Fish are dying.

[jbrit82]

I have a 120 gal tank with a 125 gal wet dry pump, protein skimmer, UV detoxify-er. Also to pumps for circulation inside the tack. I have had my tank set up for 2 1/2 months. It has fully cycled. After fully cycling I have had 4 tangs, 2 lion fish, blue spotted rabbitfish, clown fish, grouper and a couple other die. My ammonia has never gone over .25 but my Nitrite spike again and my fish developed ich. I treated for Ich for 5 weeks and have been adding TLC bacteria to the tack. I got all the levels back to 0 and bought another lionfish, grouper and dog faced puffer. They died two days later. My ammonia went back to .25 and nitrite spiked again. I have no Idea what I'm doing wrong !!!!!
Can the Ich or any other parasites live in the live rock even after treatment. I have two fish that have lived through everything and they are a green bird nose wrasse and a squirrel fish. I treated the Ich with "Kill Ich". After the 4th week of treating I did a 30% water change and did not treat for 3 days then began treating again for a week. The last couple of fish that died did not have signs of Ich nor do I believe that Ich will kill a fish in two days. The squirrel fish and wrasse never had any white spots but did scratch.
I also have two anemones. My Ph stays around 83 and temp is 76. During Ich treatment I raised it to 80 then back to 76 with salinity around 1.023. I also add three fish at a time. Is this bad? The two fish that lived were bought at a separate store that I found in NJ. There prices were 3x more then other stores but there fished survived. The fish that I have bought from 4 local store have all died. Is there something that one store has different then others. Is there an online store that is good for ordering fish.
Could I get rid of the live rock and get fake Corral arrangement for a fish only tank?
I didnt know what else to do other then empty the tank and start over trying to save the last two fish. What should I do????

 

[saxman]

Your ammonia in a cycled tank should be ZERO...if it's spiking like that, your tank isn't properly cycled. Ammonia burns a fish's gill structures, sometimes irreversibly. Also, you shouldn't bombard a new system with a heavy bioload (e.g., more than one fish, maybe two, depending on tank size and fish mass).
Secondly, you've just learned the reason folks QT their new specimens, as now, you need to pull your remaining fish, treat them (not with Kick Ich, which is "snake oil" and does not work), raise the tank temp to 84*F (to speed up the parasite's life cycle) and let the tank sit fallow for at least 6 weeks (8 is better). Your best bet for treatment IME/IMHO is quinine sulfate (sold as ****** Pro), as this has proven very effective in treating some of the resistant strains of ****** that have reared their ugly heads in the hobby.
The more expensive LFS may get their stock from a different wholesaler, so you may want to give them your future business once you get your tank squared away.
Finally, based on what I've read here, you need to research your fish better prior to getting them...most groupers get too large for a 120 gal, and puffers and lions typically don't mix well (the puffers pick at the lion's fins). We can help you out with this if you need advice.
HTH