Please Help - New Fish Dying

[wickedwes]

Hey everyone. i bought a regal tang and a fox face this sunday. bought the tang in the morning and the fox face in the afternoon. i acclimated both of them to a 25 gal q-tank(at seperate times). the tang has just been pretty spastic swimming up and done the back corner of the tank. the fox face has been looking pretty weak. yesterday the fox face was just kinda stuck next to the filter intake (its and eclipse2 hood) not moving too much. then she was kinda laying down on her side behind some rocks. it looks like she might be getting ick too. i just went home for lunch to check and the foxface is looking worse. she isnt moving too much at all (basically just breathing) i put some frozen brine soaked in garlic in and it sat there for about an hour and she didnt touch it (it was laying right next to her) i tested the levels and the ammonia and nitrates were pretty high so i changed about 50 percent of the water. the specific gravity is about 1.017. i think the water change must have stressed the tank too cause the tang is looking a little weird now too. should i lower the specific gravity for hyposalinity and add some copper or something. i really need some help on what to do. thanks

 

[seafish]

you are in trouble you cant add fish that fast tangs need lots of room 25 gal is good for hospital tank but i would never put fox face and tang together in 25 gal you stressed them out to much i buy fish one at a time leave them in hospital tahk for a month when i know ther good shape i put them in my 125 display tank it my sound over kill but i dont like ick and i dont like flushing beautful fish down the drian only if i would done this when i first started i would be alot richer because i poured money in to it that i didnt have i like regal tangs and i bought about 10 of them before i found out how to care for them it ant easy but it cn be down i would seperate your fish some how a nother tank or put a devider in the tank you have good lck and never buy two fish at a time onless its damsels or clowns or cardnals

 

[wickedwes]

they are both juvenlies (maybe 2") and the lfs store said that it would be ok to quarantine them together. guess maybe i should not have listened to them. is there anything i can do now?

 

[playtime]

what else do you have in your tank? If you have inverts or are planning on ever having them, then you can't add copper. Copper kills inverts. QT is the best preventative. as for the foxface, I doubt if you will be lucky enough to save it but it couldn't hurt to try. Why do you suppose your amonia and nitrite were high? How many fish do you currently have in the tank? How often are you feeding? Is there anything dead in the tank that could cause the spike. Before this water change, when was the last one?
I found that with the smaller tanks, you really need to keep an eye on the levels because they can go south very fast. what are you using for filtration? do you have a skimmer?
playtime

 

[playtime]

Almost forgot, Why is the salinity so low? Do you usually keep it that level? The garlic might help with the ich if that is what they have. The garlic doesn't kill the ich, just irritates the skin of the fish so they fall off. It does take time to cure it using garlic. What is your water temp.?
playtime

 

[krazykarel]

Playtime: Where did you read that garlic irritates the skin of the fish and then the ich falls off? Can you give me the link where i can read up on this?

 

[beth]

No links please.

 

[playtime]

Actually there isn't a link, I heard it from one of the sharks, Trey I believe. Check in the search at the top of the screan. Search garlic. You will get some good info there.
playtime

 

[playtime]

oops, my bad. Tangs_in_pacifica is the one who discussed the garlic irritating the ich. I believe that Trey may have as well.
playtime

 

[wickedwes]

thanks for the advice and all. the regal and the foxface were the only two in the tank. i am sad to report that the foxface died when i got home from work. my first fish loss. i guess i will stick to quanantining only one fish at a time now. i just hope that the regal makes it