Maroon Clown Fish with Ich

[monica4]

I have a ten gallon tank with tons of live rock (that I'm sure isn't even considered live rock anymore) I moved from NY to Florida and just carried the rock with me in water. I don't think anything is alive, but I am getting the purple growing on it again. I have lots of sand on the bottom. The water is cycled though. It's been set up for over a year. Anyway, I have two hermit crabs that I've had almost a year. I just put a maroon clown fish in last week and he was doing fine. He was eating and looking good. Now I think he has ich. He has white spots on his head. Okay, here I go... I have another tank that is 75 gal. and I have water in it. It has not cycled yet. I'm wondering what is the best way to help this poor clown fish. I have been reading a ton on this site about how to treat ich, but I'm wondering can I put the rock and crabs in the big tank and then treat the clown in the small one? Can the crabs make it if the water is not cycled? I'm thinking the clown wouldn't make it in the water because he is already sick. ??? Any help would be great!!! Thanks so much!!!

 

[beth]

What is the ammonia and nitrite level in the 75?

 

[mumbulog]

My marron cl9own seems to have ich now. He had a fungus a couple of weeks ago and it cleared up on its own. He still has a great appetite and I am wondering if he will fight the ich off on his own? There is also a yellow tang in there with him and I am afraid the tang might catch it as well. If he keeps eating well will he fight this naturally?
I feed him scallops, brine, mysis , mixed in garllic daily.
Monica I don't mean to still your post just thought we can both work on this together since its the same kinda fish!

 

[monica4]

My Ammonia and Nitrite are at 0 in the 75. My clown also still loves to eat when I feed him he just has white spots on his head.

 

[monica4]

Okay, I'm afraid to say I did this but ... The clown fish started sitting on the bottom of the tank and not moving and I wanted to save him so I put him in the 75 gal. Was that stupid? There is nothing in the 75 yet so I thought maybe I could try to save him better in a bigger amount of water. I figured I probably shouldn't stick everything else in there if it isn't ready. He has been swimming at the top all evening. (staying in one spot) I also gave him his food early today that I soaked in garlic first. Now I put ich in my big tank that I was just going to order lr for! Guess I wait.

 

[mumbulog]

I'm no expert, but if he was eating you may have wanted to keep him in the tank he was in to keep the stress level down and he could fight it off on his own. But this is propably a false assumption because moving them to a qt tank would cause stress as well, wishful thinking I guess.
I woke up and my clown has no more spots, ick doesn't come and go does it? His face and top of the body was covered in white dots and nothing today, thats odd.

 

[mumbulog]

the white spots are back on my clown now. Would this be ick, can ick come and go?

 

[monica4]

I am no expert, but from what I've read (all over the place) Ich does go away for awhile. I guess it is one of the stages it goes through. It falls off the fish, but is still in the water. That's one reason I moved it because I though maybe by some miracle more water would help. I doubt it but I'll try. It is still swimming at the top. I'm going to give it more garlic soaked food and lower the salt some more soon. I thought I'd find him dead today, but he's still going.

 

[mumbulog]

when I feed him and he's swimming the white spots fall right off from him.

 

[monica4]

Mine hasn't done that yet but I do see more spots today. He only has them on his head. I guess I have to go get medication for him. It sounds to me if the spots fall off they just come back worse until the fish is dead. It's hard to know what to do because one solution for one person does nothing but kill everything for another person.

 

[mumbulog]

monica go to your LFS and get kick ick. It's pricey but not harmful to your tank and works. I'm using it now, I moved my clown to a smaller qt to use less of the product.

 

[mwaraxa]

The white spots are going to fall off. Thats what they do. They feed off the fish, fall off, attach to the glass or rock i believe, then hatch. Then you have even more parasites in the tank that are looking for fish hosts. If the ick has no fish to attach to then it will eventually die (3-4 weeks) I wouldn't have added him to the display tank because now you have ick in it. DO NOT put any more fish in that display tank untill you deal with the sick one already in there. If it's the only fish, and you have no inverts in there, i would start doing hypo on that tank. You would have to do this for the 4 weeks to make sure the ick is gone before you add anything else. Thats what i would do rather than put meds in my main tank.