Can garlic be harmful?

[sumeet]

I'm about to start adding garlic to my tank & fish food to help with the ich and to prevent future outbreaks. I saw some posts here about just using fresh garlic cloves to extract some juice or just buying pure garlic juice from a grocery store. Is that okay?... Kent Garlic Xtreme is VERY expensive and is also just pure garlic juice. I plan to put in a few drops of the fresh garlic juice directly in the tank and to soak the food in it as well. Is there any harm with too much garlic? Will it do anything negative in case I put in too much??
Any other suggestions / experiences with garlic would be appreciated as well.
Thanks!

 

[jlem]

I use the garlic juice in a bottle from MCcormicks. Make sure to shake the bottle. I soak my food in a couple drops with every feeding. I also soak my seaweed in a couple drops to. I would not add directly to your tank. the garlic soaked into your food will dissapate into the tank anyways so you will be adding some staight into the tank. Can you give more details on your setup, fish,filtration, and maintenance practices so we can see what is giving your tank ick in the first place. If this is a mild case then the garlic with improved maintenance may ward of the infestation. If it is a severe case then hypo may be your needed remedy.

 

[sumeet]

Thanks for your reply. I have a 125 gallon reef tank (with very little reef though)... live rock, live sand, several large tangs, a longnose butterfly, a large volitan lion, a large tomato clown, and some inverts... The tank has been stable and disease free for months (since I set it up)... This is my first disease experience... Water quality is always excellent... Wet/dry filtration... protein skimmer is always on (although it is off now during the KICK-ICH treatment I just started)... I do water changes regularly... just did a big 40% water change when I noticed the ich and before starting treatment with KICK ICH...
Thanks for any other suggestions!...

 

[jlem]

A new trend on the board is smaller, more frequent water changes ( 5-10% weekly ). This usually allows less need for suppliments excluding calcium. Do you use a prefilter before your biological filtration. This will let you remove gunk before it can break down if cleaned with water changes. Feed your fish once a day what they can eat in about two minutes. If they are not skinny then they are eating fine. You can put a drop of Poly Vi Sol childrens vitamins from wallmart to sup up your food. If the Kick ich does not work then You may have to try hypo. Your bioload is pretty high so I would do minimum 15 gallon biweekly water changes. Make sure to dose the Kick Ich according to your tanks actual water volume wich probably is alot less than 125 gallons. If your tank is 72-18-22 it only holds 104 gallons after you subtract the glass and figure 20 inches of actual water depth.

 

[clarkiiboi]

Sumeet--please say you did NOT add kick ich to your main tank with the LR, LS, and inverts. If so stop now---this will harm all of these. What I get out of this is you have an outbreak of ich, right? The chemicals like the kick ich are not a good thing to do, and as with garlic additions: it is a preventative measure, used with a tank not infested. Garlic will NOT cure ich, its just an immune booster to fight it off (corect me if I am wrong). Do you have a hospital tank set up---hypo is the best means to fight off the ich on your fish. HTH