Few Qs

Hello from Pittsburgh: I am trying to recover from recent disaster. My newly tank was doing very well for months with few corals and a yellow Tang, a pseudochromis, 2 clowns, 2 Damsels, a six line wrasse, and two fire fish along with (snails, star fish, shrimp, and cleaning crew) until I decided to buy a Powder blue and a blue hippo Tangs through mail order. Just few days after receiving these two fish, I noticed the Ich infection on both Tang ( tried feeding Garlic, Ich attach treatment, etc.,). To make the story short, I lost the both new fish along with my BUTful and friendly yellow tang, Pseudochromis, two clowns, and the Damsel. I bought another Powder blue and yellow tangs and both died of massive infection (very cloudy eyes) within 48-72 hours after the purchase. However, my two fire fish and six line Wrasse are perfectly healthy and don't show any sign of infection. Now, here are my questions and appreciate your expert opinions:
Since the remaining 3 fish are healthy, would the Ich go away in few month if I don’t add new fish? Considering they need a host (fish) to survive.

I am gearing toward a coral only tank. If doing so, how often do I need the water change considering there will be no fish in there.

Thank you and best wishes to all,
Arash

 

How large a tank are we talking about? With that amount of fish, I'm thinking pretty big.

The best way to fight disease is to keep stress down so the fish's own immune system can fight it off (+ garlic supplementation to the diet). If you have a smallish tank w/that amount of fish (and some of those tang combo's) the stress level would be fairly high.

 

The ich parasite can lay dormant in systems for a very long time even without a host. Thats my understanding.

Not having fish will keep your water much cleaner. With a reef tank people recommend 10-15% water changes every other week. With coral only, who knows.....depends on how much your coral poop. A good way to determine if you are changing water often enough is to monitor the nitrates. Get a good liquid test kits and run some tests.

 

They have 3 host fish still. You would have to remove them to a QT tank for 2 months for the Ich to die off in the display tank

 

THX guys, my tank is 72 G bow front and my specs been very good with frequent RO water change. I have all kinds of testing kits. I think some fish are more susceptible to infection than the others due to their skin composition. I've read that the Powder and Blue tangs are especially more susceptible that the others. I like to emphasize that B4 addition of these two, I had a very happy and healthy tank that my yellow tang and clowns ate off my hands. If these tree fish are healthy so far, then the Ich must have gone through its dormancy (cyst) stage.
Arash

 

Yep, some will no longer be in the tomont stage.* Others will be in the theront or trophont stage.* The remaining three fish may be very healthy and fighting off infection well.* However, they are still hosts for the parasite.* All it takes is one single ich parasite to make it to the tomont stage and then it will reproduce.*

 

I wouldnt put those tangs in a 48" tank, but thats me. You could keep a Kole or Tomini Tang if you really want a tang, but Powder Blues are VERY suseptable to Ich. You are correct in thinking that if you leave it for a few weeks the Ich should die off.

 

Not leaving the three fish in there. As long as there are fish in the DT there will be ich. It may not be noticeable but they will still be there and all it would take is a stressful event and BAM ich everywhere.