Large reef tank owners only please!

[mie]

How would you treat your fish for ich in a large tank lets say 100 plus gallons that is well established with all kinds of large corals and stuff that have spread out and covered pretty much everything? You cant catch half the fish. You cant tear your reef apart. You cant do hypo or copper in your dt. What do you do? I am getting geard up to do a in wall 150 in my kitchen and this is a question I was curious about.

 

[flower]

Thank the Good Lord that you are just thinking about it...and it isn't a reality.
Prevention....use a QT and make sure you dip your coral before placing it into the DT..There are worse things than ich.
The truth is, in a reef there is nothing you can do. Keeping the fish very healthy so they are not so susceptible...but if it happens, you will have no choice but to let the parasite run its course...when all fish are dead let the tank sit fishless for 6 to 8 weeks so the parasite dies off.
The junk they sell for ich will make the inverts and coral sick (not kill) and it doesn't work.
I had this happen in my 90g. established reef. I gave up after many tries with different ich medicines. So I tried one last thing...I upped the temps, this makes the fish happier and I fed them shrimp soaked in fresh garlic to hopefully up their immune systems. I got two cleaner shrimp as I heard they pick off parasites...I figured it couldn't hurt.
Well to my amazement...the fish staying healthy, and not being susceptible to the parasite..6 months later no more ich. I even moved and the fish stayed ich free...a very stressful situation and still no ich outbreak.
Some say no way...but I tell you I had ich in my tank for years, every time my fish got a little stressed..ICH outbreak...I killed more fish with ich meds than the ich ever killed, with secondary infections.
All that could have been prevented with a QT.

 

[eric b 125]

+1 the best offense is a good defense. ich cant be present unless it is introduced into the system. QT is key. that being said, i'm a believer in ich being present in all of our systems. i KNOW it's in mine, even after two experiences with hypo in a qt. a week later my hippo tang started showing signs of it. after that, i threw in the towel on doing hypo again. i started feeding a varied diet and keeping my params in check, and havent seen spots in months.

 

[ophiura]

You really must do a full QT on anything going in.
Beyond that you are in the garlic stage, though additional prevention - by not overstocking and maintaining ideal water quality and diet is also important.

 

[cranberry]

IMO, there is such a thing as an Ich free system. No non-fish item gets placed in the tank without a 6 week minimum QT period. Every fish that is to enter the system gets treated... not just QT'd. If you stick to this, you can prevent ich from entering your system. But there can be no breaks in practice and it can be really hard to not just through a snail or a tiny frag in there without first doing a full QT.... but it can be done.
I am doing this with my 60g scorp tank. After they go in, they aren't coming back out for something like Ich. I'm not sure how stressful it's going to be for them all.... being in the same tank. I'm not taking any chances.