Is this Ich on my blue tang?

[WtksBlondie104]

With the flash on, these spots turned out dark, but the spots are white, but not in her skin. It looks like they are hanging on her, or attached to her. I had one die before of ich. But the white spots were in her skin, not on it.

Do I need to take her out immediately and treat her?

[lReef lKeeper]

can you turn the flash off and post a pic ??

[WtksBlondie104]

She wont stay still long enough

[WtksBlondie104]

I now have my tang in my old 29 gallon tank with a heater, skilter 250 filter, and a cave to hide in.

I bought Formalin to treat her, but was nervous about the toxicity on it. So, I used what my LFS sold me, which was "Stop Parasite". The Salt is at 1.021, and we used 10 gallons of water from the fish store, and 5 from my tank, and the rest freshly made water.

Am I doing everything right?

[Whoyah]

Putting the tang in a Quartine tank is the best thing you can do at this point. Ich will look like sugar or salt. The Stop Parasite doesn't list Ich as something it can cure. If it is indeed ich you will need something else. Typcially it contains copper. I don't believe Formalin is correct either.

You should also besure to feed the tang well while it is the QT. Try using dried seaweed sheets or Nori ( used to wrap sushi , around $4). I would also recommend soaking the seaweed in some Selcon first. The Selcon will help the fishes immune system.

[WtksBlondie104]

Thanks for the info. I got Mardel, Coppersafe medication. Is that the right stuff? I also got Kent Marine Garlic xtreme to soak her food in. Supposedly that will help. She is the cave, and hiding in a crevice, and not moving around. Is that normal for this type of thing going on? She took quite a bit of work to catch. That probably made things worse now.

Any info is greatly appreciated.

[WtksBlondie104]

Why wont anyone else answer my post? My tang is completely faded right now, and I know we are going to lose her this way. What do I do? I guess I am going to move her back to the main tank. This is making me think that maybe I just can't figure this thing out. I don't know what went wrong. I thought I did everything I was supposed to.

[Whoyah]

What exactly have you tried so far? Is it still eating? swimming?

Tangs are pretty tempermental when you are first introducing them. They commonly come down with ich. They need to QT them for 5 weeks before introducing them to your main tank.

When I got my Purple tang I had the QT all set-up plus had all of the food and meds ready. She went into the QT the day I brought her home and stayed in there for the 5 weeks. I had to treat for ich while she is in there.

It is no fun to loss fish ( I have lost my fair share) but the important thing is to learn from it.

[Tom McKenna]

Ditto to above suggestions. All tangs and surgeonfish get ich very easy and stress very easy until they are happy and established in your tank. But I would leave her in your quarantine tank so you do not effect any other fish you have.

[Fatman]

When my tang got ich, I just upped my garlic. From what I understand a cold front came through (I dont have a heater) and my tempeture dropped to low 70s. I think it freaked her out, and she got ich. I was about to treat the tank when the guy at the fish store recommended I just up my garlic. Another thing I did was SOAK my seaweed I feed the tangs in Garlic, so they really get a good dose of it. Afterwards, I bought a cleaner shrimp. One month later she seems fine, with no ich, and none of my other fish ever developed it either. Lucky? Maybe but just explaining how I dealt with it.
Edit: I forgot to add, I kept the tank extremely warm between 80-82, from some info it seems to affect the larva of the Ich, and not allow it to reproduce. Low salinity helps as well, but it will usually hurt your corals.