour in your tank. This is the ideology that I follow personally. I think either option is a good one if you do it right.

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Shawn, I will ask again, have you read the article?

“Do we know for sure that there arent mutiple strains of ich?” Yes, see the article.

“Do we know for sure that ALL ich shares the same life cycle regardless of temperature and other factors that come into play with the import of livestock?” We know for sure that all strains of Ich do NOT share the same life cycle if you are referring to the period of time in which it takes to complete a life cycle. Once you have read the article you will be able to argue with me that two months may not be long enough for all strains of ich. There is information in there that would fuel you’re side of the argument.

“What would someone who’s life passion is observing and understanding life in its natural envirionment know about sustaining said life in an artificial environment?” There I quoted it, and I quoted that before reading the next sentence you wrote about quoting it.
To my understanding few scientists spend the majority of their time out in the wild. Many of them spend a lot of time in labs working on…………aquariums! You be surprised how many marine biologist spend there time working on aquariums. A lot of research done marine biologist is conducted at public……. aquariums.

I really would like to give a presentation soon on the sort of people you are talking about. I can think of two authors/hobbyist/marine biologist one of which started off in the hobby, was drawn into the science part of it seeking better understanding of the animals we keep and will soon add the letters “Dr.” in front of his name. The other you may get a chance to meet in a couple of months. He wrote what some people consider the bible of reef keeping, “The Reef Aquarium Science, Art, and Technology” which is now out in its third volume. These people study both in field and in labs and report their findings to hobbyist in conferences around the world.

“My point was that i feel that almost all DT have ich in them to begin with from LR, coral, inverts, etc, etc.” If this rock has been in LFS water in the last 60 days there is a HUGE likelihood it does contain ich. However if you leave the tank fishless for longer then 8 weeks countless scientific articles say that with a 99.9% likely hood ich is no longer present in the system. Lee suggests doing a hypo treatment for 4 weeks, taking several days to bring the salinity back to normal and then monitor the fish for four additional weeks to make sure they are alright. That means you are treating the fish longer then you need to leave the tank empty.

This isn’t easy for everyone to replicate and may not be best for every hobbyist. I’m not arguing at all about the practicality of it. With as much time as some hobbyist spend on forums complaining about the problems in there tanks I think some of that time could be spent taking care of a QT tank or a hypo salinity treatment, but it would seem many of us would rather sit in front of a keyboard. In my opinion with how much I care about my tanks and how long healthy fish can live it is worth it for me to be Ich free in my systems.

Icy, the difficulty with immunity of fish is that if the fish is seperated from ich for several months it can become infected again. Fish in a healthy system may fight it off and be fine for years and not a single fish will get sick then you add one more fish or one coral and your fish are fighting it off again.

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I wasnt referring to immunity as in not getting infected. I know that in our tank there is more than likely Ich. What I meant is that our fish have a resistance to Ich due to constantle saving Ich in the system. I have intorduced fish with Ich to the system, and the ich doesnt come back in any of the fish, which I attribute to the fac that they are healthy and have a resistance. No, it doesnt mean that they are totally immune, just that if they get it it is probably not going to kill them, like it would if they were in a pristine environment.

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This means that Ich can hitchhike in on the skeleton/frag-plug/rock that the coral is mounted on and spread through your system.

Ok, back to my very orignal thoughts on ich and QT. I will keep it VERY short so as not to get sidetracked. If ich can hitchhike in on stony corals, plugs, rocks, etc…and VERY few corals(probably 0) would live through any extended amount of time in hyposalinty, arent we pretty much back at the conclusion that “most tanks have ich”? Unless of course we place every single coral we acquire in QT for the entire life cycle of ich. A QT that could keep hard corals alive yet not be plumbed into our system. That’s quite the challenge!

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That is why I say that I dont bother. I am all for inspecting a coral for pests and making sure it is healthy, but I’m not going to keep corals in a seperate tank for 8 weeks by themselves each time I want to get a new one, and I know very few people that would bother with 8 weeks.

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That is why I say that I dont bother.

Good, im done >LOL<

I dont claim to be an ich expert(thank god), or any expert for that matter. I simply offered a different opinion on QT procedures that got sidetracked. Ive always respected your’s and Jon’s knowledge of the field, and im always learning something new. If im wrong, im wrong, and i have no problem admitting im wrong. One thing i do not do is research my answer before posting. I type off the type of my head, and my words are my own, my opinions are my own. With that said, they can be wrong >LOL<

I for one enjoy threads such as this. I learn something new everyday, and i do my best to not reinvent the wheel, but sometimes we need to ask ourselves why we do the things we do. Change things up, think outside the box. Im not a sheep, i never will be. If i say something stupid, prove me wrong, ill admit your right.

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My fish had ich. It went away with a few water changes (high nitrates) and extra feedings. Haven’t seen it in a couple of years now. Never QT’d anything…

:TWOCENTS

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So I’m glad I could start a lively discussion, we needed it.

Anyway if you all want to get off your boxes, pack up your pride, and bs.

Joe, I don’t care what you say, I never read your posts, I just end up looking at your avatar :stuck_out_tongue: J/K

I take it most of you deal with Ich in the water in the hopes that your fish will grown an immunity and the Ich will die. If all the fish have immunity (for the limited time) the Ich will not have a host and the Ich will die (in due time). This may be the best bet for me as QTing EVERY thing every time might just get a bit tedious. Then again I do have the tanks and space to setup an adequate QT tank.

I agree with many of the statements of QTing and Hospitalizing (in a Hyposalinity or Copper respect) can and will be stressful to the fish. I think this is your call if the fish is at the point where it can endure that to rid the disease (or lack thereof) or if he is too far and the stress will be too much.

Obviously there is no right answer and I respect all of your opinions and advice.

My answer is I won’t be trying to rid the tank of Ich in the way of a hospitalizing all fish. I will go on the assumption what doesn’t kill them, makes them stronger. I’ll give them the best environment they can to build their immune systems and hopefully if everyone is strong enough they will all resist the ich and it will eventually die off. I do wish I had setup a QT originally and kept it out of my tank, but at this point it is simply too much effort for the gain.

For everyone that says they had Ich and it went away or my fish don’t get it unless… You might be right, you might be wrong. From my research you CANNOT tell if your fish has ich most of the time. There is only a SMALL window in which you can in which it is usually pretty far along. I’d appreciate if everyone would read the article linked before you post, even if you already have. It’s very knowledgeable, yet as stated before it isn’t gospel. Read it and take what you can.

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Hows the lemonpeel with corals? I have heard they are real nippers.

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[quote=“IanH, post:36, topic:941”]
I’ll give them the best environment they can to build their immune systems[/quote]

And THAT is the best thing you can do for any animal - regardless of wether you QT or not.

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All I know is that when I tried holding the neighbor’s cat in the tank for 10 minutes, it almost-for-sure-definately wasn’t ick that killed it so suddenly.

:stuck_out_tongue:

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lol BB guns work faster