blue tang

[mysticgal22]

My blue tang has ICK really bad. He spends most of the day scatching on the rocks. I have started to treat the tank with stop ICK. I have turned everything off except the skimmer because It told me that I could leave that on but everything else must be turned off. My niger trigger also has a bit on his tail. Can anyone tell me any thing else to do for this. I dont want him to die. We have had him for 3 months now. Please help. All levels are normal in the tank. Thank you

 

[beth]

You are wasting your time with that med.
Do a large water change and turn all the filters back on. Do you have a FO setup, reef, what?
The only 2 effective treatments for ich is copper and hyposalinity. You can effectively and safely treat ich with hyposalinity in a strictly FO tank. Otherwise, you need to set up a hospital tank to treat all your fish.

 

[mysticgal22]

I have a fish only tank. I was told that garlic would help and a fresh water dip, which I did both. I dont want to use copper due to results that I have had before with copper. I had 3 fish die from copper treatments. I hope what I have done will help. I am putting a few drops of garlic in my tank a day. Any thing else??

 

[beth]

Garlic might help as a preventative measure, but it is not a cure for ich. FW dips, at best, will only cause some parasites that are currently on the fish to drop off. It certainly does not deal at all with an infestation and will not cure ich.
If you have a strictly FO tank, with no LR or inverts, then your best and safest course of action is hyposalinity. You will need a refractometer which costs around $40. This is a valuable piece of equiptment which accurately mesures salinity/specific gravity so don't think of it as being a large expense just for ich. You can get them for this price on ----. It is the only instrument out there that measures salinity levels accurately, thus, you can see its importance all the way around in this hobby.
Take a look at the FAQ Thread at the top of this forum for the posts on hyposalinity and refractometers. Also, you really should think about QTing your fish before they end up in your tank carrying in diseases.
Good luck!