Hypo Salinity Help.

[Poseidon]

I'm looking to treat my entire tank with hypo salinity.
I want to run my idea of how to do it past you guys and get your opinions.

Step 1:
Take all liverock and inverts out of aquarium, place in sump , holding tank and other containers for long term Storage. ( do I take out the sand too?)

Step 2:
Shutoff the display tank from sump.

Step 3: slowly lower the salinity in the display tank until desired lvl is reached, leave at this level for 8-10 weeks,
This time period will also allow the sump/ holding tank system (which is fish less) to kill off any and all life forms of the ich parasite.

Step 4: return the liverock to the aquarium and relax with my once again healthy fish



QUESTIONS:

how do I maintain the setup for the 8 - 10 weeks without a skimmer or anything being attached to it? Do I do weekly water changes? More frequent then weekly?
There will also be no denitrifying bacteria as the hypo will kill all that so how do I maintain the water quality ?

Do I remove all the sand as well?

I will have to sell my two
Mandarin gobies as well, as they won't survive without liverock ( coepods) and I need the other system to be fish less

Any advice is appreciated this whole process is very frustrating.

Fucking ich

 

[Poseidon]

I want to do this today so any advice is appreciated

 

[reeferkeeper420]

I believe if this system is fishless in general, ick will be killled off with no host...but i think that takes about 12weeks. And u dont have to remove anything. Hopefully someone woth more experience will chime in about running the tank fallow.

 

[scubasteve]

just remember hypo salinity treatment causes fatty tissue build up in the liver.... have you tried adding stress coat marine i find using that with new additions and a couple weeks after help alot with ridding and keeping ich away.... i dont think you can actually get rid of it its in lakes rivers oceans pools and even our tap water if you cant get it under control chances are there is a stress factor involved creating it since they are only able to become infected when they start to lose slime coat

 

[Poseidon]

my poor fish are heavily infected and i will lose some if i dont do something asap
no stress factors, heavily feeding, all are fat and healthy just riddled with ich

im not going to use copper and these two are the only methods (besides the transfer method) that actually are recorded to work more times then fail.
i spent past several days reading as much as i can about this stupid parasite.

 

[Neopimp]

Leave the sand if you want... Remove the rock or most of it... The rock left in the tank will not be ruined completely just do not use any meds. The rock in the hypo will still be covered in bacteria, just don't expect any sea life to survive. Monitor the ammonia levels closely for the first little while as the bio filter (rocks) have just been removed from the picture, keep some Prime on hand. Also there will be die off in the sand bed. Those seachem ammonia things that just sit in the tank can be handy for easy monitoring. The water will not have the usual resistance to pH swings so that is something to watch for. Use soda ash in small amounts to keep pH up. Dimming or removing lights also has an impact on the pH as well, they will get plenty of light from the room lighting The skimmer can be left on but it will not function well if at all due to the lower SG, will not develop a stable foam head. Should still help with keeping the pH more stable though.

Drop the pH(EDIT: I MEANT SG) fairly quickly as it sounds like your fish are in dire need of relief. I have done this twice on different systems and it was never the SG drop that was hard... its bringing it back up that has to be done slowly.

My 2 cents... Got nothing to loose at this point it seems

 

[Poseidon]

All the rock is out, I'm gonna leave the sand in I think, very little is there >1".

I'm going to lower the salinity by adding fresh rodi water and removing sea water.

 

[AdInfinitum]

Hypo will not kill the nirobacter most species have wide salinity ranges.

Full hypo is hard on the fish as Steve said some species like clowns are borderline at 1.009 and aquarium strains of Ich are being increasingly reported to be resistant to SG as low as 1.008.

However where those levels may be needed to eradicate the Ich, just lowering the salinity somewhat may help the fish fight off the Ich and develop their own resistance. Ich mainly kills by wearing down the fish by constantly putting holes in their slime coats esp. on the gills and sister areas in SW the water molecules flow out through those holes and the fish have to constantly drink and excrete salt to keep from dying of dehydration. Eventually this energy intensive activity wears them down. At lower salinity they don't lose water and don't have to drink constantly. 1.014 is about homeostasis for fish.

