How to Get Rid of Ich??

This probably gets asked often on here and if I searched long enough I could find a thread for it, but anyways....I have two clowns, two cleaner gobies, a sailfin, yellow, and hippo tang, randall's shrimp goby, bi color blenny, and a niger trigger, along with nine snails. The yellow tang was the first to show signs of ich with small white dots on him. he's eating fine, not scratching up against the rocks and occasionally gets cleaned by the gobies. Now the hippo and sailfin are showing signs of ich and the yellow tang has quite a few yellow dots on him now. I do have an algea problem which I think is due to high phosphates which I haven't tested, but from what I've read can cause a breakout in algea which is what happened. My other params are 8.2pH, 0 NH4, 0 nitrite and very small reading for nitrate, can't remember the exact number since I'm at work right now. What is the best/quickest way to treat ich and get them off of the fish?

 

You have a hospital tank or are you planning on treating in your main system?

 

Treating them in my main system. I have a small 15 gallon aquarium, but its not set up right now since I'm moving end of summer.

 

You only real options are kick-ich, and thats not fast, and/or freshwater and/or medical dips for the fish. 2-3 freshwater baths should do the trick(5-10min dip, once/day), or you can do something like medicated anti parasitic foods, or a saltwater medical dip with something like formalin.

 

This may be a dumb question, but for the freshwater dips do I need to heat the RO/DI water to the same temperature as the tank so that I dont stress the fish out?

 

I think you need to look at the cause of your ich. You have stocked your tank very quickly, and this makes things much less stable. No way that you should have 2 tangs in that tank. the stress is causing the ich. I would try to find new homes for at least both tangs for awhile. go slow, let it grow.

 

Not a dumb question at all. and yes, The temp and the ph/kh needs to be the same as your system. So heat and buffer the RODI. Otherwise it will cause stress

 

I had no time to set up a hospital tank so I had to treat my display reef tank. One of my two clowns had white spots all over him so I got this stuff called microbe-lift herbtana and treated it for ten days and after three the clown was clean and pretty again...but they are the only fish I have in thirty gallons of water.

 

I re-inspected the tank this morning and found tons of food pellets in the overflow section of the tank. I think my girlfriend has been overfeeding them the past few days, because the ich and the big algea bloom all happened within the past 5-7days and I've been super busy with work so she's been taking care of the tank a good bit. The tangs were actually getting along fine. I bought them from the same display tank (65gallon) that they were in at the LFS along with a large hippo, corals and few other fish. They sort of fought at first, but then after a week they acted as if they were paired, because where one was the other would follow without fighting. After I inspected the tank this morning the only fish to show signs of ich are the yellow and hippo tang. The sailfin is doing fine. Will them just being in close proximity even though they aren't fighting stress them?

 

Perhaps I missed this . . . but what size tank is this and how old is it?

Just looking at your stocking list I would tell you that you need at least 120 or so gallons to house that many fish healthily IMO.

Just the sailfin, yellow, and hippo is enough to need a 120 gallon tank.

Now on to age. How old is the tank? How long has it taken for you to have your stock full as it is? A day? A month? A year?