Hippo tang or Powder Blue Tang - which is hardier?

[kpatrick]

There is nothing in the tank right now except for a randalli goby and a helfrichi firefish so I dont forsee anyone picking on the tang once I add it. However, I hate to see my wifes prized firefish die of ich. The LFS said not to chance it and leave the hippo and powder blue completely out of the tank.
I did not QT my last hippo and it had a small outbreak but did fine afterwards for a couple years. I dont have a QT so thats why I am wanting to know how many of you really use a QT before going into the DT.

 

[azfishgal]

Originally Posted by kpatrick
My only concern about a QT is that once you take the fish from the QT and put them in your display tank, they can still get stressed and break out in ick from transfer from QT to DT. I understand the purpose of a QT but it just seems like that is one additional tank that could stress out the fish. Maybe I have been lucky in the past without using one!
You need to read up on ich and what it really is. It's a parasite, living organism that will NOT just appear on your fish, due to stress or any other reason. Yes, stess can make it more obvious of what you have, BUT if your DT does not have ich and you QT a fish for several weeks then add them to the DT and they all of a sudden come down with ich one of two things has happend. Your DT really does have ich and you just havn't seen it until now, or the QT fish was not QT long enough and he brought it into the tank. This is why if your tank does come down with ich you need to leave it fishless for 6 weeks. The parasite will die because of it's own life cycle and it needs a host (fish) to live. Again, ich is a living parasite, NOT a disease. This is of course a subject matter that will get 100 difference opinions, so for what it's worth, that's my opinion on it.

I QT my Hippo for 4 weeks, 3 of those weeks in Hyp. IMO it did not stress him out and he's now in my DT doing great.

 

[kpatrick]

azfishgal,
Thanks for the info!!That clears up any confusion I had about ick. Like you said, everyone has an opinion or information to give. (some better then others).
Lets take the information you stated above and say the powder blue or hippo will be last fish I purchase for my DT. I put it in a QT for 4 weeks then add it to my DT. Nothing would be introduced into the DT after I added the tang so there would be nothing that introduces the parasite and no way to get the parasite 3 months or a year from now???

 

[azfishgal]

Originally Posted by kpatrick
azfishgal,
Thanks for the info!!That clears up any confusion I had about ick. Like you said, everyone has an opinion or information to give. (some better then others).
Lets take the information you stated above and say the powder blue or hippo will be last fish I purchase for my DT. I put it in a QT for 4 weeks then add it to my DT. Nothing would be introduced into the DT after I added the tang so there would be nothing that introduces the parasite and no way to get the parasite 3 months or a year from now???
You have a much larger chance introducing ich to your DT through fish, BUT it is possible to introduce ich through corals or live rock. Yes, they need a fish to host on, but if the live rock or corals were in a tank with fish that had ich they can be carriers of ich. However, ich would not survive it's complete life cycle if it was in a tank with just corals. Does that make sense? So in reality, if you want to be 100% ich free with no doubts you need to QT everything. Unfortunatley it's harder to QT corals because of light needs so some people, including me don't always do it. Going back to what you said though, if you do in fact have an ich free environement and you QT your Tang for 4-6 weeks (I say up to 6 because it's the life span of ich) and then don't introduce a single thing after that, you will not see ich on your fish. This is of course knowing for a fact that your tank is ich free. This is also a reason many people after curring the live rock and adding a clean up crew will NOT add fish for 6 weeks, just to make sure the live rock and inverts they added are not carrying ich.
How's that for an answer.

 

[kpatrick]

 

[ccampbell57]

My original fish included a hippo and a powder blue tang. After moving to a 180g, I received an outbreak of ick from another fish and both the tangs were treated. Needless to say, the hippo made it and the powder blue did not. I would say they are both prone to ick, but the hippo seems to be able to cure herself and the powder wasnt as hardy.
RIP Bruce