Lost all my fish to ich:(

[bmeeder]

Unfortunately i just lost my powder blue and mated clown fish to ich. Sucks tremondously as i loved them, especially the clown fish that would attack my hand every now and then, but life goes on.
Question is this: With no fish in the tank, will the ich die? If so, how long till its safe to add a new fish? Or do i need to treat the tank. Cant do hypo becuase i have a ton of hard corals in it.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[jackri]

Just play the waiting game... 6 weeks to be safe at a minimum.
QT anything new you get in... sorry to hear about your losses.

 

[redsea]

i am very sorry you lost all of your fish!

 

[gmann1139]

Yup, wait 2 weeks, buy the fish, QT it for 4 weeks, and you're good to go.
Also, if you're looking to get any type of invert, this is a good opportunity, because you can QT them in the tank while waiting for the ich to burn itself out.

 

[florida joe]

Ok lets just talk about your tank being fallow. Lets assume it really was the ick parasite, which infested your tank. If the parasite went from the parasitic stage to the free-swimming stage just before you removed the fish from the tank. Ick can remain for up to 18hrs before attaching to some substrate to reproduce. It can then take up to 28 days to reproduce. And then another 2 days to find a host (no host and it dies) Sooooooooooooooo. 1 day plus 28days plus 2days and another 2 just in case equals 33 days. Not a long time IMO considering what you have been through.