 

[dale]

i would take the sand out too,, lower to .08-.09 fairly quickly , but keep ph the same by adding a little baked baking soda, no rocks,, use pvc or glass/porcelain hiding spots,, daily-every other day water changes for first week or so,, system will catch up and then not so frequent,,, keeping ph the same.. i would say 6 weeks of this is fine ,, then raise slowly,, 1 point per day.. separate tank with sump is ideal ,, or canister or large aquaclear,, keep feeding light to keep tank clean..
this is what i concluded after lots and lots of research and have done 3 times now and its how i quarantine my new fish now..
good luck...

 

[Poseidon]

So many diff opinions lol

 

[Poseidon]

Tank is empty now, just sand and fish and water,
Maybe I will try to lower it to .014 first like rob says then see how that goes on the fish

 

[Neopimp]

Everyone is wrong but me. No room to negotiate just flat out wrong


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[dale]

well you cant argue with that....

 

[Poseidon]

Tank is empty of rock, slowly lowering the sg to 1.014 or so, will hold it there for a few days and see if the fish can develop resistance.

Not all the fish show symptoms so some may be resistant alresdy and I really don't want to kill the healthy ones.

Fish with signs:

Purple tang
Flame angel is the worst
Regal angel
Queen angel
Foxface
Midas blenny

Fish that are fine:
Blue face angel
Potters angel
Leopard wrasse pair
Blacker ice clown pair
Fairy wrasse
Blue damsel

 

[pulpfiction1]

did you read this?

http://www.chucksaddiction.com/ich.html

 

[AdInfinitum]

Everyone is wrong but me. No room to negotiate just flat out wrong


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Oh...except for the part about rapidly dropping the ph....lol

Seriously Torx is right on...

BTW with only sand left you could use a chloroquine based medication...these are the real deal and a genuine advance in dealing with Ich in commercial fish farming. Quinine based medications developed for treating malaria in humans and livestock. Malaria is another protozoal infection and quinine specifically attacks flagellates. Not just the usual fake cure that just treats the symptoms for temporary relief but an actual protozoa killer.

 

[Poseidon]

did you read this?

http://www.chucksaddiction.com/ich.html

I did, and a few other articles saying the same thing basicly

 

[Neopimp]

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=55423

Take thread with a bit of skepticism but that is basically what I have done with sg. approx 36hrs from start to finish pausing at 1.016 overnight.

There are articles about the osmotic shock crap kills the ich.


It's been a while since I have looked at it all. Never a spot of ich on any Of the fish since runnin this on my system. Same for my brothers system








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[Neopimp]

That advanced aquarist article linked in th chuckaddiction article mentions the relatively faster drop in sg vs raising sg.


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[Boga]

1. Keep a log with water parameters
2. Aim for 1.008-1.009. Lowering the salinity is not that important. Raising is critical.
3. Test daily for Ammonia and Nitrites, at least in the first 2 weeks
4. Watch for Ammonia spike, especially between day 5-10. Don't worry about Nitrites. Saltwater fish are resistant to a high level. Do not worry too much about Nitrates, too.
5. Get ready for possible daily WC, if required
6. Take the sand out. You need to suck out the parasites from the bottom.
7. Make sure you don't do water cross contamination with your hands and tools.
8. You can use buffering for pH if you want. (I ran my second hypo treatment at 7.6-7.8 and everything was okay).
9. Use an air stone for oxygen. you can use a HOB skimmer for that reason, too. Watch for bubbles on fish skin or eyes. If they show up reduce the aeration.
10. Place PVC tubes, elbows or other objects in the tank for fish to hide.
11. Reduce light to minimum
12. Feed well, but do not overfeed. Suck out all the excess
13. I would not scrape out the algae that is going to form on the glass. It is good to keep the newly formed bacteria and provides a barrier between the stressed fish and outside world. You can "cut" some windows.
14. Be patient and good luck